About the Global Accounting Alliance

The Global Accounting Alliance (GAA) comprises 11 of the world's leading professional accountancy institutes. It represents more than 775,000 professional accountants in over 165 countries from around the globe. The GAA promotes quality services, shares information and collaborates on important international issues. As part of this effort, the GAA publishes a bi-monthly online journal. GAA Accounting includes authoritative yet accessible articles to advance the understanding of theory and practice in accounting, business finance and related subjects for members around the world. The June 2011 edition is available online and also as a Digital Edition.

Accountants Head to the Cloud

The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) is pushing to accelerate adoption of cloud solutions among its 350,000 members, focusing especially on small and midmarket companies as well as CPA firms. The AICPA's first official endorsement of a cloud vendor, payroll-solutions provider Paychex, came several years ago but it has rolled out more such partnerships with increasing frequency, including with bill.com for invoice management and payment in 2008, financial management and accounting software maker Intacct a year ago, and tax-automation supplier Copanion at year-end 2009. The pitch is that the cloud offers a steep drop in information-technology costs, since applications are hosted by the vendors and provided on demand, rather than via physical installations or seat licenses. (Read the article "Accountants Head to the Cloud" at CFO Magazine online and review the white paper 10 Questions to ask about Cloud Computing.)

Helping Business Owners Advance their Estate Planning

This lively, straightforward discussion by the authors of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) Estate Planning Toolkit for Business Owners focuses on the fundamental aspects of estate planning for business owners. Business clients may also access this free program to learn how they can assess where they are and where they’re headed … and how advisory services can help them attain their goals. This Estate Planning Webinar, sponsored by Robert Half Accounting and Finance, attracted over 2500 participants and is now available as an online archived version.

Global Risk Management Study

This 2009 Global Risk Management Study by Accenture helps to understand the issues around enterprise risk management in the current economic downturn. The report outlines eight primary lessons to be drawn and the most important keys to achieving high performance through an improved risk management function. The key findings are as follows: 

• About half believed their company was well prepared to face the economic turmoil.
• More than 85% indicated that their risk management capabilities needed to change.
• 42% pointed to the need for better integration of risk, finance and business data.
• 80% say that poor data quality, inefficient reporting and fragmented systems are increasing the cost of risk management.
• Risk managers spent only 20% of their time advising business units.
• More than 70% have increased or plan to increase spending on risk management.

KPMG International, Being the best: Thriving not just surviving

New research from KPMG International, Being the best: Thriving not just surviving, defines the key characteristics of finance functions at leading organizations and also demonstrates the critical role people play in delivering success. Based on a global survey of more than 500 senior finance executives, including 98 respondents in Canada, Being the best: Thriving not just surviving concludes that adapting the finance function is now more urgent than ever, by providing the right information at the right time to help business leaders navigate through turbulent times. (Read the executive summary of Being the best: Thriving not just surviving.)