Source: Inside Public Accounting 

Here

are highlights of an interview with Roman Kepczyk, president, InfoTech Partners

North America, Phoenix AZ 

On

how much to spend on technology

In

general, firms spend about $6,500 to $8,500 per person annually, including the

cost of hardware, applications, infrastructure, communications, and support. 

On

what the leading firms are doing

Much

of t revolves around reducing paper to be more efficient and improve client

service. This includes instantaneous electronic access to client files in

response to client requests, communicating with staff with PDAs and smartphones,

dual monitors for multiple location use, security/patch management, archiving

documents, and automating tax and audit workflow. 

On

paperless environments

The

real objective is improving client service. Being paperless helps, but firms are

not completely paperless. In the future the term paperless won’t need to be

used, as everyone will operate in that mode. 

On

how many IT people are needed

As a

general rule expect to have one IT person for every 25 workstations. Partner

with an outside integrator for network support. You will also need an internal

network professional, but they usually don’t have the time to keep up-to-date on

all technology issues.

On

how to evaluate the effectiveness of IT people

One

important metric is downtime. Good IT support may keep that number to minutes. 

On

customer relationship management

A CRM

system is a lofty goal. Not many firms follow through on their commitments to

capture all the information that should be in the system. To do so requires a

culture change and a great deal of training.

From

Inside Public Accounting, April 2005, p. 9.

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