Strategic Finance articles from August 2006

Strategic Finance archives from August 2006

William L. Brower, Jr.: Management accounting advocate.(Change Agent)(Biography)
August 1, 2006... Although IMA Chair Bill Brower, CMA, CFM, jokes that he hopes his major accomplishment this year will be to lower his golf handicap by three strokes, his real mission, he says, is to continue his work as an advocate for management accountants....

Five keys to working effectively with recruiters.(Careers)(Editorial)
August 1, 2006... With accounting and finance candidates in high demand, finding top talent can be especially challenging today. Research by our company shows that it takes an average of four weeks to fill a staff-level accounting position and six weeks to bring...

Consumers consider the importance of corporate social responsibility.(Ethics)
August 1, 2006... The corporate social responsibility (CSR) factors that American consumers believe are most important differ from those that socially responsible investors (SRI) use. Although its members are far from united in their appraisal methods, the SRI...

Who needs budgets? You do. Your budgeting process can target information that needs to flow within your organization and to your B2B partners.(Budgeting)
August 1, 2006... BUDGETS AREN'T JUST ABOUT THE NUMBERS. They're about communicating vital information within the organization. And in the very near future, the budgeting function in your organization may be called on to serve as a role model for communicating...

Learning: Your suppleness quotient.(Best Practices)
August 1, 2006... At what point do you begin to be old? When the first gray hair appears? When you feel stiff after sitting through a 90-minute airplane ride? When your radio listening is confined to "golden oldies"? "When I think of people who are older...

IMA's strategy with professional advocacy.(Institute of Management Accountants)
August 1, 2006... Greetings from IMA's new director of professional advocacy. Just what is a professional advocate, and what is its value to you as a member? A person serving as an advocate supports views of various issues shared by interested parties. In my...

Six levels of financial knowledge: here's a framework that management accountants can use to help their organizations reach new heights of financial understanding and become more profitable.
August 1, 2006... In the October 2003 issue of Strategic Finance, Paul Sharman made the case for management accounting. This topic couldn't have been more timely then, and it's even more critical now. To the extent that the financial community can engage both...

RFID: The changes it will bring.(Technology)(Radio Frequency Identification)
August 1, 2006... THE YEAR IS 2054. A fugitive walks into the Gap to buy some clothes for his companion. A retinal scanner reads his eyes upon entry, and a nearby holographic image says: "Hello, Mr. Yakimoto. Welcome back to the Gap. How'd those assorted tank...

Taking a stand.(Perspective: Message from the chair)
August 1, 2006... If you are comfortable when floating with the tide, what about when it's necessary to swim against it? Do you rise to the occasion and challenge the status quo? I had a mentor at work who encouraged me to speak up, emphasizing that the failure...

Blowing the whistle on bad profits.(expense of customer relationships)
August 1, 2006... Too many companies can't tell the difference between good profits and bad. The consequences are disastrous. Bad profits choke off a company's best opportunities for true, lasting growth. They blacken its reputation and make it vulnerable to...

Companies still struggle with enterprise risk.(NEWS)
August 1, 2006... Although companies are embracing the concept of enterprise risk management (ERM), recognizing its value, many still struggle with implementation issues, particularly making sure all employees are trained to assess, manage, and prevent it....

FASB to reconsider lease accounting standards.(NEWS)(Financial Accounting Standards Board)(Brief article)
August 1, 2006... The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) has added a project to its agenda to reconsider the current accounting standards for leases. The Board says "the goal of the project is to ensure that investors and other financial statement users...

Senate Committee chairman blesses FASB draft.(GOVERNMENT)(Richard Shelby, Financial Accounting Standards Board)
August 1, 2006... As the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) begins taking into account the comments it received on its Phase 1 Proposal on accounting guidance for retiree healthcare, pensions, and other employer-sponsored post-retirement benefits, it...

A resource for controllers.
August 1, 2006... Janice M. Roehl-Anderson and Steven M. Bragg begin the third edition of their book, The Controller's Function: The Work of the Managerial Accountant, with the bold statement that it is the "complete operations reference manual for the corporate...

Alternative costing methods: Precision paint shop's dilemma.(2007 Student Case Competition)
August 1, 2006... "We invested a great deal of time and money into developing the activity-based costing (ABC) system, and now I am not sure if it provides the information we really need for long-term decision-making purposes," Amy Wesling, plant manager of...

A classic edition.(12c Calculator from Hewlett-Packard Co.)
August 1, 2006... The 12c Calculator from HP is 25 years old. A special Anniversary Edition offered today looks and acts just as it did when introduced in 1981 with the exception of improved performance due to modern components. The Anniversary Edition HP 12c...

An open source summer.(Tech Forum)
August 1, 2006... * THIS SUMMER HAS SEEN some interesting developments for the Open Source community as well as those selling or giving away OSs (operating systems). On the continent, Microsoft has found the European Union far less tractable than the U.S....

Exposing enterprise data: XBRL GL, Web services, and Google, Part 1.(XBRL)(eXtensible Business Reporting Language Global Ledger)
August 1, 2006... What would be the value to your organization if the data in it could flow together, regardless of the source, and be accessed by any application-even a standard search engine? Not only is it possible, but it's no more expensive than the...