The accounting profession and IT
September 6, 2008
The last week’s prepearation for various things I’ve got going on have left me way behind on reading. This post by Vinnie Mirchandani is one I should not have missed. He says:
As I prepare for my trip to the West Coast I am looking forward to seeing fellow EI, David Terrar and his presentation at Office 2.0 on the community IT Counts he helped develop for the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales (one of the oldest and most influential accounting bodies in the world). I am then staying over the weekend to participate in the CFO Technology Summit.
And it occurred to me that the accounting profession has in some ways influenced the IT industry (not always positively) more so than even the science and engineering professions.
The rest sets out some of the milestones and issues the profession has been engaged upon aqnd which have impacted IT.
Vinnie talks about being harsh over the way Sarbanes-Oxley has been a money pit that sucks innovation oxygen away from IT budgets. I on the other hand prefer to think about the way the profession has continued to suck at the IT capex Kool-Aid rather than think more about switching out that spend to opex using saas as the wedge. The current economic environment provides an ideal opportunity to reassess those investments.
Vinnie and I will hook up on Tuesday as he tastes (for the first time I think) the joys of an SAP technical conference. When I first went to one I felt all at sea. What could a suit find that was valuable to the way he/she works? The second time around was a bit different because I had someone in tow who was prepared to show me the fun side of geekery. Now I can’t wait to get over to Las Vegas and suck it all up. How things change.
While there I will be doing at least one panel where I share experience on ESME alongside David Pollak, the guy who wrote the framework. I won’t pretend to understand the technical nature of David’s work. But I appreciate the way that project has come together. It’s a bit of a case study in community operations.
PS - As I am finishing up this post, I hear that David Terrar, Oliver Marks and Francine McKenna are meeting up with Vinnie for a quick tour around MOMA. That’s a nice crew of folk with whom to spend time. In all the years I’ve been visiting San Francisco, I’ve never had the time or opportunity. I’ll be in Vegas less than 72 hours so I guess I’ll miss out there as well. Ho hum.
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