confidence among u.s. accounting and finance workers dipped 0.3 points to 50.6 in the first quarter of 2010, according to the mergis group placement agency. mergis called the dip “a slight hiccup” in confidence.
highlights:
55% of accounting and finance workers believe there are fewer jobs available, representing
a 15 percentage point drop from the fourth quarter of 2009.
32% of accounting and finance workers are not confident in their ability to find a new job, an increase of seven percentage points from the previous quarter.
fewer accounting and finance workers believe it is not likely they will lose their job in the next 12 months. specifically 64 percent of workers believe it is unlikely, versus 74 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009. this marks the lowest level in the history of the survey.
rick richardson’s rules for smart cpa tech spending.
richardson
in the aicpa insider, alexandra defelice talks to cpa tech guru richardson (cpa, citp, ex-ernst) about what cpas need to know today about managing their current investments and preparing for the next wave. she provides top ten list of tech to-do’s for accountants.
six things accountants can do today:
milk what you have much longer than you think you should.
never buy anything until the third version is introduced, allowing time for many of the kinks to be ironed out.
cpa firms should invest 5 to 10 percent of gross revenues on technology (including hardware, software and training).
select one employee (not necessarily the it director) to serve as a “technology ombudsman” to manage budgeting and spending.
assign the “ombudsman” to stay current on tech trends and brief others in the organization when new developments may affect the practice or clients.
allocate five percent of their chargeable hours to the assignment
you could be wasting a lot of time, money and effort on the wrong career and business-building strategies.
by rick telberg
as every owner of a tax-and-accounting business understands, your best source of new business is usually referrals. and referrals come through networking. many cpas are energetic networkers. they join local civic clubs, participate in their communities, get active in their professional associations and spend a lot of time at the clubs (golf, tennis, etc.). many are now going online with facebook and linkedin too.
but how many hours and how much in dues, meals, drinks and raffle tickets will it take for many cpas to admit that they don’t have much to show for it?
fox
business development advisor nancy fox, who has worked with a number of new york-area law and accounting firms, suggests you may be doing all the right things — but in the wrong places and with the wrong people.
“so many professionals,” she says, citing accountants and lawyers alike, “are just a little bit shy about networking upwards.” professionals, like most people, are simply more comfortable meeting people, talking to people — networking — with people like themselves, people with the same level of income, education or achievement. “but if you want to build your practice, those are not necessarily the people who are going to take you to the next level.”
the association for accounting administration (www.cpaadmin.org) has released the findings of their 2010 technology survey which focuses on six production areas including: security, productivity, infrastructure management, mobility and governance, according to roman h. kepczyk, cpa.citp at http://itpna.com/vision/2010/20100420aaaitsurveyresults.htm
about 115 firms participated in the survey with a goal of finding out what the top technology initiatives were that firms should be looking at implementing this year, and what the current adoption of those technologies was within participant firms.
what’s working in tech at leading local firms read more →
small and medium business investments in software-as-a-service applications (excluding crm and erp as saas) will jump 18% cagr over the next five years, projects access markets international partners inc. the projections are even more pronounced when contrasting crm as saas vs. crm installed at site-the former is expected to grow 16% cagr while spending on crm will remain flat over the same period.
can the profession seize its rightful role in risk management, governance and compliance? maybe, but it’ll take vision and guts. do you have what it takes in the post-meltdown world of the new normal?
by rick telberg
in the aftermath of the global financial meltdown and the surge of new corporate interest in enterprise-wide risk management, do internal auditors face risks of their own in getting left behind?
maybe so, according to some prominent thought leaders in the profession.
after surveying more than 2,000 executives across 50 regions of the globe, researchers at pricewaterhousecoopers report that internal auditors are being challenged “to remain relevant and meet stakeholder demands” in ways like never before.
brown
what’s required today, according to brian brown, pwc principal and internal audit advisory services leader, is a whole new, and somewhat unnerving, concept of the internal auditor, a new vision brown and his colleagues call “internal audit 2.0.” more than simply checking accounts, internal auditors need to adopt a new way of thinking about their job that goes beyond audit as we’ve known it and embraces the fast-developing body of knowledge in governance, risk and compliance. or else, brown says, they run the risk of becoming marginalized and obsolete as new risk-management professionals take over.
although 54 percent of adult americans say they’ve not been able to save money over the last 12 months, a surprisingly large number have been able to save money in the past year in spite of the country’s economic turmoil, according to a survey conducted for the american institute of certified public accountants by harris interactive.
forty-six percent of the survey respondents said they managed to save, and many said they did so by curtailing their spending. most of their cutbacks were on discretionary items, such as dining out (50 percent), travel (46 percent) and clothing (35 percent), though 31 percent of the savers said they’ve curtailed home renovations. much smaller numbers said they reduced outlays for medical expenses (16 percent) and higher education (12 percent).
