In my introductory post, I mentioned that this blog was going to have an experimental element. Well, the experimentation has begun.
It’s time to switch up a variable. The variable: Time. Your time.
Time is a commodity. It is scarce, finite, and valuable. In exchange for your time, we are required to provide content of equal value – a fair exchange.
Last week we were talking about the language barrier between Accounting and IT. I managed to maneuver the conversation to the more specific area of IT known as Business Intelligence (B.I.) in a laughably transparent attempt to further my own agenda.
Providing some standard B.I. terms without definitions, I was looking to gauge your understanding of typical B.I.-speak through a quick game of word association. There were no responses. I figure I’ll probably need to establish myself more before I can expect comments. I’m also going to assume there is a vague understanding of these terms. Taking a line from The Simpsons when Bart’s teacher asks him if he knows Long Division, Bart replies, “I know of it”. I would argue these are the “I know of it” terms of B.I. for an average accountant.
– We’ll revisit the B.I. terms from last time next Tuesday and provide definitions. Today is a fun look at historical accounting, and for a change, I’ll make reference to Indicee. –
The Art of War, Chapter 2: Waging War
“Sun Tzu said: In general, the strategy for employing the military is this”:
If there are 1,000 4-Horse Attack Chariots, 1,000 Leather-armoured Support Chariots,
100,000 Mailed Troops, and Provisions are transported 1,000 li, then the domestic and external campaign expenses, the expenditures for advisors and guests, materials such as glue and lacquer, and providing chariots and armour will be 1,000 pieces of gold per day.
Only then can an army of 100,000 be mobilized.” *
Effective Communication between departments is a problem that does not suffer from a lack of attention. Books, studies, speaking tours, coursework, and more continue to proliferate in an effort to break through those barriers that seem to inevitably build up inside companies and organizations. There is an entire industry that’s been created around this idea of improving business communication; and in fact, it’s an idea as old as human civilization. Ever since “oouga booga” became “let’s work together” we have struggled to understand each other.
A powerful manifestation of this struggle is the one between Accounting and IT Departments. Arguably the two nerdiest and most reviled misunderstood departments in a company, it’s surprising there’s not more feeling of simpatico. There are similarities: They are never around when you need them; or if they are around (and looking for you), you want to avoid them. And in those instances when you can’t get away fast enough, you can’t figure out what they are trying to say anyways! True story; I have actually seen a guy physically turn and run when he saw the Director of Finance coming down the hall! Another true story: an engineer friend of mine who described her week as one of “trying to hide from the Cost Accountant” who was looking for a breakdown of a manufacturing cycle.
This post was inspired in part by a recent post on AccountingWEB by Bill Kennedy called This Accounting Life. In it, Bill talks about some things we can all probably relate to: working Saturdays, late nights in order to meet regulatory or internal deadlines or creating budgets, month end, year end, and the list goes on and on. Normally, this laundry list culminates with the request for just one more ad hoc report. If Bill’s experience has been anything like mine, the request likely comes in about 2:30pm on a Friday afternoon. Bill laments the lack of prior warning most of us received about the typical “Accountants Life” while in school, but also admits his compulsion to chase down inconsistencies that add to the workload. Word to Kennedy, I can relate.
Anyone else have a “Lumbergh Moment” they would like to share?
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