 Attendee InformationResources
Corporate |
 CONFERENCE AGENDA
Track Sessions
 Monday, October 22, 2007
Concurrent Sessions IConcurrent Sessions II Concurrent Sessions III Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Concurrent Sessions IConcurrent Sessions II Concurrent Sessions III
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Registration 12:45 PM - 4:45 PM Optional Workshop Session: Excel 2007 -- Best Features for Accountants [4 hours of CPE credit] [additional fee required] Microsoft Excel 2007 is proclaimed to be the most significant update since Excel 95 and may well be as traumatic for Accountants as the move from Lotus 123 to Excel. Microsoft's move from the traditional drop down menu and iconic toolbar to their new tab driven Contextual User Interface (CUI) and Ribbon Bar is sure to please some and confuse many. However, getting beyond the user interface changes is only the first challenge facing accountants. Excel 2007 also brings a bounty of new features and functions, many of which will be extremely useful to accountants. This 4 hour session provides accountants with the training and insights they will need to take full advantage of the new Excel 2007 interface and features. Will Fleenor K2 12:45 PM - 4:45 PM Optional Workshop Session: Internal Controls for Small Business Accounting Systems [4 hours of CPE credit] [additional fee required] For small businesses, maintaining an effective system of internal controls presents a significant challenge. Implementing many of the theoretical concepts surrounding internal controls - such as segregation of duties - may not be practical or even possible in some cases. Consequently, the current internal control structure of many small businesses fosters an environment in which too much risk is present. This, coupled with the presence of computerized accounting software, can often lead to disastrous results for small business owners and managers. This course is designed to assist accountants in evaluating, developing, and implementing an effective internal control structure in a small business environment. Throughout this course, the concept of risk-based internal controls is stressed, ensuring that small businesses are insulated from the most significant risks. Bob Spencer Owner TSIF 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM General Session: Tech Update 2007 will be the year of changes. This session is designed to help accountants make practical decisions about the best technology investments and what to be leery of. Technologies covered include the latest in Wi-Fi, Wi-Max and broadband cards. From UMPC to PDA we will cover the alphabet soup and make it easier to understand. How will you manage your migration to Office 2007 and Vista? What are the pitfalls we have found? You can learn on your own, the painful way -- or let us explain what you need. Randy Johnston K2 6:30 PM - 7:15 PM Opening Reception
Monday, October 22, 2007
Continental Breakfast & Networking in the Exhibit Area 7:00 AM - 8:00 AM Registration 8:00 AM - 9:10 PM General Session: Office 2007 -- Making the Transition Office 2007 dramatically changes how you will perform everyday functions such as word processing, sending and receiving email messages, working with databases, and creating spreadsheets. New features such as the Ribbon interface, improved graphics capabilities, and XML-based data files offer tremendous opportunities for increased productivity, but only for those prepared to take advantage of these opportunities. Specific topics covered include new Office 2007 features of interest to accountants, what functionality has been removed from Office 2007, and upgrade and migration considerations. Now is the time to prepare for the most significant upgrade to Microsoft's standard-setting Office productivity suite of products in over a decade. Don't miss this unique opportunity to learn how to make the most of Office 2007! Tommy Stephens K2 9:10 AM - 10:00 PM General Session: Optical Character Recognition OCR - Automating the Tax Preparation Process Optical Character Recognition is the next major technology to improve productivity in the accounting industry. In this must see presentation you will learn about a breakthrough application that uses OCR to read the values from source documents and enter them into tax software thus eliminating the need for your professionals to perform the task of data entry. This amazing technology will reduce tax preparation time by 40% or more and allow you to prepare returns in a Paperless Workflow. Dave Wyle CEO SurePrep LLC 10:00 AM - 10:30 AM Refreshment Break & Networking in the Exhibit Area Concurrent Sessions I 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM CPA Firm Technology 2007 This fast paced session is a review of nearly everything a firm needs to stay competitive and profitable. Discussion flows from practice management and tax solutions to operating systems and hardware. The session is led in an open forum format. Come participate and put in your two cents, fill out a survey, and listen to experiences of your peers. This session will expose solutions that are working well, and which ones to avoid. Highlights include attendee survey, open forum discussion, review of key issues and solutions, and recommendations for your firm. This session is