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by 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research
eighteen percent of accountants make financial errors at least daily, a third make at least a few financial errors every week, and 59 percent make several monthly errors, according to a new survey that blames “capacity” issues.
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is technology the best answer?
“while capacity issues aren’t new to accounting, demands on accounting staff capacity continue to rise. in the past three years, 73 percent of accountants report that their workload has increased because of new regulations, and 82 percent say economic volatility has increased demands for their work,” says mallory barg bulman, senior director of research in the gartner finance practice. “if these financial and regulatory pressures continue to increase, as history suggests it will, the already-limited capacity accountants will be stretched further and increase error rates.”
the survey asked accountants how often they or their peers made common errors due to manual work, automation, those made by other internal business partners, insufficient review, reopening books, misinterpretation, or volume/complexity overload.
“financial errors can have tangible business consequences. when accountants make errors — and those errors make their way into the monthly or quarterly close — the enterprise may make business decisions based on incorrect data or, worse, issue inaccurate financial statements,” says bulman.
efforts to increase capacity through finance technology have not yielded the expected gains. given technology’s importance to the accounting team’s ability to reduce errors, gartner experts tested what improved technology outcomes.
“it stood out that when users displayed acceptance of the technology they were using in accounting, they used it much more effectively, realized capacity improvements, and made significantly fewer errors,” says bulman. “it’s better to have less technology with a workforce that accepts it than to have the cutting edge of technology and resistant employees.”
four elements define technology acceptance in this context: users must find it easy to use, learn, and customize for their needs. it must also have all the information the user needs in one view. companies that digitize with high technology acceptance for their technology environments see a 75 percent reduction in financial errors.
“in this survey, 73 percent of accountants felt that the technology available to them is missing one or more of the four elements of acceptance,” says bulman. “the accounting functions that are managing to build technology acceptance don’t necessarily have different technology: building acceptance has more to do with putting in place practices that allow staff to perceive technology as easy to use and helpful.”
gartner experts recommend three best practices to build technology acceptance:
- incorporate structured staff feedback into vendor testing and prioritizing technology enhancements.
- replace old behaviors with new ones and lean on tenured staff to guide the way.
- provide transparency into errors and the resolution of errors.
“given the potential of technology acceptance to reduce error rates in accounting, controllers should make sure they understand the levels of acceptance in their functions and improve it where necessary,” says bulman.