The need for training and a disaster recovery plan were the top concerns for member firms polled in accounting association CPAmerica International’s recently released Information Technology Benchmarking Survey.
The online survey, CPAmerica’s second, collected data from association members on software, certifications, training and disaster recovery.
“We have an annual practice management survey that all of our firms complete and that tells them where they stand against other firms within the association in vital areas,” stated CPAmerica president Alan Deichler. “This is really utilized by the managing partners and the partner group of our firms. We wanted to give IT directors and network administrators a tool that they could use that would correlate to what the partners are using to measure the firm.”
CPAmerica outlined the survey’s three major takeaways:
- Training is needed. Most of the surveyed firms said training on specific accounting firm applications, such as tax or audit-related software would be the most beneficial to non-IT staff, closely followed by Excel and Word training.
- The biggest challenge, for network administrators at two out of three firms, is training and keeping up with systems/projects/initiatives for network administrators.
- Disaster recovery is a top priority for more than half of the respondents in the next two years, while 62 percent of respondents do not currently have a disaster recovery plan.
“We have seen a great level of participation with this benchmarking program and have done the same for marketing and human resources,” stated Joyce Arthur, senior member services manager of CPAmerica. “Our members want to know what their fellow association members are doing and to see where they stand compared to them.”
The complete results of the survey are confidential and only available to those members. For more information, contact CPAmerica.