supported by the website: www.cpafirmtech.com. Val Steed K2 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM Effective Use of Multi-media in Business While most people have digital cameras in their phones, many do not know how to transfer captured images to their computer or why they would want to! Do you listen to podcasts? Do you create our own podcasts? Why Not? Audio messaging, music and training you can do in your office. Enhance reporting with graphic images, or document contacts with photos. This may be the most fun and worthwhile business technology session you have ever attended. Randy Johnston K2 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM Internal Controls for QuickBooks and Other Small Business Accounting Systems Small business accounting applications have matured to the point where implementing effective internal control procedures can be relatively easy. Yet most owners and bookkeepers remain unaware of the internal control measures available to them within their accounting application and the steps required for implementation. Consequently, occupational theft and fraud continues to plague small businesses with some studies reporting occupational theft and fraud losses at up to 5% of revenues. Learn the techniques for implementing effective internal control procedures in many of the leading small business accounting applications including QuickBooks, Peachtree, SAP Business One, and Microsoft Office Accounting. Don't miss this special opportunity to take a proactive step toward preventing and detecting theft and fraud in your own business or those of your clients! Tommy Stephens K2 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM Vista - What you really need to know... Vista -- Microsoft's newest operating system has arrived. Now what? While Vista promises more stability and security and provides better performance compared to previous versions of Windows, there are potential pitfalls you must be aware of before upgrading or migrating to Vista. Learn about the new features of Vista and how to reap their benefits, and specific upgrade considerations, including potential hardware and software conflicts and incompatibilities. Be sure you are prepared to take advantage of all that Vista has to offer by attending this session. Will Fleenor K2 11:45 AM - 12:30 PM Lunch Concurrent Sessions II 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM Budgeting and Forecasting Tools Ventana Research, after extensive research into the budgeting and forecasting practices of businesses, states that the use of spreadsheets in budgeting is an obsolete practice that should be abandoned. Use of dedicated budgeting and forecasting tools improves the accuracy of budgets, significantly reduces time spent in preparing a budget, and facilitates the rapid updating of budgets as business conditions change during the year. This session provides an overview of the many budgeting and forecasting tools available in the market today. Coverage includes application suitability, feature set, software and implementation costs, and operating system and database infrastructure requirements. If you are mired in spreadsheet budgeting, come and get a glimpse of what modern budgeting and forecasting processes should look like. Tommy Stephens K2 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM Excel PivotTables for Accountants PivotTables are the most powerful feature of Excel, yet few accountants use them in their day-to-day activities. For some, PivotTables are too intimidating. For others, PivotTables are unknown. With a little instruction and guidance, you will be using PivotTables to accomplish routine analysis and reporting. We will begin with basic PivotTables and progress to advanced PivotTable topics. Topics covered will include drag and drop pivoting, grouping and ungrouping, calculated fields, drill down to underlying details, consolidated PivotTables, and PivotTables dynamically linked to external databases. Val Steed K2 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM Using Excel and Access Together Accountants (particularly those in industry) often use Microsoft Excel to analyze and manage hundreds and even thousands of rows of data. While Excel certainly provides a powerful, flexible, easy-to-use environment for making calculations, it is often difficult to get Excel to perform tasks that would be relatively simple in Microsoft Access (i.e., comparing large data sets for duplicates). This advanced session is designed to provide experienced Excel users with the techniques they need to use Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Access together to handle data analysis and summarization. Topics covered include: Access Basics for Excel Users, Importing Excel Databases into Access, Linking to Excel Tables in Access, Cleaning Up Excel Databases with Access, and Creating Excel Pivot Tables with Data in Access, and more. Will Fleenor K2 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM Vendor Panel: High End Accounting Software Accounting Software products designed for companies larger than $10M are the focus of this panel. We will discuss current market trends, emerging technologies, and the key players in the market. The changes taking place for this market segment are astounding, and you should attend to