The Future of Outsourced Accounting
As the Dow Jones Tops 16,000, the press focuses on the success of big business. What can’t be ignored however is that small business in the United States is a predominant factor in a stable economy. America has a bright future. To ensure that the country endures and prospers economically, small business needs to get leaner, faster, stronger and smarter.
Several years ago, the topic of outsourcing payroll seemed like a bold and audacious proposition. I can still remember graduating college, and the company I worked for absolutely refused to outsource payroll. It was a violation of privileged company information. What if they sold employee information? What if our competitors were able to get this information and use it against us? Five years later, they were on the band wagon, and would never dream of bringing the processes back in house. What changed? What finally made them realize this was the right thing to do? I think it was time.
Although they could have outsourced payroll processes long before they did, they needed time to make sure the processes were truly secure. They needed to verify that the company was going to be in business now and into the future so once the processes were turned over, they would not need to be concerned their data was sitting in an unstable company. I believe this same test is now happening with outsourced accounting.
Although there have been outsourced accounting companies offering services for many years, companies are just starting to realize there are truly stable, well formed businesses providing a quality service for a reasonable price. And I believe company management is finally starting to see, these businesses have a true investment in providing a professional and quality-based service. Business owners are getting a taste of how outsourced accounting companies provide a true team-based accounting process.
There are many quality firms to choose from, Lalea & Black, LTD being one of those. And while all of our accounting processes from data entry to the financial package creation are done by US based accountants, other companies can provide outsourced solutions that include India based data entry to financial preparation by trained accountants in China. Some companies are new, while others have been in the business for several years. Lalea & Black, LTD and its competitors are always looking for new ways to build security into the service. In order to provide this comfort, the industry is building new access platforms, security is invested in and partnerships with larger software firms are beginning to flourish.
I believe that the outsourced accounting market will be larger than the outsourced payroll market. Companies will over the next few years quickly embrace the fact their internal accounting department is one of the few revenue neutral departments in their business. They will see outsourcing is beneficial, as the accounting teams are trained, and instead of a few employees, they have access to an entire team of trained accountants, CPA’s and MBA’s whose sole focus is optimizing this revenue neutral function.
When businesses begin to realize outsourced accounting firms like Lalea & Black, LTD see their clients’ financials as the lifeblood of not only their firm but the client firm and work with each other as teams, the environment ultimately results in the most beneficial way to perform accounting.
Daniel R. Litvin, CPA/MBA