Six Steps to Battle Cybersecurity Risks
What cost or time investment would you pay to protect your firm and your clients?
By Donny Shimamoto for Cybersecurity for Accountants
INNOVATION & CHANGE MANAGEMENT
Is Audit in Crisis Because of Definitions?
Auditors, accountants and businesses need to agree on expectations and deliverables in audits.
By Alan Anderson
Transforming Audit for the Future
Instant download:
“The New Manifesto for Accountants.“
Do the banks and investors get useful information from historical audited financials? In their book, “The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers,” Baruch Lev and Feng Gu researched the relationship between changes in stock prices and the dates that corporate financial reports were released.
MORE: Three Fundamental Questions to Ask in Audit | How Auditors Can Beat AI | The Big Issues in Audit: Frustration, Inconsistency and Technology | Five Ways to Increase Audit Efficiency | Early Adopters Gain an Edge in Audit | Talent Retention: Five Tips for an Audit Adjustment | Six Benefits of an Internal Audit | The Ten Financial Controls That’ll Make You a Hero | Five Cash Reports You Can’t Live Without | When an Audit Is a Great Thing
Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.
In the 1950s and 1960s, roughly 90 percent of the market value of public companies could be directly attributed to the earnings and book value reported in their financials. By 2013, that percentage had dropped to just 50 percent. Personally, I’m surprised it’s even that high. The historical financial statement does not serve the needs of the users of those statements.
READ MORE →
Disturb the Present to Improve the Future
Five suggestions to help you compete.
By Marc Rosenberg
The Rosenberg Practice Management Library
To thrive in today’s tough and fast-changing market, accounting firms must become more agile and adaptable than ever before. But what are the characteristics of an agile, adaptable, quick-learning CPA firm? And how do you get that way?
MORE: New Partners Must Be Impact Players | Why Partners Can’t Shirk Performance Reviews | What Firms Should Address in Partner Agreements | 11 Best Practices for Partner Compensation | Why Buying Into a Firm Is Such a Great Investment | The Business Side of CPA Firms | It Shouldn’t Take So Long to Make Partner | Three Types of Skills You Need to Become a Partner
My initial, somewhat amusing (probably just to me) thought was the credo for Little League umpires (who in many communities are 14-18 years old):
Be mobile.
Be assertive.
Be loud.
It may have more relevance to what follows than either of us might initially think.
Chris Vanover: Question the Why or Stay with the Status Quo
Audit is on a self-destructive pathway if we don’t take action.
The Disruptors
with Liz Farr
It’s Okay to Say No to Clients (Even the Large Ones)
Working with “smaller” clients can often be more rewarding – and profitable – than “big” clients.
By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA
There’s a reason you aren’t actively training clients to allow you to work efficiently. You’re afraid that you’ll lose clients.
I guarantee that you will.
MORE: Control Your Time: Avoid Ambush Meetings and Calls | Get Clients to Bring Tax Docs Early … Yes, EARLY | Why Time Tracking Still Matters | Make Fewer Mistakes, Increase Revenue and Capacity | Six Ways to Create a Millennial-Friendly Firm | Do You Know Your Turnaround Time?
Clients have trained you to be inefficient. They’ll resist retraining. Some of them will leave and infect someone else’s practice.
The reason you fear losing clients is that you fear you can’t replace them.
Heather Satterley: You’ve Got to Meet People Where They Are
Stop saying yes to everything and start saying yes to yourself.
Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).
The Disruptors
With Liz Farr
Heather Satterley is well-known for being an accounting tech expert. But tech isn’t the only skill accountants need today and for the future. “You can have great technology skills, but if you don’t have people skills and those softer skills, that’s going to be a problem,” she said.
MORE PODCASTS and VIDEOS: Bill Penczak: Stop Forcing Smart People to Do Stupid Work | Sandra Wiley: Staffing Problem? Check Your Culture | Scott Scarano: First, Grow People. Then Firm Growth Can Follow | Jody Padar: Build a Practice that Works for You, Not Vice-Versa | Ira Rosenbloom: With M&A, Nobody Wants a Fixer-Upper | Peter Margaritis: The Power Skills Every Accountant Needs | Joe Montgomery: Find the Sweet Spot of the Right Clients, Right Services and Right Prices | Marie Green: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You | Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance | Clayton Oates: One Way to Keep Clients for Life | Randy Crabtree: Follow These Three Rules to Keep Employees Happy | Erik Solbakken: Yes, You Can Work Less and Make More | Donny Shimamoto: Future Firm Growth Requires a Mindshift | Jennifer Wilson: Empower Young Workers to Build the Firm Everyone Loves | Mike Whitmire: Re-Think Your Hiring and Training Practices | Hector Garcia: Success Strategies of a Quickbooks YouTube Superstar | Blake Oliver: Why Tax Work Yearns To Be Free| Private Equity Explodes in U.K. | Brannon Poe: The Status Quo Must Go | Accounting Nerds, Unlock Your Super Powers | Disruptor: Jason Statts Shakes Up the Status Quo | Think Small to Think Big with Matt Wilkinson | When Financial Statements Go Extinct with Corey Schmidt | Can Geraldine Carter Save Accountants from Themselves? | Re-Inventing Accounting with Tyler Anderson
One of those softer skills that will be a key skill for the future is problem-solving, which requires keeping an open mind to “look at not just facts and figures, but look at tools, resources, people and pull them all together,” she explained. No one can be an expert at everything, so having “a wide network of really awesome professionals” is vital for filling in any gaps “to get the job done.”
Are You Ready to Become a Data Analyst?
The right dashboards can optimize your data … and your value.
By Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk
Business leaders are constantly called upon to make snap – yet important – decisions. Yet, poring through spreadsheets, reports and financial statements can be a laborious and time-consuming process, especially for those who need to act on urgent matters.
MORE: SURVEY: Zoom, Teams Top Meeting Choices | Are You Using Too Many Monitors? Or Not Enough? | One in Four Firms Replaces Servers by Schedule | You’re Probably Not Reading This on an iPad | 52% of Firms Look Outside for IT Support | Pandemic? What Pandemic? | Today’s Top 3 Problems: Staffing, Workflow and Tech
This is where data visualization tools can be a tremendous boon to organizations. Automatically pulling from various data sources, these cloud-based, interactive dashboards present business data visually using charts, graphs and other widgets. Once designed, these repositories save precious time for analysts, managers and key decision-makers, allowing them to focus on the information and analysis rather than on the grueling process of gathering it and creating reports.
Stop Sending the Wrong Message to Audit Teams
Audit is becoming further commodified.
By Alan Anderson
Transforming Audit for the Future
Instant download:
“The New Manifesto for Accountants.“
The value of what we provide to clients has declined until it has become a commodity. That, in turn, drives our fees down.
The lack of innovation means that our clients can’t tell the difference between the audit we do and one done by the firm down the street. None of them provide relevant information or any value to our clients.
MORE: Three Fundamental Questions to Ask in Audit | How Auditors Can Beat AI | The Big Issues in Audit: Frustration, Inconsistency and Technology | Five Ways to Increase Audit Efficiency | Early Adopters Gain an Edge in Audit | Talent Retention: Five Tips for an Audit Adjustment | Six Benefits of an Internal Audit | The Ten Financial Controls That’ll Make You a Hero | Five Cash Reports You Can’t Live Without | When an Audit Is a Great Thing
If our clients don’t see the value, then the audit is only being done to meet a regulatory or banking requirement, and in that case, the cheapest option that meets that basic requirement is the one they choose.