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and accountants are decidedly upbeat on the outlook for their firms and themselves. some 47% percent are expecting continuing improvements in business through 2010, compared to only 16% bracing for more setbacks. and at their own dinner tables, 44% are upbeat, compared with 16% who see more trouble ahead.
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and, unlike in recent surveys, accountants are also generally upbeat about their clients, customers and the nation’s economic outlook as a whole — a stark reversal from a year ago this time when they saw the economy crashing and clients disappearing.
for firm leaders, all this could add up to a new round of heated competition as firms vie for a limited pool of class a clients and, according to other research we’ve done, a surge in staff turnover.
if you thought it was a bumpy ride on the way down with the economy. just hold on. it could be just as bumpy on the way up again.
but signs of strong season are emerging. [updated april 24, 2010 with data as it develops.]
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in a new 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 survey by bay street group llc, the first 100 accounting firm professionals responding since the end of tax season april 15 are reporting that the “general economic situation” was their chief challenge or concern this year.
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second on the list: late or unprepared clients, which may be no surprise considering the economic toll on many businesses and individuals.
but the third-ranking issue may, indeed, come as a surprise: staffing. it may be ironic — or sweet revenge — that accounting firms were having trouble recruiting good staffers because just about a year ago at this time many of the same firms were cutting headcount in response to a collapsing economy.
starting salary offers to the college class of 2010 are down compared to last year at this time, according to a new report from the national association of colleges and employers.
but both finance and accounting majors saw their average salary offers rise. the average offer to finance majors rose by 1.6 percent to $50,546, and the average offer to accounting majors inched up by 0.4 percent to $48,575.
sageworks, a raleigh, n.c.-based business analytics software provider, reports in forbes that cpa firms may just be the most profitable business an entrepreneur can choose.
the offices of cpas tops a list of 20 other industries, with an average pretax margin of 17.1%. wired communication carriers (transmission-line operators and the like), with a 10.1% margin, rank 20th.
“industries which provide need-to-have solutions rather than nice-to-have solutions tend to do better,” says sageworks founder brian hamilton.
the data are drawn from financial statements on nearly 300,000 companies, most with under $10 million in annual revenue, and bucketed by five- and six-digit north american industry classification system codes. the figures were gathered between 2000 and 2009, to capture an entire business cycle. to be considered, each category included at least 100 companies.
tax day is looming over america, and john stossel celebrates by dedicating a major part of his weekly o’reilly factor appearance to railing against “bob,” his accountant. stossel owes bob several thousand dollars for filling out his tax forms… in the pantheon of great stossel moments on fox news, this one ranks somewhere between the glenn beckgreen phone/scooter interview and the time he literally wore a ball and chain to his interview with bill o’reilly. during half of this interview, stossel actually plays the straight man to o’reilly’s radical libertarian who opposes enforcing speed limits.
john stossel is an idiot… using stossel’s logic, why should we pay doctors to solve complicated health issues? why didn’t god make our bodies easy enough to figure out for ourselves? or for that matter, why do we pay mechanics to fix our complicated cars? or contractors to build our complicated houses? life is complicated, and when you live in a huge country like the united states, one does have to comply with some things that are difficult to support the greater infrastructure. i’m personally sick and tired of these arguments always attacking everything. i’m a veteran and a former peace corps volunteer, and now i own an accounting firm with my brother. we employ intelligent, hardworking people who have to put up with idiot articles like this attacking our profession, and that attack a good way life in a good country. i’m honestly not proud of the direction this country and the media are heading.
among corporations reporting assets of $250 million or more, the irs since 2005 has cut back by a third the hours it spends examining their books. irs has also sharply reduced the number of large corporate returns it examines — down 22 percent since 2005, according to the analysis of agency data by the transactional records access clearinghouse at syracuse university.
this despite the fact that irs auditors uncover the largest dollar amounts of tax under-reporting in the books of these large corporations and congress has actually provided irs with more revenue agents trained to handle complex returns such as these, according to the non-profit, non-partisan watchdog group.
who’s making up for the difference? answer: small business audit hours are up 30%.
he offices of cpas tops a list of 20 other industries, with an average pretax margin of 17.1%. wired communication carriers (transmission-line operators and the like), with a 10.1% margin, rank 20th.
