How Hiring in Latin America Solves Your Accounting Problem

Here’s the part most articles skip.

The talent shortage isn’t just about cost. It’s about available people.

When you post an accounting role in your local market, you’re competing with every other firm in your city for the same three qualified candidates. 

Those candidates know it. They can wait for better offers.

They can negotiate harder. They can walk away.

In Latin America, the talent pool is significantly larger.

Here’s how.

Roles Fill Faster

Instead of 90+ days to find someone local, you can hire qualified accountants in 2-3 weeks.

Post a job on a platform like HireTalent.LAT, get 50+ applicants within days, and actually choose between multiple strong candidates instead of hoping one person says yes.

You Can Create an Entire team (with the same budget)

When you needed three accountants locally but could only afford one, now you can actually fill multiple positions. A typical accounting staff in the US costs around $50K-$65K annually.

In Latin America: $20K-$35K.

Your controller gets the support they desperately need.

Your close process doesn’t depend on one person working weekends.

You stop the Turnover Panic

Your senior accountant gives two weeks notice and suddenly you’re back to square one, scrambling for months to replace them.

With access to Latin American talent, you have real options. You can fill critical roles in weeks, not quarters.

You can Hire Ahead of Need

Build your team before busy season. Add capacity before the ERP implementation. Staff up for growth instead of always playing catch-up after you’re already underwater.

That’s how you beat a talent shortage. You go where the talent actually exists.

What Can Latin American Accountants Do ?

Latin American accounting teams handle everything from basic bookkeeping to director-level work.

Day-to-day bookkeeping and AP/AR: Invoice processing. Bank and credit card reconciliations. Vendor management. Collections follow-up. Expense reports.

Month-end close and management reporting: Accruals and journal entries. Variance analysis. Multi-entity consolidations. Management dashboards and reporting packages.

Tax and compliance support: Sales tax filings. 1099 prep. Support for US tax returns (supervised by US CPAs). SOX testing support in larger companies.

Some US firms have handed their entire close process to Latin American teams and cut their close time from 15 days to 10. 

Better reporting discipline. Fewer errors. Less stress on the US-based team.

The cultural piece you cannot ignore

Latin American business culture is more relationship-oriented and higher-context than typical US business culture.

In many Latin American countries, there’s greater respect for hierarchy. A subordinate might hesitate to contradict a manager openly or say “I disagree” or “I don’t understand.”

In the US, we expect people to speak up when the numbers are off.

In Latin America, staying polite and quiet is sometimes the default. Which means errors can happen silently unless you actively create psychological safety.

Communication style tends to be less blunt. Bad news gets softened to preserve harmony.

Americans expect: “The vendor file is missing three invoices and I can’t reconcile until we find them.”

Latin Americans might say: “I’m reviewing the vendor file and there may be a small issue with a few invoices that we should discuss when you have time.”

Same problem. Different delivery.

Time orientation can be slightly more flexible. Modern Latin American professionals learn very quickly that month-end deadlines are sacred and non-negotiable.

But culturally, the default setting in some countries leans toward relationships over rigid clock-watching.

Overcommunicate explicitly that “month-end close deadlines cannot move” and tie timeliness directly to performance metrics.

When culture becomes an advantage

The relationship focus means people stay longer when they feel respected, fairly paid, and included in the team.

When you invest in relationships, you get retention. When you get retention, you get institutional knowledge. 

When you get institutional knowledge, your accounting actually gets better instead of just cheaper.

Cultural proximity to the US matters. Latin American teams share similar media references, consumer brands, and business vocabulary. 

When your accountant needs to understand industry nuances or talk to US stakeholders, that shared cultural context helps.

What makes these teams succeed

Clear scope and SOPs.

Detailed process docs for close, reconciliations, and approvals.

Loom videos walking through each step.

Strong hiring bar.

Firms that insist on prior experience at firms like Deloitte, PwC, EY, or KPMG, strong English skills, and verifiable references get dramatically better results.

Real integration. Slack channels. Daily standups. Performance reviews. Promotions.

Failures happen when firms underpay and overload people, expect “plug and play” performance without onboarding, or work through low-transparency agencies.

What this actually costs

A staff accountant in the US costs $50K-$65K. In Latin America: $20K-$35K.

A senior accountant or accounting manager in the US costs $70K-$95K. In Latin America: $35K-$55K.

Controllers in the US command $100K-$150K+. Latin American directors with experience at top firms: $50K-$80K.

These are fair market rates for qualified professionals.

Final Thoughts

The US accounting talent shortage isn’t getting better anytime soon.

You can keep competing for the same limited pool of local candidates. Keep losing people to firms that pay $5K more. Keep watching your controller work 60-hour weeks during close.

Or you can look south.

The firms that figure this out first are building competitive advantages that compound over time.

Better close processes. More bandwidth for strategic projects.

Higher retention because nobody’s burning out.

Meanwhile, their competitors are still posting the same job listing for the fourth month in a row.