U.S. clients can’t ignore “the largest economy in the world and access to a highly motivated and educated workforce.” via CalCPA “There is no cookie-cutter approach for a U.S. business looking to expand into China,” says the managing partner at Rowbotham & Company LLP, citing “the fluid nature of tax and legal issues, and industries that are subject to special tax concessions. The Cultural Revolution essentially banned scholars, lawyers and capitalists until they were welcomed back in the late 1970s. As one lawyer from China recently told me, you will not find many lawyers in their 60s and 70s, which means strategies that are well established in the West are still in their early stages in China. In the CalCPA [...]
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Bay Street Group LLC and Capstone Marketing, two leading marketing and market research firms to the CPA profession, have joined forces to conduct a ground-breaking and comprehensive investigation into the critical success factors for today’s accounting firm. The researchers have identified seven keys to success in CPA firm management, namely: 1. Leadership 2. Technology 3. Learning Organization 4. Marketing and Business Development 5. A Great Place to Work 6. Client Service and Satisfaction 7. Strategy Execution The project is quantifying what has long been unquantified: How certain management practices correlate with success in accounting firms. FREE DOWNLOAD: “The Seven Keys to Success in CPA Firm Management” (PDF, 11 pages)
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MARKET MELTDOWN: The CPA View on Financial Planning after the “The Panic of ’08″ Personal Financial Planning Issues and Opportunities Preview Edition FREE DOWNLOAD: Click here, 12 pages PDF. In a new survey of CPAs taken in the days following the stock market meltdown Sept. 15, the vast majority of respondents expressed profound concern over the situation. But they also expressed cautious optimism based on prior moves they had made that anticipated a financial calamity. Highlights: 58% of CPAs are “very concerned” by events. 81% say investors’ biggest problem remains “under-funded retirement accounts.” 77% believe CPA firms enjoy vast opportunity in financial planning services. 52% are already getting involved in offering advanced tax and estate planning services. FREE DOWNLOAD: Click [...]
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Rule 1: Don’t rely on Social Security. What’s your best financial planning advice? Sound off here. by Rick Telberg At Large Lehman. Merrill. AIG. Bear. Legendary names all. And the story of each adds to the uncertainties that CPAs are facing with clients every day. Looking to help clients financially prepare for the future, CPAs are counseling restraint. But, first of all: don’t count on Social Security. “Due to the lack of certainty, Social Security benefits should not be assumed in the financial plan,” said Gary Manion of Olney, Md.
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And what should CPAs be doing about them? Sound Off: Take the poll. See the answers. by Rick Telberg/At Large Accountants are all too familiar with the succession issues faced by accounting firms. But accounting firms aren’t the only ones with succession issues. In fact, closely-held and family-owned businesses across the nation are facing a succession crisis of their own. CPAs are well aware of the problems their business clients face and are devising strategies to help.
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Manage your distractions, interruptions. How often do CPAs check email? Join the survey. Get the answers. by Rick Telberg Several times every day, CPAs across the nation ask themselves the same questions: “Should I finish what I’m doing? Or should I take a quick peek at my email inbox?†According to the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London, email may be the worst thing for productivity since… Hmmm, just a minute. I’m trying to remember… Oh yeah! The researchers found that checking your email can be more damaging to office productivity than getting stoned. The experiment actually had subjects take an IQ test while undistracted; while distracted by emails, phone calls and other digital temptations; or while under [...]
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…don’t tell your clients. They may work as much or more. How hard do most CPAs work? Join the study. Get the answers. by Rick Telberg If you think balancing work and life is hard on CPAs, think again. While accountants and finance managers may log long hours during busy season, many small-business owners are logging those hours all year. To be sure, overworking isn’t good for anyone. But it may be more the rule for Americans rather than the exception. Indeed, about half of the nation’s small business managers find themselves doing work-related tasks at times they’ve reserved for their families. The same number say they make business calls and check e-mail while driving.
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We are in the midst of the largest entrepreneurial surge this country has ever seen, Fortune Small Business reports. According to Small Business Administration projections, nearly 672,000 new companies with employees were created in 2005 — the biggest business birthrate in U.S. history, 30,000 more startups than in 2004, and 12 percent more than at the height of dot-com hysteria in 1996. “And the trend shows no sign of abating,” Fortune says. Sixty-six percent of respondents in a 2006 Yahoo Small Business and Harris Interactive survey said they wanted to start a company someday; 37 percent of those said they hoped to do so within the next five years.
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Does it seem sometimes that everyone’s an entrepreneur in the U.S.? Maybe here’s why… “The findings of the study suggest that individuals choosing to enjoy a preferred lifestyle, can operate an unincorporated home-based business knowing that their return on revenues will be greater than if they rent business space. As a home-based business owner, with few or no employees, they can work the hours and seasons necessary to reach the needed level of revenues and net income. Those wanting to maximize income can hire employees, work more hours, and operate outside the home. Home-based sole proprietors who take the home business deduction contribute a total of $102 billion in revenue to the economy. The 10 million “all other†firms, which [...]
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Mick, Keith and Charlie How do you pay just 1.6% on your earnings? If you’re the Rolling Stones, you run the money through offshore trusts in Holland and the Caribbean. Over the past 20 years, London’s Daily Mail reports, have paid 3.9 million pounds Sterling on 242 million pounds in earnings. [1 British Pound = US $1.90] Here’s how: Their funds have been invested in Holland, where there’s no tax on royalties. The news only came out after Keith Richards’ fall from a Fiji coconut tree got the group thinking about estate planning. So they set up a couple foundations in Holland, which requires some limited disclosures. U2 has now hired the same Dutch financial adviser. Well, I guess Mick’s [...]
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