Maybe it won’t help but at least they hired one. There may be something to the strategy of not having a CFO but we’ll be damned if know what that is. Hey, if you’re making money hand over fist and getting the checks cut on time, who gives a damn, right?
Unfortunately for MySpace, their ever-shrinking market share has maybe gotten to the point where some semblance of a financial strategy may be necessary. Enter Mark Rosenbaum who will surely help turn this ship around. Or maybe not, who knows. Good luck man.
MySpace Hires Finance Chief [WSJ]
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Survey: CFOs Wouldn’t Turn Away Some Help with Their Clerical Work
The following post is republished from AccountingWEB, a source of accounting news, information, tips, tools, resources and insight — everything you need to help you prosper and enjoy the accounting profession.
If financial executives could get one thing off their plates, it would be administrative tasks, according to a recent survey by Robert Half Management Resources.
More than one-third (38 percent) of chief financial officers (CFOs) interviewed said that if they could eliminate one responsibility, it would be basic clerical and administrative work.
“Today’s less extends to all levels of the organization,” Paul McDonald, senior executive director of Robert Half Management Resources, said of the survey results.
“At small and mid-size companies, in particular, this often means financial executives have had to take on tasks once handled by others,” McDonald said. “The demands of the current economic environment make it even more essential for senior-level managers to use their time wisely.”
CFOs were asked, “If there was one responsibility you could hand off from your job, what would it be?”
• Basic clerical/administrative – 38%
• Accounting-related – 19%
• Human resources-related – 14%
• Managing – 7%
• Operations-related – 3%
• Interactions with vendors – 1%
• Nothing – 8%
• Other – 10%
The survey was developed by Robert Half Management Resources, a provider of senior-level accounting and finance professionals on a project and interim basis. It was conducted by an independent research firm and includes responses from 795 CFOs from a stratified random sample of U.S. companies with 20 or more employees.
Robert Half Management Resources offers executives six tips for maximizing their time:
1. Set realistic expectations – High standards are a must, but setting impractical goals can cause frustration and waste valuable time. When initiating a project, consider what you would like to achieve if resources and time were unlimited. Then determine what can reasonably be accomplished considering available resources and other priorities.
2. Don’t procrastinate – It’s tempting to postpone less challenging assignments for more exciting initiatives, but it can backfire if projects start to stack up. Procrastination strains working relationships and creates unnecessary stress as everyone strives to catch up.
3. Delegate – Distribute more routine tasks to other staff members. Look for opportunities that allow your top performers to gain visibility and build their expertise and decision-making skills.
4. Keep meetings on track – Distribute a detailed agenda prior to the discussion so everyone is prepared. Meetings should begin and end on time. If information can be easily covered in e-mail or phone, a meeting might not be warranted.
5. Bring in help – If you and your team are overloaded, consider bringing in outside support during peak activity periods or for large-scale initiatives that are finite in nature.
6. Recharge – Financial executives are accustomed to long hours and demanding work, but that doesn’t mean they should sacrifice breaks and vacation. Scheduling time for even a short respite can restore energy and a sense of control.
About Robert Half Management Resources:
Robert Half Management Resources is a provider of senior-level accounting and finance professionals to supplement companies’ project and interim staffing needs. The company has more than 145 locations worldwide and offers online job search services at www.roberthalfmr.com. Follow Robert Half Management Resources at twitter.com/roberthalfmr for workplace news.
If You Believe the AICPA, Hiring Is Looking Good
Sometimes we get job reports from certain mainstream media outlets that shall remain nameless that look a tad suspect but in the case of this info from the AICPA, I think we can safely rely on the findings.
Here’s the good news via the Journal of Accountancy:
On the demand front, hiring is back on the upswing after decreasing from 2007 to 2008. In 2007, the total number of accounting hires was 36,111. That dropped to 25,488 in 2008 but climbed to 33,321 in 2010. A large portion of that increase was in firms with fewer than 10 CPAs on staff. Firms of that size increased their hiring projections from 11,432 in 2008 to 16,342 in 2010 (see Exhibit 1).
In terms of the types of positions CPA firm new hires were recruited to fill across firms of all sizes, accounting and auditing still commanded a narrow majority at 51%; followed by taxation at 25%; other at 16%; and information technology at 8%.
The accounting and auditing share of new hires was down from 60% in 2007, with the declines coming from firms with 50 or more CPAs. Hiring of new CPA graduates likewise decreased for information technology (down 5 percentage points from 13%). Tax showed a slight increase (2 percentage points) with the strongest gains coming from firms with fewer than 10 CPAs, while the largest growth since 2007 was in the “other” category.
The percentage of overall firms expecting to hire the same or more new accounting graduates than last year also is up—to 89% from 74% when the question was asked in 2008.
Here’s the next obvious question: are we talking about real, created-from-nothing jobs or are we talking about covering massive staff turnover popularized in public accounting by serf-like working conditions and disappointing compensation? Because hiring the same guy in four different firms doesn’t add up the same as hiring four new accounting grads. Duh.
Oh, and something else – where’s 2009? It doesn’t appear in any of the included exhibits, nor is it mentioned in the Journal of Accountancy article even once. The full survey, available from the AICPA’s website, doesn’t specifically mention the exclusion of 2009 in the survey methodology. We aren’t one for conspiracy theories (yeah, right) but it seems suspect that an entire year would just disappear and fail to get a single mention. I mean it was only two years ago.
We’ll dig into the survey results in more detail later, maybe once we track down 2009. Though not specifically mentioned in the above charts, the entire 2009 Trends in the supply of Accounting Graduates and the Demand for Public Accounting Recruits report can be found here.
Walgreens Is ‘Aware’ of CFO Being Charged with Second DUI in Just Over a Year
At this rate, Wade Miquelon is going to be at Billy Joel territory in no time:
Walgreen Co. Chief Financial Officer Wade Miquelon was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving last month, his second such arrest in a little more than a year, according to Kenilworth and Glencoe police.
Miquelon stonewalled officers when they requested a breathalyzer test which goes over well approximately 100% of the time. As for the past incident:
In Sept. 2009, he was stopped at 12:51 a.m. at Green Bay Road and Glencoe Drive and charged with speeding, improper lane usage, DUI and having alcohol in his system. In May, he accepted a one-year supervision for the latter offense, according to a Cook County District Court clerk.
“We’re aware of it,” said Walgreen’s spokesman Michael Polzin. “It’s a personal matter, and we don’t comment on personal matters.”
Are they also be aware that it’s relatively inexpensive to hire a full-time driver for a senior executive when you have profits of $2 billion? Just so, you know, no one gets killed.
Walgreens CFO charged for 2nd time with DUI [Chicago Breaking Business]