IMA Launches FMAA Certification in Arabic, Empowering Professionals with Essential Business Skills

IMA® (Institute of Management Accountants), the association of accountants and financial professionals in business, is pleased to announce the availability of its  FMAA™ (Financial and Managerial Accounting Associate) certification in Arabic. This significant step is designed to broaden access to accounting and finance knowledge, targeting more professionals…

Unveiling the Future of Finance: IMA’s Middle East Annual Conference Focuses on Vision 2030

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, November XX, 2023 – The prestigious IMA Middle East Annual Conference was successfully hosted in Riyadh on November 4, shining a light on Vision 2030’s transformative potential for the future of finance in the region. Financial experts, leaders, and innovators all gathered to discuss strategic thinking, AI, leadership, sustainable finance, and ESG.

IMA Launches Certification Focused on Foundational Financial and Managerial Accounting Knowledge

The FMAA certification will open new pathways for early career professionals while helping to strengthen and expand the profession’s talent pipeline. The FMAA™ (Financial and Managerial Accounting Associate) instills the fundamental knowledge and competencies in accounting and finance, allowing professionals early in their careers to showcase their expertise to employers and build a foundation to expand their skills.

Middle East Student Case Competition

IMA® (Institute of Management Accountants) culminated months of intensive competition in a heated final that saw four teams from the Middle East competing against each other. The American University of Beirut were the winners of the IMA Middle East Student Case Competition, with The New York Abu Dhabi University – UAE, being the first runners up. In addition, the other two universities that competed for the top spot were Prince Sultan University from KSA and the University of Stirling Ras al Khaimah – UAE.

Future CFO Roadshow

IMA® (Institute of Management Accountants) successfully completed its innovative Future CFO Roadshow the week of May 21-27, 2023. This enlightening event journeyed across the Middle East, making stops in Riyadh, Manama, Kuwait City, Doha, and Cairo.

Small Business CFOs Must Build Ethical Awareness

JAN 2022 | J. Stephen McNally CMA, CPA – IMA
The incentive to cut corners, including ones requiring questionable ethics, has never been greater.

Cybersecurity – Three Fundamental Steps to Safeguarding the Finance Function

OCT 06, 2021 | Mohamad Bachar Saidi, CMA, ACMA, CIPP™

Cybercrime has been at the center of so much media attention that it has become perceived as a kind of familiar, omnipresent, and inevitable ill force that everyone simply needs to accept and learn how to live with. In fact, nothing can be further from the truth. 

Six Ways CFOs Can Help Small Businesses Recover

Sep 06, 2021 | J. Stephen McNally, CMA, CPA, CFO – PTI Family of Companies

Many small- and medium-size businesses have been sailing through incredibly turbulent waters for over a year. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) contribute about 52 per cent of the UAE’s non-oil GDP, according to Ministry of Economy estimates in December 2019.

Agility – The doorway to finance transformation in the digital age

AUG 20, 2021

Necessity is indeed the mother of invention. Never has Plato’s postulate been as relevant as it has been during the COVID-19 pandemic

Best practices for reviving the female workforce post COVID-19

APR 25, 2021

We see the men, but do you see the women? Not a question anyone of us should be asking at the start of 2021 but yet here we are – still asking it. One of the most striking outcomes of economic liberalization in the region was the entry of large numbers of women into the workforce.

Choosing to Transform

APR 20, 2021

There is no doubt that women make phenomenal leaders. Unfortunately, not many of them are given the opportunity to demonstrate their outstanding leadership skills, with many of being held back from achieving their full potential through a variety of hurdles and challenges.

Could the COVID-19 Pandemic Catalyze Arab Youth Unrest?

Feb 25, 2021

It is no secret that the COVID-19 pandemic has, over the past year, exposed serious fault lines and vulnerabilities in societies, institutions, and economies all around the world.

Digitalization Brings Forth a New Area of Expertise for CFOs: Cybersecurity

Feb 14, 2021 | Margaret Michaels

It’s no secret – the role of CFOs is being transformed by the day. Changes imposed by digitalization were only accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic and brought with them mandatory skill sets needed to chart the course for the finance and accounting function, and even entire organizations.

Can AI and Automation Replace Accountants?

Sep 24, 2020 | Loreal Jiles

While we await the mass distribution of self-driving/autonomous cars, one must acknowledge that automation, machine learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI) have already begun making serious in-roads into the professional realm, including accounting. We have now entered a period where information technology and the physical world are intersecting to transform business value chains, forever changing the way we live and work.

How Can CFOs Drive Sustainability in Businesses?

Risk is something that every business must deal with, and, as the past 12 months have proven, risk is often due to circumstances beyond our control. December 2019 witnessed one of the biggest Australian bushfires, followed by Indonesian floods in January 2020, a volcanic eruption in the Philippines, locust swarms in East Africa, the Middle East and Asia, and epic wildfires in the western United States.

Transforming the Finance Function with RPA

In 2019, the IBM Institute for Business Value published the report “The enterprise guide to closing the skills gap” in which it indicated a staggering “120 million workers in the world’s 12 largest economies may need to be retrained/reskilled in the next 3 years as a result of intelligent/AI-enabled automation.” Perhaps more astonishing is how ill-prepared executives believe their countries and companies are to offer the development that millions of workers will require.

Do CFOs Make the Best CEOs?

July 08, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

Not many are aware that Indira Nooyi – one of corporate America’s long serving CEOs and an Indian American business leader was interestingly the CFO of the company before she bagged the CEO job. She joined PepsiCo in 1994 and worked her way to CFO, a position given to her in 2001.

The Future of Work: 5 ways the Finance Professionals need to prepare for the future

May 06, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

According to many thought leaders, scholars, and researchers, we are at the dawn of yet another industrial revolution; only this one is unlike anything we have ever seen before!

Big Data at the Forefront of Digital Transformation

May 05, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

The concept of big data is not a novel one. In fact, it has been around for years. There is only one fundamental difference though: it used to be a manual process. We are talking spreadsheets analyzed by humans. Can you just imagine how time consuming it must have been to review and analyze data before the digital era?

How finance & accounting professionals can make the best out of working from home

May 05, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

According to the Corporate Affairs Ministry, almost about 11.89 lakh companies were active in 2018. Active companies are those defined as carrying out normal business activities and making their statutory filings to the stock exchanges on time.

From Classroom to Boardroom – Jumpstart your career!

February 17, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

When contemplating the endless hours spent researching, reading, studying and preparing to earn the chosen degree that will set your accounting career in motion, a moment of reflection: are you arming yourself with the right tools to hit the ground running?

What employers of the 21st century are looking for – Top skills companies want to hire

February 5, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

Global media has been going on about digital disruption and how it has transformed every sector with forecasts predicting the annihilation of some 70% of jobs this year.

Digital Transformation – A Blessing Disguised as a Tsunami

January 31, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

Whether you work in the public, corporate, governmental or academic sector, chances are you are dealing with a prominent buzzword being tossed around boardrooms and classrooms around the world: Digital transformation!

Stuck in a career plateau? How to jazz things up in the workplace!

January 31, 2020 | Rouba Zeidan

Let’s face it, we are entering a new era in the workplace where the very meaning of “work” is changing forever.