What do you do if you're wasting time on non-essential tasks as a corporate accountant?

List the activities and identify based on the following drivers: - Reassess why the activity has been taken over? - Review the impact (direct impact might be non essential but it can have a relevant impact in a collateral process) - Assess which are the stakeholders of the activity (several time we reach the conclusion that the report need has changed and either the activity make no sense anymore or need to be rebranded) - If still has some value but to operational, assess to automate (excel, Gsheet, dashboard etc).

Corporate accounting demands precision and efficiency. - Meticulously record every task you perform, no matter how big or small. - Use a notepad, spreadsheet, or time-tracking app to capture everything from data entry to client meetings. - Create categories like core, non-essential task. - Allocate more time to core tasks first. - Then delegate balance time to non-essential part. - Delegate the least non-essential part.

🕒 Corporate Accountants: Maximize time by focusing on what truly impacts the bottom line! Prioritize key tasks using the 80/20 rule. Embrace automation to handle routine work, delegate non-essential activities, and invest in continuous learning to stay ahead. Regularly evaluate your workflow to enhance efficiency. Remember, it’s not about being busy, but being productive in achieving financial goals. Prioritize smartly and drive success! 💪 #TimeManagement #CorporateAccountancy #Efficiency

In my role as a corporate accountant, I once found myself spending excessive time manually reconciling accounts and generating financial reports. Realizing the inefficiency of this approach, I sought feedback from colleagues and explored alternative solutions. With their guidance, I identified automation tools that streamlined repetitive tasks and freed up valuable time. Implementing these tools transformed my workflow, allowing me to focus on high-impact activities such as financial analysis and strategic planning. This experience taught me the importance of recognizing time-wasting habits and proactively seeking solutions to enhance efficiency.

Analysing the tasks to identify values, timing, and efforts needed for all tasks will be the starting point on the correction track. Propose solutions or alternatives to overcome the issue of wasting time on non-value-added tasks, such as automating these tasks or creating a process to perform such tasks by a lower level of employees. The selected solution should be regularly monitored to assess its effectiveness. 

Optimizing productivity for corporate accountants requires a proactive approach to identifying, prioritizing, and minimizing non-essential tasks. With strategies such as effective time management, task prioritization, delegation, automation, and continuous improvement, accountants can streamline their workflow, enhance efficiency, and focus on tasks that drive value for the organization. Moreover, investing in professional development and staying abreast of industry trends are essential for achieving long-term success in the dynamic field of corporate accounting. By embracing these principles and adopting a mindset of continuous learning and improvement, accountants can make great contributions to their organizations' financial objectives

I believe this is a constantly moving target. As a business grows different needs, tasks and analysis is needed. A large contributor for inefficient time is due to tasks being carried forward as new needs arise and become more relevant. The task of delegation is more about upskilling and empowering your team to perform the tasks you once did in order to free time for you to focus on the new needs. It's about upskilling, letting go and elevating (and holding accountable of course).

Identify the tasks that are perfect to delegation. Activities that involve minimal decision-making and can be standardized (e.g., data entry, accounts payable processing, bank reconciliations). Identify tasks that align with the skills and experience of your team members. Clearly communicate the task details, desired outcome, and deadlines to the team member you're delegating to.

Use of accounting software with automatic data capture features can integrate with bank statements and credit card transactions, eliminating the need for manual data input and reducing the risk of errors. Freeing oneself from repetitive tasks allows to dedicate more time to financial analysis. Review data trends, identify potential risks and opportunities, and provide valuable insights to guide better business decisions.

Addressing the issue of non-essential tasks in corporate accounting necessitates a focus on automation. By utilising advanced accounting software and various other technological tools, accountants can streamline repetitive tasks, enhancing efficiency.

We often find ourselves doing repetitive processes. From Anti Money-Laundering Checks to Reviewing Accounting Figures. The trick with making routine processes more efficient is to put robust systems in place to streamline each of them. Why do each review as if it were your first? Install systems of processes that do the work smarter, quicker and easier. Often this can be done with the help of automation. Most bookkeeping software, for example, allow you to set rules that allocate similar transactions to the same nominal code or category. Once the software recognises that the transaction relates to a purchase of stock, it can automatically process the transaction accurately without prompting. To quote Elsa from Frozen: # Let It Go !

Automation of processes offers multiple advantages. From an accountant perspective, the most important is to allow users to skip the mechanical and repetitive tasks in order to keep the focus on data analysis and monitoring of KPI.

Automation is important in reducing accounting administration work in capturing bank statements, and caterorising monthly recurring transactions through adding rules in Accounting software to recognise the recurring transactions. Outstanding reveivables overdue invoices reminders can also be automated and appreciation emails to clients who settle thei bills on time. These automation practices allowes one to focus on value additional critical activities to improve the company profitability and efficiencies.

Saying no isn't about being negative; it's about prioritizing planned task. Learn to identify tasks that fall outside duties or have minimal impact. Instead of a rejection, propose alternative solutions that address the request while protecting your time.

You have to set boundaries for a number of reasons but a more important factor is to ensure you are producing the best work you can on the most important tasks in your day, month and career. Being interrupted, being given medial tasks or having to correct others work will drain your mental capacity in a day or month and affect the quality of your most important work. Learn to say no! Focus on the important matters and set time aside to do it, then you can assist others. If your most important tasks fail you will be held accountable, no one else.

