Hello everyone.  It has been about one week now since we made our big announcement on the revised CMA curriculum.  The entire IMA/ICMA teams are mobilized to answer the excellent questions we are receiving.  We appreciate the candor and respectful discussion - including suggestions on positioning and creating greater awareness - to enable the CMA to reach new heights in the global marketplace!  Thank you very much.  I wanted to reinforce a few points.

The market research that we conducted leading to the curriculum change was not only with CFOs, but with accounting and financial professionals working on their teams including IMA members. What they told us is that they have a competency gap in planning, analysis, control, and decision support. Whether they have CPAs on their staff is irrelevant, because the CPA exam does not test for these skills in depth nor do undergraduate accounting curricula cover MA topics in much depth. The CMA exam should not be a competitor of the CPA but rather a complement.  We test a different body of knowledge.  Hiring and salary surveys show that multiple certifications from credible bodies are differentiators in terms of career opportunities and salaries. The evidence is there.

The revised CMA curriculum is more focused and relevant to the needs of today’s finance and accounting teams in the areas of planning, budgeting, analysis, risk management, internal controls and decision support.  The last major curriculum change was 6 years ago.  The move from 4 parts to 2 parts reflects this updated focus and relevance.  Any of the 31,500 individuals who have been awarded the CMA should be proud and assured that we have maintained or even increased the rigor of the new exam which goes very deep on a more focused set of topics:

• Risk management and internal controls counts for about 20% on the new exam vs. under 10% on the current exam; 2 – Financial Accounting  is now broadened beyond U.S. GAAP to include IFRS and essential differences in revenue recognition, inventory valuation (e.g., LIFO) and more.
• More “C” type complex questions are on the new exam, which requires synthesizing and making recommendations.
• More foundational pre-requisite knowledge is required to pass the exams, in the areas of economics, statistics, and financial accounting.  This is now assumed knowledge going into the exams.
• Depending on study habits and style, we estimate about 300 hours of study to pass the new 2-part exam.
• Each of the 2 parts contains 2 essay questions, requiring higher order thinking, synthesis, communication and recommendations.
• Each of the 2 parts contains 5 separate and distinct topics (a total of 10 competencies or bodies of knowledge tested, logically organized into a 2 part exam).

While maintaining or even increasing the rigor and robustness of the new exam, we believe that the increased relevance and focus for the CFO team will increase the demand for Certified Management Accountants around the world.  That is good for our profession, expands our global advocacy voice, and perhaps most importantly, increases individual and organizational competence in protecting investors and in driving greater economic value.

   Jeff