CFO on the go
April 2011  
Welcome to CFO on the go 

We have included some of our latest white papers for your review. We included the short version in the newsletter; if you follow the links it will provide you with the full article.

I want to draw your attention to this month's feature article "Keeping Honest People Honest", a previous article but timely for our readers.  One of our clients just incurred a theft of over Two Million Dollars through some crafty accounting over the past few years.

We are planning a Webinar to provide owners with some ideas on how to prevent theft and embezzlement from happening in your company.  The cost is a $100 donation to St. Martha's Food Bank.  We will help you if you will help us help the less fortunate.

Send us an email if you are interested

 

Marketing your Construction Company in 2011
Time is running out

Time May Be

Running Out


 

When asked how you intend to market and advertise your construction business this year, what will you say?  If you talk with your father or uncle on the most effective way to promote a business, they are very likely to tell you to make sure you are listed in the yellow pages, or to perhaps purchase a spot on the radio if you have available budget. Those solutions were certainly solid strategies throughout much of the preceding century, but today, everything has changed.  If your business isn't on the internet, and you aren't aggressively managing it there, take a deep breath because you aren't likely to survive the long haul.  This article outlines the key essentials of marketing in the new millennium.

Outbound Marketing is a term often used today to describe classical marketing methodologies such as:

·         TV advertising

·         print

·         mail ads

·         radio

·         telemarketing, etc.

When television was first developed, there were very few channels so audiences had little choice when it came to what they could watch, and as a result generally knew what was on most other channels.  Interestingly, this was part of the reason for why TV advertising was so effective: people had no compelling reason to flip channels when the ads came on.  The other part was that in the early days, people were not saturated with marketing and found TV advertisements beneficial, if not actually interesting.

Fast Forward to Today

Please click to download the rest of this great article 

 

Still Using Excel to Get Some of your Reports?

Liberty Reports represents the next generation of integrated Excel-based reporting technology offered by Event 1 Software. Connectivity for each software application supported by Liberty Reports is custom tailored to create a very positive and intuitive experience as you utilize Microsoft Excel as a reporting tool for your business data.  Using Liberty Reports, you will transform Microsoft Excel into a powerful and intuitive reporting solution virtually overnight.  Use it for business intelligence, management reports, exception reports, auditing, and much more. It works with Master Builder and there is another version for Timberline.  It extracts data from your company database in real time.  

 

Register for an upcoming webinar to learn more including how to prepare a cash forecast. 

Search Sage Timberline Office
Search Sage Timberline Office

Send me an email with the upcoming dates 

Insurance Tracking - We Make it Easy!
Tracking insurance certificates from subcontractors, sub tiers and any other job related vendors can be a time consuming, mission critical task prone to human error.

Insurance Tracking from EWA Software Solutions automates this repetitive, manual task.  They have made the process simple by design, significantly reducing the time spent to guarantee compliance.  By combining content management technology from Paperless Environments with EWA Work-flow Automation, modest input on the front end of this process produces significant output on the back end.
  1. Reduce the time it takes to track insurance and resolve compliance issues.
  2. Mitigate risk; by automating - there is less chance of exposure due to lapse in coverage.
  3. Integration with your business system provides a single point of data entry.
  4. EWA Insurance Tracking is designed for the construction industry.
This is an add on for both Master Builder and Timberline users, please call if you would like to take your company paperless.

 

 Click for the Information sheet 

Mobile Time Tracking

Mobile time tracking software on your mobile device

Crew A and Crew B leave their boss' office Monday morning at the same time and return that evening at the same time after a hard day of work in the field.  Crew A traveled to three separate painting jobs throughout the day, prepping, sealing, caulking, spraying and rolling paint.  The crew members are exhausted and just want to erase the day from their memory.

Crew B, also tired, traveled to three separate jobs during this period as well.  It also performed a variety of job activities, including framing, drywall, sheering and roofing.

Friday (payday) rolls around at the end of that week.  Crew A, which uses handwritten paper time cards, rushes to finish filling out its time sheets that morning.  When it's done scribbling down estimated work shifts, each member turns in a perfect 40-hour time sheet to its payroll manager.  Everyone's time card says they worked five days that week and exactly eight hours per day, plus a 30-minute lunch - on the dot.  And to top it off, no one has any idea how long it took them to paint at their first jobsite on Monday or their third jobsite on Thursday.

They just want their paycheck.

Crew B, however, has nothing to turn in on Friday.  No paper, pen or pencil needed. Crew B doesn't use paper timecards.  In fact, Crew B doesn't write its work shifts or job activities down at all.  This business tracks Crew B with time tracking software that runs right on their foreman's Smart phone.  Its foreman tracks the entire crew throughout the week, as work is actually happening, so no one is forced to remember time and attendance numbers.  He tracks job activities, travel time and even records field notes on his mobile device.

When Friday morning rolls around, the foreman wirelessly sends his time records to his payroll manager.  When the payroll manager opens up her time tracking software on her computer, the numbers are automatically populated for all of Crew B. She sees that while many men in Crew B worked between 35 and 38 hours, not one of them worked 40.  Her business saved hundreds in labor costs in just one payroll.  

Find the entire article here 

 


Current Promotion for
Project Management and Estimating
CFO on the go is offering a Special for the months of April and May for our current Timberline clients.  Add two or more users of Project Management and you will receive a 1 year subscription to Sage's ATL classes ($490) in addition to 24 month zero interest payment plan.  Want to learn more?  Register for one of our upcoming webinars, just call us for the current dates.

For Master Builder and Timberline users we are offering a similar promotion on the Nations #1 Estimating solution.  Purchase one user and a database and you will receive Sage's ATL subscription ($490) in addition to the zero interest payment plan.

You need to act quickly, the 24 month zero interest leases can end at anytime. The funding for this program is limited.

Call 800-659-5851 and ask for an estimating specialist

Meet Chuck and hear how he and his team are using Sage Timberline Estimating
Meet Chuck and hear how he and his team are using Sage Timberline Estimating

Want to be the Hammer or the Nail?
In This Issue
Marketing your Company in 2011
Using Excel for Reports?
Insurance Tracking Made easy
Mobile Time Tracking
Employee Fraud

Featured Article

 

EMPLOYEE FRAUD and HOW TO PREVENT IT

 

Ø A Massachusetts security consultant estimates that 30% of workers plan to steal from their employers, 30% will if given the opportunity, and 40% are basically honest

 

Ø In 1988 the FBI recorded 3,500 cases of white-collar crime that exceeded $100,000 per case. There were 10 times that many cases with amounts less than $100,000.

 

Ø The national Retail Federation estimates that 38% of all "shrinkage" is due to

employee fraud.

 

Ø In 1994 the Commerce Department estimates that employee fraud cost American business between $40-50 billion and was responsible for 20% of all business failures. A University of Virginia business professor with expertise in this field estimates losses at

over $120 billionI

 

Read more

How its done!

What does an embezzler

look like?

How to prevent a theft in

your company.


Click here for the full article 

 

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Rudolph & Sletten and Sage Timberline Office Estimating

Rudolph & Sletten and Sage Timberline Office Estimating

 


Meet Doug and Sage Timberline Enterprise

Meet Doug and Sage Timberline Enterprise

 

 

Meet Chuck and hear how he and his team are using Sage Timberline Estimating

Meet Chuck and hear how he and his team are using Sage Timberline Estimating

We would like to ask you to spend a minute to complete a short survey so we can be sure to improve and provide you with information that helps you grow your company's bottom-line.

 

Short Survey 

 

 

Dennis Feidner

CFO on the go

800-659-5851 

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