President's column

In the first of a new series of columns, Richard Aitken-Davies writes

In this my first progress report as your President, I pay tribute to our outgoing chief executive, Allen Blewitt. Allen has done a first class job for us. He has built on the platform left by Anthea Rose who laid the foundations for ACCA's global reach.

During Allen's tenure, growth has accelerated with membership up 25% and student numbers up 47%. Our reputation and influence has been raised through Allen's world class presentational and ambassadorial skills. His open and direct style of leadership has transformed how ACCA is seen internationally. Most importantly, he has established ACCA as a professional body that is good to do business with. And through that, more partners than ever have chosen to work with ACCA. In a world where growing numbers of professional bodies are seeking to replicate ACCA's global success, the connections ACCA has made and fostered will stand us in excellent stead. Allen can take great pride in how he has raised ACCA's profile on the international stage whilst overseeing quality growth in many markets. He leaves an impressive legacy.

Our incoming chief executive, Helen Brand, has deep experience and a record of achievement in ACCA and is a worthy successor to Allen. Her appointment, in a rigorous and highly competitive recruitment process, is testimony to the quality of our succession planning as well as her excellent personal credentials for the role. Helen's vision and experience will ensure that ACCA continues on the road to our objective of being the leading global professional accountancy body in reputation, influence and size.

Our global prominence brings responsibilities. Our duty under our charter is to promote the profession of accountancy and this means, amongst other things, helping our fellow professional bodies in developing nations meet the exacting requirements of global standards by sharing our skills and expertise. That's why I was immensely proud to sign, on behalf of ACCA, practice monitoring agreements with the Institutes of Chartered Accountants of Barbados, Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago recently. I was with Allen in Trinidad representing ACCA at the annual conference of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of the Caribbean with whom ACCA enjoys excellent relations in what is an important region for us.

I was also privileged to chair a new members' event in the UK held at the British Museum. It was immensely motivating to meet so many excellent young people from all corners of the World. Truly a United Nations of accountants, a great advertisement for our qualification and a clear sign that ACCA's future is in good hands!

Our annual Council strategy weekend took place in July. Our focus was how ACCA's future strategy needs to take account of the rapidly changing global environment beyond 2010. We are also looking at ACCA's constitution, including our International Assembly which has played such an important role in helping us to gather views from our World markets and test Council's policy proposals. This is all about ensuring that ACCA's 104 year record of successful development through innovation continues into the future. The inputs from our excellent staff and Council members working together were of the highest quality and I am greatly encouraged by the insightful and comprehensive nature of the deliberations.

As I close, I want to thank all of you for allowing me the privilege of being your President this year. I am very proud to head an organisation which is so successful and so highly regarded. This is of course principally down to the quality of you as members. You are the brand and the brand is strong.

I look forward to reporting back to you regularly in future issues.