In my last article (Accounting Today, Sept. 4-17, 2006, page 22), we explored the importance of understanding what motivates your people. I encouraged you to use the six professional motivators to ask them to prioritize what motivates them - both as a team and individually. In this article, we'll explore actions and ideas that I'd like you to consider for appealing to each of the six within your organization.Acknowledgement and respect

The concept of the paperless office was first introduced as a futuristic vision at Business Week in 1975, and 30 years later, its realization remains elusive.Although the evolution to a paperless office has been slower than predicted, there has been recent momentum fueled by the development of electronic tools with specific functionalities that drive productivity. The introduction of these products has created some confusion about the roles that each plays, and has raised questions about how best to integrate these tools. This article offers a glimpse at two emerging products - document management systems and automated workflow applications - each critical to the implementation of the "less-paper" office.

Many CPAs believe that they are their clients' most trusted business advisors, but what about being trusted within the firm? Sadly, that trust often doesn't extend among partners and staff.In today's competitive environment for talent, employees leave partners and managers, not firms. Trust is often defined as "confident reliance on another person." If your partners and managers are not trusted internally, you may be fighting a serious battle that will prevent you from retaining and attracting quality talent.

Tax and financial products provider Thomson Tax & Accounting has bolstered its Fast-Tax print services to include Schedule K-1s for trusts and estates.

Sage Software has released Sage BusinessWorks 7 Accounting, the new version of the company’s business management solution.

It was difficult to sell software to a group of sheet metal manufacturers. That was because they don't think of themselves as manufacturers. They think of themselves as being in the sheet metal business. Changing the approach to fit their self-image, improved the ability to sell to these prospects. Someone made that observation at the Sage Summit user conference earlier this month. I don’t remember who discussed this in terms of how this person's company was forced to adopt to the prospects' thinking, but it goes to the heart of the issue of how to reach a market. In a way, it would be the same as trying to market to journalists as writers. Technically, we are writers. It's not the first way we think of ourselves. The tools we use are similar. But how we think is different. This is the problem of confusing categories with reality. Categories are a way of ordering things. But they organize things from a particular point of view, and obviously everybody doesn't have the same point of view. In the world of business, many labels, such as manufacturing companies or SMBs, are categories that vendors use to make it easier to organize records for selling goods and services. It's often said marketing technology doesn’t work—prospects want to solve problem and don't care about the bits and bytes. And while might agree they are small businesses, letters like SMB and SME aren't really about them, but about the people who apply the terms to them. It's not the best approach. So what's the secret? There's no great secret here. The lesson is that the best way to reach a market is to understand the needs of prospects and treat them as if they are important and let them know that you are worried about their needs first, not about your own pocketbook. .

Sage Software announced the launch of Sage Pro ERP 7.4, the latest version of the company’s business management solution for small and midsized businesses.

“Can I ask you a stupid question about your session? What is ERP?"

SAGE COMPLETES EMDEON BUY: The Sage Group plc, the U.K.-based parent to Sage Software, said that it completed its previously announced acquisition of Emdeon Practice Services, a vendor of software and services to physicians' practices. Terms of the deal, which was announced in August, were not disclosed.Within Sage Software, Practice Services, which has roughly 20,000 customers, will form the new Sage Software Healthcare Division.

Accounting and financial software provider Intuit Inc. has officially released QuickBooks 2007.The company has worked hard to build buzz around the latest incarnation of its flagship product - first by unveiling improvements to its ProAdvisor program, and then by announcing a partnership with Google Inc. to tie online marketing services into the software.

If you ask typical small or midsized accounting practices what their cornerstone applications are, chances are that they will tell you tax prep and write-up. Even with all of the businesses moving their accounting and bookkeeping in-house, write-up engagements are still the mainstay of many accounting firms' practice.Even when a client does most of their own bookkeeping, or has an in-house accounting staff, there's still a need for someone with in-depth accounting experience and knowledge - you. Even a full-time staff accountant probably doesn't have the time or inclination to keep abreast of the latest Financial Accounting Standards Board statements and Internal Revenue Service rules on depreciation and amortization. Closing and adjusting entries are another place where many accounting practices earn their keep.

Is your firm's technology limiting its growth? Do you continue to invest in the same technology year after year, or is your firm integrating back-office operations at the same time that it's investing in new integrated core production applications such as tax return preparation and financial reporting?Notice that I use the term integration. There has been confusion among many in the accounting industry regarding the difference between linking applications and integrating applications. Linking allows data to transfer from one application to another, and it is generally a one-way link. Integration is more robust and allows applications to share data stored in one or more databases. Most firms still have far too many databases and spend an inordinate amount of time reconciling data.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has awarded a trio of contracts totaling $54 million to transform the financial statements in its Edgar database into interactive information.Included in that strategy was some $5.5 million earmarked for XBRL US Inc. to complete the writing of XBRL taxonomies, so that every item in a company's financial statement, such as net income or gross sales, can be assigned a unique, computer-readable label.

In its latest attempt to become a player in the accounting software space, Microsoft had released a free stripped-down version of its software -- targeting small businesses that are late adopters and rely on pencil and paper or Excel for their bookkeeping needs.

Delivering the keynote address at the 2006 CCH User Conference, CCH president and chief executive Kevin Robert outlined a number of the company's new technology initiative investments.

Nearing the November elections, Intuit Inc. has given $1 million to a California political action committee called the Alliance for California's Tomorrow.The group has already spent $66,000 supporting the campaign of Republican Tony Strickland for state controller, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Few hobbies have been more revolutionized by the Internet than genealogy.Exchanging information with others was once an ordeal that involved subscribing to a publication in which researchers placed classified ads. A reader would look for those that were promising, send a query with a self-addressed stamped envelope, and hope for replies that were about the right family. Someday.

A new version of Sage Software’s business management solution for small businesses, Sage BusinessVision 50 Accounting 7.1, has been released.

Beware of people who tell you technology is important.

SBA TO GO BY 'OFFICE ACCOUNTING' IN 2007: Microsoft announced the release of a public beta for Microsoft Office Accounting 2007, formerly called Microsoft Office Small Business Accounting. According to the company, the latest version adds online marketplace integration and invoicing to help small companies conduct business online.Among the new features are integration with eBay and online payment via Paypal. Specifically for accountants, where SBA failed to generate the massive response it had initially hoped for, a new "Accountant Navigator" has been designed to help accountants manage multiple clients, and a dashboard-driven payroll center should allow payment processing to be run for multiple clients from a single place. Among other features are an Accountant Transfer Wizard, which allows a business to share and update files directly to an accountant; and a Journal Entry worksheet designed to let accountants quickly enter multiple transactions and closing entries.