I liken mergers and acquisitions to terminal illnesses. We all either know somebody or have ourselves been impacted by a terminal illness and our outlook has been quite negative. I blame this negative outlook on the famous quote by Albert Einstein that goes “We keep doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results”. This is also known as the definition of insanity.
At some point, you as the CFO are going to realize that you have responsibility over the tax function. This may come as a surprise, hopefully not, but it may. This will be the case whether you have an internal tax director or whether you rely on an outside advisor for your tax services. Your role will probably be a little more complicated if you’re relying on outside advisor. But in any case, you’ll have that responsibility. So knowing that you have that responsibility, you need to assess where your tax knowledge is; What do you know about taxes? What should you know about taxes? Do you think there’s a gap? How do you fill that gap? Well we’re going to talk about a few things here that will help you get through that process.
Some of America’s best run companies fail when implementing an ERP system. Andrew describes how three simple concepts; lead, limit and organize can make your system implementation a success.
Atlantic City is a wondrous place; I remember visiting years ago, when the casinos were filled, and the players were waiting in line for a table. Today, most casinos are closed, and those remaining are empty with $5 tables on weekends. As I sit down at the roulette table and watch the ball run around the track, you can see the eyes on players filled with nothing but hope.
This look of hope is what I see from too many employers come renewal time. Unfortunately, most employers’ hope lands on green double zero as they watch the insurance carrier win their ante for the next twelve months. If the employer strategy is to annually interview consultants in a grand search for the lowest cost fully-insured carrier, how can the future be bright? If an employer does not address the major issues as to why healthcare costs are spiraling out of control, they are simply gambling with the future of their companies.
Imagine one of your sales reps takes a client out for a steak dinner and submits the receipt for reimbursement. Later you learn that your finance team didn’t even look at the receipt and auto-adjudicated the reimbursement to the sales rep. Then you take a closer look at the receipt and you see a charge from the chef, a charge from the expeditor who glanced at the plates as they went out the door, a charge from the waitress, and a facility fee from the restaurant. Then you learn that this particular restaurant charges 500% more than other restaurants charge for the same dish because they aren’t known for steak, so their chefs just aren’t very efficient in preparing it. How angry would you be? You would probably contact the restaurant and demand an explanation and you may even demand your money back.
