Please forgive me for my persistent rant and criticism against accountants who budget poorly or continue to calculate the substantial and growing high indirect and shared costs originating from resource expenses such as salaries, supplies, power, information technologies, and travel. I cannot seem to hold back my frustration.
Read MoreA paradox which continues to puzzle me is how chief financial officers (CFOs) and controllers can be aware that their managerial accounting data is flawed and misleading, yet not take action to do anything about it.
Read MoreUsually I am fairly rational and do not let my personal emotions interfere with how I interact with others. However, as the readers of my blogs and articles may have detected, my more recent writings increasingly reflect my frustrations with old school accountants. I cannot disguise my irritation and annoyance with accountants who refuse to be progressive.
Read MoreThere is a widening gap between what the CFO and accountants report and what internal managers and employee teams want and need. This does not mean that information produced by the accountants is of little value. In the last few decades, management accountants have made significant strides in improving the utility and accuracy of the costs they calculate and report. The gap is being caused by a shift in managers’ needs – from just needing to know what things cost (such as a product cost) and what happened – to a need for detailed information about what their future costs and profits will be and why. Examples include driver-based rolling financial forecasts and true marginal cost analysis for what-if scenarios.
Read MoreI continue to get mixed signals regarding how advanced CFOs are with their journey to become the “strategic advisor” that is so frequently mentioned in finance and accounting magazines and consulting firm’s centers of excellence (CoE) websites. There are countless articles describing the vision of CFOs and their staff after completing a successful financial transformation of their processes. And I have also written inspirational blogs and articles about accountants transitioning from bean counters to bean growers. But I am unsure how much the evidence supports the vision.
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