All roles involve menial tasks, but in my opinion, it's crucial to focus 80% of your time on meaningful tasks that drive the company forward. Setting boundaries doesn't mean refusing to do those tasks, but instead, it means ensuring that company leaders understand which projects and tasks take up the most time. You should align to make sure that the work produced, time spent, and expectations align, all while staying within the reasonable time boundaries you've set for yourself. For instance, you could set a limit of no more than 50 hours per week, depending on the held position.

Before taking any activity in, always re-assess the need, validate the impact and define a time line (if it concerns to a non essential activity take a lower recurrence - for instance, monthly instead of weekly).

Usually in a corporate role, you are liaising with many stakeholders which creates a huge challenge when it comes to managing time. One needs to be smart enough to manage the relationship while contributing to achieving the overall objective of the organization. My tactics are; 1. politely divert the thinking pattern so that it can be understood who should be working on the specific request 2. fix time to discuss specific things officially 3. List down routine activities together with the person responsible

New regulations emerge, technologies evolve, and business priorities shift. To remain efficient and impactful as a corporate accountant, embracing continuous improvement is essential. Schedule regular reviews (e.g., monthly or quarterly) to systematically analyze your tasks and identify areas for improvement.

Setting and reviewing the workflow and tasks of 'checking, rechecking, and counterchecking' is crucial in corporate accounting. Counterchecking is the most important, where my seniors used to find my mistakes... Checking: It involves carefully examining calculations and data entries for errors or inconsistencies. Rechecking: The data is rechecked to confirm accuracy. Incorporating the 'maker and checker' principle etc. Counterchecking: To compare your data with information from other departments, like production or sales, providing external validation.

Accountants are naturally reviewers. Continuously improving should be a principle which is key to success for the professional growth and learning process. New ideas of improvement should be mandatory for the top accountants and to review your regular tasks would help on the process.

One thing that has worked for me in the past is the implementation of monthly review meetings. This was a chance for myself and my team to sit down and work out what was not working and why For this to be successful, it is important to foster psychological safety within the team, so that all members feel they can speak candidly. It is also critical to ensure that all team members feel heard and that their contributions are valued. By implementing this process, month end close became a few days quicker and all team members felt valued and happy in their roles

Do the mundane as quickly as you can and look for ways to reduce the scope of the task or set up processes so that is is accomplished as quickly as possible.

With changing time the feedback becomes important tool for further improvement 360 degree feedback should be obtained for accounting processes Employees Customers Vendors Auditors Management and shareholders Government officers Bankers and Finance Providers and Technology Service Providers So that the processes should not miss any loop and it should be the perfect. Analysis of such feedback should be scientific and objective.

If you're wasting time on non-essential tasks as a corporate accountant, you should seek feedback from your colleagues and superiors to help you identify wasteful activities that can be shreded.

This is ultimately what you should do as it does not add value to the company nor beneficial for your professional growth and development. By seeking feedback and when done right it can lead to better efficiency and value adding to the company increase visibility and engagement for the employees. It is win win.

Feedback from your stakeholders and partners is very helpful in the ever-lasting development cycle, so it helps you recognize strengths and weaknesses in things you do. And makes you aware of the areas you should improve. Feedback should be inherent part of the organizational culture, so everyone understands its value and remains comfortable giving & receiving it from others.

Seek feedback from a colleague so that you have an objective view of your productivity and can start the process again of identifying those time-wasting tasks.

Tasks may be categorised as : 1. Important and Urgent 2. Important but not urgent 3. Not important but Urgent 4. Not important and not Urgent Second aspect, to consider is what is the level of reporting hierarchy of the corporate Accountant. That will decide what he can delegate and what tasks he should attain himself. He should not take risk of delegating important task that might impact management decisions.

Staying informed about new regulations, technologies, and practices in your field is crucial for effective work. Balancing work and personal life, along with managing stress and maintaining a continuous desire to learn, can boost both happiness and productivity at work. Building connections both inside and outside workplace, we can exchange ideas, gain new insights, and stay up-to-date with the latest trends and opportunities.

A corporate accountant has to prioritize her/his tasks and the time to spend on them due to reporting deadlines (external and internal), involvement in the development of new services or products, strategic and budget preparation of data and financial statements and regular analysis of realization and the comparison with planned figures. The automatization of repeated tasks and processes takes some time but in the end, the accountant will gain some additional time to focus on real important analyses, reports, and comparisons or get the knowledge of new or changed regulations. As ESG or sustainable reporting is becoming mandatory in the EU, I'm wondering if accountants would have to report also non-financial figures.

Sometimes it is very difficult to assess who are the stakeholders of a report/activity that is already identified as non essential. For very complex and dynamic organisations, one of the testing that can be made to assess if the activity is still relevant and brings any value-added is not to issue the activity in the day planned (again: bearing in mind it is a non essential activity)and let the stakeholders emerge (if applicable). After almost 2 decades in Finance, several cases of stakeholders testing, no feedback is given, the activity is just discontinued.

prioritize critical activities, delegate where possible, and automate repetitive tasks. Set clear priorities, avoid multitasking, and create a distraction-free environment. Regularly assess and adjust your workflow to optimize productivity. urgent and important, important but not urgent, urgent but not important, and neither urgent nor important. First, focus on getting things done that are both important and urgent by checking due dates of each .