Angelito M. Gabriel

The art of work: Finding meaning in our daily tasks

October 25, 2024 10:43 pm

“Work should be and can be productive and rewarding, meaningful and maturing, enriching and fulfilling, healing and joyful.  Work is one of our greatest privileges.  Work can be poetic.”

Working mothers and homemakers

May 10, 2024 10:42 am

The 15h of April was a memorable and a significant date for many CPAs. It was the deadline for filing annual income tax returns.  A week or two before this date, their work becomes frantic and a few days before the 15th many of them would spend many working hours in the office, even sleepless nights to complete the work and meet the income tax filing deadline. I know how this feels for I have spent more than three decades of my life working in one of the big accounting firms (Firm) in the country.  I also know the joyful feeling the day after when you have delivered your report and kept your promise to your clients.  You get a slack or break from hectic work but not for long as the work begins to peak again in the next few months nearing the year end.  This is the story of their life as CPAs and my story too.

Accountancy: A noble profession from saintly traditions

December 03, 2023 1:49 pm

I did not know that St. Matthew was the patron saint of accountants until about 2011 when I retired as an audit partner in one of big four accounting firms.  I accepted an invite from PICPA to facilitate an ethics course for CPAs.  The venue for the session was the PICPA house in Mandaluyong City.  As I entered the lobby, I noticed a painting of a man hung on the wall which I learned later was St. Matthew, the patron saint of the profession I chose to pursue. I began to study more about his life and used his story to argue that CPAs needed to look deeper into our Code of Ethics to become purpose driven accountants.  This saint was the inspiration for the course title I chose, “Purpose Driven Accountants: A Deeper Look into the Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants.”  

The accountant’s project: Making sense of the numbers

July 24, 2023 2:15 am

“If the story behind the numbers is true and fully told, then people will change as they hear it – not only at the intellectual level, but down at the level of the heart, because that is where stories affect us. Truly great stories blend head and heart. They produce rational understanding, and emotional acceptance. An accounting number can be a truly great story.”

The Accountant’s choice – Service over self-interest

January 04, 2023 11:51 am