The book explores the developing challenges and opportunities within the business and finance world which are likely to impact the accounting profession in the near future. It outlines a number of approaches to ensure that the accountants of the future are equipped with a useful awareness of some of the key topic areas that are quickly becoming a reality and helps bridge the gap between academia and practice. The chapters are standalone introductory pieces to provide useful précis of key topics and how they apply to the accounting profession in particular. It aims to deliver key readings on 'hot topics' not addressed in other texts which the accounting profession is tackling or are likely to tackle soon. Hence the book provides accounting students and researchers a solid grounding in a broad range of highly relevant non-technical accounting themes, looking at the bigger environment in which future accountants will be operating, involving considerations of strategic corporate governance issues and highlighting competences beyond the standard technical accounting skill sets.

Chapter 1. Contemporary Issues in Accounting - An Introduction; Darren Byrne.- Chapter 2. Sustainability, the Triple Bottom Line and Corporate Social Responsibility; Elaine Conway.- Chapter 3. The Challenges of the Circular Economy; Simon Peter Nadeem, Jose Arturo Garza-Reyes and Denise Glanville.- Chapter 4. Technology Challenges in Accounting and Finance; Liz Crookes and Elaine Conway.- Chapter 5. The Contemporary Corporate Tax Strategy Environment; Juliet Hogsden.- Chapter 6. Corporate Reporting: From Numbers to Narrative; Parminder Johal.- Chapter 7. Contemporary Challenges in Audit; David Thompson.- Chapter 8. Why Do We Need To Measure Performance? A Local Government Perspective; Hilary Coyle.- Chapter 9. Finance and Accounting - Beyond the Numbers with Self-Leadership; Darren Byrne and Dave Lees.- Chapter 10. The Future of Accountancy - Beyond the Numbers; Elaine Conway.