Strategic Finance articles from October 2006

Strategic Finance archives from October 2006

Four keys to improved staff retention.(financial services)
October 1, 2006... In a job market where there are often more open positions for experienced financial professionals than there are people to fill them, retaining staff is a priority for accounting and finance managers. Retention in this current environment...

Prizes in every box.(End Note)
October 1, 2006... If you're still using Internet Explorer as your browser and you haven't yet cracked a molar grimacing over the adware or viruses, it might be time to get out before you do. There are now about 655 good reasons to switch to Opera 9, a free Web...

Surveys show ethics problems persist.(Walker Information, Association of Certified Fraud Examiners)
October 1, 2006... Two organizations have completed their separate biannual analyses of the ethics environment in business and the fraudulent outcomes of unethical environments. The results they report are sobering. The first organization, Walker Information,...

The unmentionable.(Best Practices)
October 1, 2006... In 1968, it was considered a coup to get movie star Paul Newman to do a live interview on TV, so Tonight Show guest host Jerry Lewis was agog the night when Newman came onstage. Of course, Newman was there because he had something to promote:...

Lessons from China: Haier Group has achieved extreme success through unique performance-management systems.(International)(Company overview)
October 1, 2006... Haier Group is one of China's fastest-growing companies and one of the world's top brands. Twenty-two years ago, the firm was a nearly bankrupt refrigerator factory in Qingdao, and now it's the world's fourth-largest white-goods manufacturer....

Push or pull: message from the chair.(corporate development)
October 1, 2006... When I was in college, I remember trying to write a paper on whether labor wage increases were a cause of inflation or if they were a response to inflation. Another time, someone told me that science had demonstrated that it is easier to pull a...

It's time to change: CFOS must move beyond their traditional financial scorekeeping role and also develop leadership skills in strategy and operations if they want to succeed today.(chief financial officers)
October 1, 2006... It has been five years of extreme change for chief financial officers. In fact, few business roles have changed as dramatically during this period. Somewhat suddenly, the classic model, where the CFO acts as chief accountant and technical...

Are companies more ethical now?(misconduct)
October 1, 2006... It depends. Nearly three out of four employees responding to KPMG's 2005-2006 Integrity Survey reported that they had observed misconduct at their companies in the previous 12 months, and half said that what they observed was serious and could...

IFAC wants comments on ethics proposal.(International Federation of Accountants)(Brief article)
October 1, 2006... As mentioned in this column last month, the International Accounting Education Standards Board (IAESB), an independent standards-setting board within the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC), is proposing new guidance to help...

COSO framework.(Letters to the Editor)(Letter to the editor)
October 1, 2006... Parveen Gupta and Jeff Thomson's article [September] was excellent. When I was Chief Technical Officer of Grant Thornton, we adopted an audit approach that emphasized substantive testing for two reasons: (1) We were convinced that even...

Next on executive compensation?(Securities and Exchange Commission)
October 1, 2006... Now that the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) has finished its rule making for mandating new disclosures about compensation for top corporate officers, some are looking for the Commission to take a next step. The most likely possibility...

An overview of financial risk management.(Essentials of Financial Risk Management)
October 1, 2006... In Essentials of Financial Risk Management, author Karen A. Horcher defines financial risk management as "a process to deal with the uncertainties resulting from financial markets." Horcher summarizes the process of financial risk management...

A masterpiece of a mouse.(Logitech's new VX Revolution Laser Mouse )
October 1, 2006... After using Logitech's new VX Revolution[TM] Laser Mouse for a few weeks, I realized that I had not shaken it once to locate or center the arrow cursor. The highly responsive wireless mouse is effortlessly precise, partly because your hand...

Turn that thing off.(internet)
October 1, 2006... * DOES TELEVISION WATCHING PRODUCE APATHY--reducing brain voltage while teasing apart moral fiber? What about the Internet? We know it's the library where you can get such outlaw texts as The Anarchist's Cookbook, but what about the...

A bridge over troubled water.(accountants)
October 1, 2006... * The U.S. financial regulatory bodies are focused on auditing... America's undergraduate programs lack courses in management accounting... At least 80% of graduates pursuing a career in accounting go into public accounting first... The...

Broaden your view on XBRL's representational capabilities.(eXtensible Business Reporting Language)
October 1, 2006... Do you think of your operational and reporting systems as "cookie-cutter" operations? "To make financial statements, take two cups of transactions; add one tablespoon of journal entries. Cook the books for an hour. For another batch for the tax...