Taking a Coach Approach to Addressing Ethical Dilemmas
Ethical dilemmas are not rare events in the life of a CPA—they are a regular feature of work life. What is rare is feeling prepared to navigate them with confidence, clarity, and care for the people involved. This course equips CPAs with a practical, people-centred skillset for doing exactly that.
Grounded in the IESBA's five fundamental principles of professional ethics and guided by a "coach approach," this course explores four situations every CPA is likely to encounter: someone brings you an ethical dilemma and needs help thinking it through; you need to point out that something appears unethical; you and another person are in conflict over the right ethical course of action; or you are the one facing the dilemma yourself.
A coach approach is not about avoiding giving advice or dodging difficult conversations. It is a mindset shift—from expert to thinking partner, from fixing to enabling—that helps the people around you develop the clarity, ownership, and courage to act ethically.
This course is designed for CPAs working in any sector who lead, advise, or influence others and, most of all, want to always act ethically.
FCPA, FCMC, ACC
With more than 25 years of experience advising and coaching organizations and leaders in complex contexts, I have established a strong reputation for helping organizations and individuals to realize their goals. I have designed, delivered and facilitated hundreds of presentations and group meetings. As co-owner of an executive search and HR consulting firm, I led and managed the firm’s growth and national expansion. I’ve been a consulting partner and principal with two large public accounting and consulting firms and have held senior finance leadership roles in the public sector and in a global not-for-profit organization. I have taught at the university undergraduate and high school continuing education levels. I am a Fellow of the Chartered Professional Accountants, a Certified Executive Coach and Associate Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation, a Fellow Certified Management Consultant, and have a Master of Business Administration Degree. I am certified to interpret Gallup Clifton Strengths assessments, the Hogan Assessment, and the Management Research Group LEA Self-Assessment and LEA 360 Assessment.
Provincial regulators of CPAs in Canada do not require that independent providers of CPD be approved to offer courses. Instead, individual CPAs are responsible for assessing whether a CPD activity meets their requirements, and may take activities from any source provided those requirements are met.
Every course offered on LearnFormula is delivered by a qualified subject matter expert or learning organization, and advances learning objectives that are relevant to the responsibilities or professional competencies of Canadian CPAs. All activities on LearnFormula are quantifiable in terms of hours, and are also verifiable, in that users receive documented evidence of their attendance via a certificate of completion after finishing a course (and this certificate is stored by LearnFormula indefinitely). Nearly 100,000 Canadian CPAs successfully satisfy their CPD requirements via LearnFormula on an annual basis.
