Main idea :

This paper aims to examine the business communication skills that accounting
students see as having the highest importance for career success. It also
explores the current levels of development of these skills and analyzes them
through a comparative study between three Tunisian business schools.

In Tunisia, all courses provided to accounting students are in French. French is

the language of business; therefore, success in professional careers requires a
good level of that language’s knowledge. Indeed, the French language is
present in all the tasks carried out by the Tunisian accountant: reading and
understanding the Tunisian Accounting Standards, using accounting software,
reading bills and contracts, writing emails, faxes, internal and administrative
documents, annual reports

Problem-Solving
The findings of the present study reveal that the existing university accounting
program is failing in its attempts to produce graduates with a wide array of
communication skills. These shortcomings are viewed as ongoing barriers to
employment for accounting graduates. Furthermore, we assume that since
communication aptitudes are developed by certain factors such as age, maturity
and organizational affiliation, business schools do not have to assume alone the
whole responsibility for developing “workplace-ready” business
communication skills in accounting students. After that, graduates themselves
and firms employing them should share the responsibility for developing
business communication skills. Finally, future research could look at the best
ways and the appropriate place to teach or learn oral and written
communication skills, given that this is still an unexplored topic.

Finding and not Finding

The results indicate that all students are conscious of the importance held by
communication skills for career success in the accounting profession. However,
they feel that their aptitudes are sometimes poorly developed, especially when
it comes to proficiency in French (as a language of business in Tunisia) and
written skills.