learn what has changed, what is changing, and what will change in the coming years. Key competitors including Adagio, Sage MAS90/500, Sage ACCPAC, Microsoft Dynamics, Open Systems OSAS and TRAVERSE, SAP, SYSPRO, and similar competitors will be discussed. Moderator: Bob Scott Editor-in-Chief Accounting Technology David Lahey Accpac Paul Lundquist Open Systems Bill Walker SAP Donna Armstrong Director of Sales Collins Computing Jeff Gariepy SYSPRO 1:40 PM - 1:50 PM Change Break Concurrent Sessions III 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM A How To Guide to the Paperless Office What are the best practice steps to going paperless? The authors and presenters have spent several years working with managing and implementing Digital Management Initiatives. This session is the culmination of their experience. What are the Phases and Tasks necessary to a successful paperless implementation? What are the 10 things you should know to purchase the right scanner? What is the right answer to the backup solutions you need? This session is a fast paced overview for small to large businesses. Tommy Stephens K2 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM Business Continuity and Disaster Planning The instructor Lisa Traina is not only a nationally recognized speaker but she also owns and operates an accounting consulting practice in south Louisiana. As a result of hurricane Katrina she brings to this session a wealth of experience and understanding of exactly what the issues are and what solutions really work. This session will focus on what businesses must do to protect their systems and be able to fully recover servers and workstations in the event of a disaster or hardware failure. Topics covered include everything from what is needed for a Bare Metal Restore (BMR) to Internet and Optical Disk backup options and how to test the recovery process from top to bottom. Based on her depth of experience she will also cover the numerous myths that exist and misconceptions that many people have with respect to business continuity issues and disaster planning. Lisa Traina Lisa D. Traina, CPA, L.L.C. 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM Office Accounting 2007: A Compelling Alternative Originally titled Microsoft Small Business Accounting and released in September of 2005, Office Accounting 2007 continues to evolve and gain acceptance in the small business market segment. Now available in two versions -- Office Accounting Express 2007 and Office Accounting Professional 2007 -- the application offers plenty of features designed to meet the needs of small and growing businesses. Learn how unique features such as Office Accounting's integration with Outlook and Business Contact Manager, online file sharing, Accountant Transfer Wizard, and Accountant Navigator can benefit you and your clients. With Office Accounting Express now available as a free download to all consumers, Office Accounting is sure to continue to grow in popularity among consumers and accountants alike. Randy Johnston K2 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM Vendor Panel: Tax Technology Times are a changing, really. Firms are now scanning documents that automatically place the scanned documents in proper sequence for the tax process. Document imaging is there for all and it really works and it is productive. Tax solutions have new innovations from integration with research, pop up reminders of past year amounts, direct data import, some CRM, and secure client communication. This session is a moderated session of the best tax solutions on the market. Come watch the top tax vendors present what they feel is their latest and greatest advantages. Key competitors including SurePrep, Avalara, CCH, Thomson Tax, PayCycle, Lacerte, ProSeries and similar competitors will be discussed. Moderator: Val Steed K2 Marshall Kushniruk Avalara Jerry Conner CCH Rich Walker Intuit Dave Wyle CEO SurePrep LLC Teresa Mackintosh Thomson 3:00 PM - 3:30 PM Refreshment Break & Networking in the Exhibit Area 3:30 PM - 5:00 PM General Session: Security Issues and Answers for Accountants Viruses, worms, and spam & oh my! Information security concerns continue to be a top priority for corporations and end-users alike. User awareness is at an all time high and technologies that help safeguard mission critical systems and data are constantly improving. Many organizations have spent significant time and money to protect their systems and data. Yet security breaches and system compromises continue at alarming rates and confidential information appears as vulnerable as ever. What's a concerned organization or individual to do in order to truly protect their information assets? This session will review today's most common and significant threats and explore the latest tools, technologies, and "best practices" to help attendees safeguard their information systems. Dave Cieslak Principal Arxis Technology, Inc. 5:00 PM - 5:30 PM Meet the Editors This is your opportunity to meet and "quiz" the editors from Accounting Today and Accountant Technology. Make sure your voice is heard! Bill Carlino Editor-in-Chief Accounting Today Bob Scott Editor-in-Chief Accounting Technology 5:30 PM - 6:30 PM Reception in the Exhibit Area
