Census data shows 25% increase in home-based entrepreneurs.
The number of people who worked at home increased by nearly 2 million, from about 9.5 million in 1999 to about 11.3 million in 2005, according to new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau. Nearly half of these home workers had college degrees and nearly half of them earned $75,000 a year or more.
5-step action plan for addressing clients’ sales and use tax needs
via SpeedTax
CPA firms are well-positioned to take the lead in helping guide their clients through the complicated, time-consuming, and resource-intensive world of sales tax compliance and management, according to a new, free guide authored by Geni Whitehouse, CPA.CITP.
Whitehouse
The just-published “How to Talk to Your Clients about Sales and Use Tax” asks CPAs to put themselves in their clients’ shoes to help them address the challenge of complying with sales tax rules in an environment of heightened audit risk.
Underwritten by SpeedTax, a Software-as-a-Service sales tax solution provider, the guide outlines 5 steps that firms should take to begin addressing their clients’ sales and use tax needs.
Mergis confidence index dips.
via Mergis
The Accounting and Finance Employee Confidence Index, a measure of overall confidence among U.S. accounting and finance workers, dipped 0.8 points to 50.9 in the fourth quarter of 2009, according to The Mergis Group, the professional placement division of Spherion Corporation.
The survey, conducted by Harris Interactive, shows that more accounting and finance workers believe the economy is getting stronger, although fewer workers expressed confidence in their ability to find a new job. READ MORE →
How to take quantum leaps, even in busy season.
by Rick Telberg
If your accounting firm or finance department is pushing off technology decisions to the IT department, you may be pushing it off to the wrong people.
Not that they don’t know what they’re doing. But effective technology strategies cannot be pushed off. They must start at the top, with the users and in alignment and constant re-alignment with overall plans and strategies.
The problem is not that IT people may do the wrong things. But without executive-level champions, they may not get the support they need to do anything at all. That leaves accounting offices adrift and falling behind.
Kepczyk
Roman Kepczyk, CPA.CITP, is out to change that. As a past chairman of the AICPA IT Executive Committee, a member of the AICPA Special Committee on Enhanced Business Reporting, the AICPA Group of 100, AICPA Best Practices Task Force and one of the charter Certified Information Technology Professionals (CITP) that the AICPA has designated (among other distinctions), he qualifies as a top industry guru.
In a CPA firm, Kepczyk says, “the executive committee shouldn’t push it all off to IT. Leadership must lead.”
Too often, he says, partners and firm administrators don’t trust their own IT people. As a result, the firm falls into an expensive and time-consuming break-fix cycle that could have been avoided if only top leadership had taken some time to understand their firm’s long-term needs and lay out a strategic plan. In a new handbook, Quantum of Paperless: Partner’s Guide to Accounting Firm Optimization, Kepczyk finds 32 areas in which a little knowledge and forethought could save firms big money. Investing a couple hours in this little book with a sharp No. 2 pencil could be the best tech investment you make all year.
Here are some of the fastest and easiest strategies to implement, with the some of the best ROI.
If you haven’t already done these things, then you’re already losing ground. But if you hurry, you might still have time to do something before busy season gets completely crazy.
As a firm owner, you can’t risk putting a dent in your reputation with a poor salesperson.
But how and where do you find a good salesperson?
The answer is: Start where you shop. Start paying attention to the good salespeople you encounter when you’re the consumer. What is it they’re doing that makes you feel good about working with them? Learning to recognize good salespeople is the most important first step.
Three more ideas:
Word of mouth. The more typical ways of finding good salespeople revolve around word-of-mouth recommendations. Tell everyone you know that you’re seeking a strong salesperson:
Tell your clients. If they’re fans of your product, one of them might even be interested in coming on board.
Tell your suppliers. The people who call on your business are in sales and know many others. There could be someone good they know of who’s just burned out on the product line they currently represent and need a change. This is an especially wise method for finding good help because your suppliers won’t recommend a dud. Their reputation with you would be ruined and they might lose your business.
Tell your banker. When your business succeeds, so does theirs.
via Entrepreneur
Economists predict demand for accountants and auditors will explode over the next few years.
by Rick Telberg
In a report that’s getting a lot of attention from savvy CPA firms and financial services headhunters, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) last month forecast a 22 percent headcount expansion from 2008 through 2018. That’s 279,400 new jobs.
Courtney
Brendan Courtney, president of The Mergis Group, told me that jobs are already surging for accountants in the new bailout and recovery industry. He’s looking for thousands of trained, experienced finance professionals.
But he also says that today’s displaced job hunters will need to look first at contract work and temp jobs until employers feel it’s safe to hire permanent workers again.
To be sure, many tax, accounting and finance professionals are still slogging through the Great Recession. The Association for Financial Professionals, for instance, reported that about one in four respondents say their organizations will contract in 2010. At the same time, a PricewaterhouseCoopers survey of private companies found 43 percent of CEOs and CFOs still budgeting no expansion over the next 12 months to 18 months. The data just seem to reinforce economic uncertainties and a weak outlook.
On the other hand, finance and accounting professionals continue to do better than average. Robert Half, for example, names several areas in which salaries are holding steady or rising, and starting salaries this year will beat the averages:
Looking past the recession, the BLS sees burgeoning opportunities for professionals. “As the economy grows, the number of business establishments will increase, requiring more accountants and auditors to set up books, prepare taxes and provide management advice,” according to the BLS.
“As these businesses grow, the volume and complexity of information reviewed by accountants and auditors regarding costs, expenditures, taxes and internal controls will expand as well,” the BLS says.
But it will be important to take a broader view of opportunities.
And the BLS says much of the finance and accounting profession could be profoundly affected by a newly borderless business world. “The continued globalization of business,” BLS researchers say, “will lead to more demand for accounting expertise and services related to international trade and accounting rules and international mergers and acquisitions.”
And here’s the growing movement towards International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), which, the BLS explains in it’s own simplified way, “uses a judgment-based system to determine the fair-market value of assets and liabilities.”
Judgment? That’s exactly what professionals are hired to do.
Add it all up and the experts seem to be saying that if you can make it through 2010, the rest of the decade should be much easier. Of course, we must still survive 2010.
They’re thinking “short-term.” Do you know what that means and how to use it?
A huge 45% of small business owners consider their focus to be short-term rather than long-term. Additionally, when the Executive Board asked business owners what they consider to be “short-term,” 50% of them said one to three months.
Source: Executive Board
So how can accountants use this “focus” to capture business owners’ attention? The Executive Board advises:
Aligning your marketing with the mindsets of small business owners is important in ensuring that it resonates with them.
