Process optimization in accounting

Requirements and goals of process optimization

• Data quality and level of detail: Mapping of different data categories.
• From compressed value to itemization: Interaction of different applications and the need for complete evidence.
• Successful presentation, more than colorful pictures; the need for reliable and valid data.
• The fast close and its complex reporting requirements: Shorter reporting cycles with increasing complexity.
• Harmonization of technology and processes: Compensation with the same or decreasing personnel resources with the support of IT.
• Integration and internal challenges: Networking all information for fast and reliable overall information.
• Man and machine: building a common understanding.

The organizational structures in the company

• Integrated accounting: More than the balance sheet.
• Account assignment, recording, posting: often beyond financial accounting.
• Less posting, more analysis: the new image of the accountant.
• Accounting and controlling: reconciling the seemingly disparate worlds of figures.
• Creative controlling options: from the account balance to the result of an article per customer.
• Accounting principles versus imputed interest, rents and risks: The challenge of reconciliation.
• From order to cash flow: the departments involved.
• Purchasing and sales process as the basic framework for entrepreneurial trading.
• Accounting as a management tool.

Process analyses and strategies

• Implementation strategies, challenges, resistance, results: fundamental decisions, maximum freedom or strict corporate guidelines?
• Individuality despite strict rules.
• Theoretical processes and practical IT support: the link between process and IT.
• The right software for the right process.
• Process models and control: necessity of documentation, organization of projects, documents for project control.

Implementation with IT support

• From sole proprietorship to group: Necessary dependencies.
• The group specification as a determining factor for the document flow in the individual company.
• Harmonization and the need to adapt the system.
• Processes and integration: IT solution options.
• Postings from cash register and bank, but also purchase to pay (purchasing process) with workflow control and document archiving, practical examples of setting up modern IT systems.
• Monthly/quarterly/annual financial statements: Where are the brakes and accelerators?
• Duration of closing processes: Analysis and intervention in processing, IT support, employee involvement through information, account assignment instructions and training.
• The myth of the fast close: The technological misconception and the resolution!
• The limits of IT: a solution at the touch of a button thanks to high-tech?
• Potential for human improvement: The summary.