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Continental Breakfast & Networking in the Exhibit Area 7:00 AM - 8:00 AM Registration 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM General Session: IT Strategy and Vision Alignment between the firm's strategic and IT plans is imperative. Learn about the changing role of the technology leader and how they must be integrated with the management team. Consumer technology now drives firm technology. Learn how much and where successful peers spend their IT Budgets. Planning times People times Processes equals Performance 3. Technology is the accelerator. Gary Boomer Boomer Consulting 9:00 AM - 10:00 AM General Session: Accounting Today and In the Future Accounting software has changed significantly. Technologies that weren't readily available in the past are common building blocks for today's business management software. .NET, web enablement, software as a service and software components are all common building blocks today. Financial reporting and business analytics are available to all sizes of business and are deeply integrated into many products. Examples will include digital dashboards, outsourced payroll and credit card clearing, and integrated financial reporting. During this session, you will be exposed to state of the art technology in accounting, and gain insights into future. Randy Johnston K2 10:00 AM - 10:30 AM Document Management, Portals and the Paperless Office Can you find the information you need instantly? This is an introduction of the benefits of working in a digital office. A. David Bergstein, CPA Business Development Manager CCH 10:30 AM - 10:45 AM Refreshment Break & Networking in the Exhibit Area Concurrent Sessions I 10:45 AM - 11:55 AM Advanced Outlook Tips Including Outlook 2003 & Outlook 2007 Most accountants (including many long time users) barely scratch the surface with respect to the features and functions that are available in Microsoft Outlook. Beyond the basics of sending emails or recording client/contact information, MS Outlook can be used for scheduling and planning meetings, task lists, notes, finding documents, sharing calendars, controlling spam, transferring and sharing contact information, working with MS Exchange servers, and much more. Key features of the new MS Outlook 2007 and great features of Outlook 2003 are included. The session is designed by accountants to meet the needs of accountants. Val Steed K2 10:45 AM - 11:55 AM Cool Tools and Gadgets for Accountants This session will cover the latest and greatest tech tools and gadgets that CPAs can use to improve productivity and provide a better quality of service. The session will separate the hype from the reality. Participants will gain insight into what technologies are leading edge but really work and are ready for prime time, and which ones are bleeding edge and should be approached with skepticism. Some of the topics covered include: hand held devices, software utilities to save time and money, wireless innovations, portable everything, biometric devices (yes they are reasonably priced and well tested), hardware innovations, and much more. Will Fleenor K2 10:45 AM - 11:55 AM Improving Organizational Performance with Digital Dashboards It's time to look beyond outdated processes and into the advantages leading-edge tools such as digital dashboards and benchmarking provide when they are used as key components of financial and operational reporting processes. Crucial building-blocks such as obtaining critical data through ODBC connections; practical sources of benchmarking data; what technology tools are available to assist when implementing dashboards and benchmarks; and how to make dashboard and benchmark data widely available in your organization are all covered in this fast-paced overview. Tools such as Excel 2007, Crystal Excelsius, ProSystem fx ProfitDriver, Prophix, and SQL Reporting Services are demonstrated. Don't miss this opportunity to learn how to breakthrough your organization's current reporting limitations with digital dashboards and benchmarking. Tommy Stephens K2 10:45 AM - 11:55 AM Leveraging Portals Portals should be a part of your technology plan and budget. These secure sites resolve security issues (email, aggregation of data, & etc.), provide improved client service, improve communications and strengthen relationships with clients. Don't wait until your clients demand them. The primary advisor is different than the trusted advisor. Firms should be both. Those who control the portal will be the client's primary advisor --$$$$$. Often, it is what you don't know you don't know that costs you money and limits your value. Gary Boomer Boomer Consulting 11:55 AM - 12:50 PM Lunch Concurrent Sessions II 12:50 PM - 2:20 PM Accounting Solutions for Small Business This session is designed to call attention to the specific challenges facing small businesses and how to take advantage of the features offered by many of the leading software applications in an effort to solve these challenges. Leading applications such as CYMA, Peachtree, QuickBooks, and Microsoft Small Business Accounting will be used to demonstrate effective solutions designed to meet the accounting and financial reporting challenges facing small businesses. Step-Up solutions like Adagio, MAS 90, Open Systems, Great Plains, and SAP Business One will also be covered briefly for those who conclude that the small business solutions really don't meet their needs. Randy Johnston K2 12:50 PM - 2:20 PM Advanced Excel Tips While most accountants are good with Microsoft Excel, many have never had any formal training. As a result they have missed a lot of important and practical features. This session is jam packed with practical, useful Excel techniques that will save you time and help you do a better job. Some are simple solutions (ex. custom views for hiding and un-hiding rows and columns). Others are innovative ways to save time and do a better job (ex. using wild card characters to build complex formulas). Even if you have been using electronic spreadsheets for over 25 years, you will likely discover many new Excel tools and techniques. Will Fleenor K2 12:50 PM - 2:20 PM Vendor Panel: Document Management Solutions Document Management and Content Management continue to evolve and become more widely adopted. Strategies from key vendors operating in different market segments will be reviewed. There will be session content that is useful to both industry and public practice CPAs as products and strategic techniques are discussed. Key competitors including Acct1st, Altec doc-link, CCH Document, Doc-IT, Documentum, FileCabinet CS, GoFileRoom, Interwoven, Laserfiche, Questys, Westbrook Fortis and similar competitors will be discussed. Moderator: Tommy Stephens K2 Andrew Hatfield Acct1st Lee Triebwasser Altec, Inc. Rich Walker Intuit Michelle Dulog Personable 12:50 PM - 2:20 PM Working Out of the Office -- what you need to know to be truly mobile This session provides guidance on how to manage and equip virtual workers of all kinds, from the work at home employee to the road warrior to the occasional access for someone at a conference or working from a vacation home. Policies, procedures, controls and the culture of being virtual will be covered along with the appropriate enabling technologies (i.e. hardware and software) to solve this problem. Barry MacQuarrie Chief Information Officer, XCM Solutions, LLC Director of Technology, Kirkland Albrecht & Fredrickson, P.C. Evan McDonald AT+T 2:20 PM - 2:30 PM Change Break Concurrent Sessions III 2:30 PM - 3:45 PM Managing Digital Documents - Working with PDFs What can you do to a PDF file? PDF files are the standard document format for digital documents today, and now is the best time to learn how to create, manage, store and share PDF files. Learn how to create, manipulate and store digital documents. Applications presented will be Adobe Acrobat Professional 8 and less expensive options for creating and working with PDF files. Will Fleenor K2 2:30 PM - 3:45 PM Office Automation for CPA Firms Where does your office stand with respect to getting the maximum benefit from todays office automation tools? Things have progressed quickly in the past couple of years with respect to the tools that are available for CPA firm automation. Many of these new tools can not only save time by automating clerical tasks (ex. eliminating the need to manually sort through and key in supporting documents for tax returns) but also have the potential to improve the quality of the final product by making working paper review easier and more effective. Come to this sessions to see how new technology for CPA firms can save you time, improve client service, and make more money. Barry MacQuarrie Chief Information Officer, XCM Solutions, LLC Director of Technology, Kirkland Albrecht & Fredrickson, P.C. 2:30 PM - 3:45 PM Peachtree Premium Accounting: A Complete Management Tool Peachtree by Sage Premium Accounting offers advanced functionality to small and growing businesses seeking to utilize a complete business management tool instead of just traditional accounting software. In this session, you will receive a comprehensive overview of Peachtree Premium Accounting, including many facets of the application such as fixed asset management, Crystal Reports ®, serialized inventory, multi-company consolidations and reporting, departmentalized financial statements, enhanced budgeting, advanced financial analysis and management functions, and dashboard reports, as well as what's new in the 2008 release; vertical market applications for construction, not-for-profit, distribution, and manufacturing organizations; screen-level security options; advanced inventory management options; an introduction to Peachtree Quantum; and so much more. Don't miss this opportunity to learn how to put the power of Peachtree Premium Accounting to work for you immediately. Tommy Stephens K2 2:30 PM - 3:45 PM Vendor Panel: Small Business Accounting Software Products designed for businesses smaller than $20M will be the focus of this panel. Key competitors including Sage Peachtree, Microsoft Office Accounting, Intuit QuickBooks, CYMA, Adagio and similar competitors will be discussed. We will look at trends in this market segment along with discussions of strategies to convert to or from these products. Verticalization, the attempt to move upmarket, the addition of more comprehensive features, and programs to support these systems will be reviewed. Moderator: Randy Johnston K2 Sheila Merryman CYMA Rich Walker Intuit Bob Lewis Microsoft Andrew Bates Softrak 3:45 PM Conference Adjourns |
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