Questions are the Strategic Runway Towards A Great Business (Segment III)

Preface: “A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God.” —Alan Perlis

Questions are the Strategic Runway Towards A Great Business

Credit: Donald J. Sauder, CPA | CVA

The value of data is only beginning it strides to connect the world networks of business, as it leaps into the next generation fields of innovation. The insightful analytics per predictive business intelligence systems are more rapid than gradually to change the landscape of enterprise and decision making, e.g. business.

Power BI is a business analytics service by Microsoft. It aims to provide interactive visualizations and business intelligence capabilities with an interface simple enough for end users to create their own reports and dashboards.

Quote: https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-new-ai-and-enterprise-features-for-power-bi/

In a world in which data is coming from everywhere, Power BI is about helping our customers embrace a data culture, where every employee can make better decisions based on data. The growth of Power BI has been staggering – customers ingest more than 20PB of data to Power BI every month, lighting up over 30M reports and dashboards, and the Power BI service processes over 12M queries per hour.

Part of that seasonal change in business is that computers and data systems will continue to increase in their influence of business decision makers.

But you don’t have to take our word for it. Gartner named Microsoft a Leader in the Magic Quadrant for Analytics and BI Platforms for 12 consecutive years.

Today we’re making significant new announcements that will help our customers driver a data culture.

….. A key enabler of data culture in organizations is the pervasive availability of standard, authoritative datasets that represent a single source of truth, allowing users to make decisions on trusted data, remix to create insights, all with unified governance.

While Power BI is no laughing matter for next generation entrepreneurs, applying data in a comprehensible manner to entrepreneurship is certainly advised for any ambitious business owner.

What is of greater importance for us is that when seeing these developing visualizations of data predictions, and the corresponding accuracy, we both see and understand that enterprise management is in a vibrant season of change. It will be fleeting moment, and the foliage will be past. Part of that seasonal change in business is that computers and data systems will continue to increase in their influence of business decision makers.

While Power BI is no laughing matter for next generation entrepreneurs, applying data in a comprehensible manner to entrepreneurship is certainly advised for any ambitious business owner. For the journeyman in business, we can begin with easier to develop key performance indicators, cash flow management and financial analysis.

So, if your looking for more from your business, ask yourself the following business self-assessment questions, for Accounting | Tax | Data. If you answer any question “NO”, then follow-up and ask yourself – “WHY NOT”? Document your answers concisely. Answering “no” is not necessarily wrong, you just need to understand the “why not.”

Accounting | Taxation | Data 

  1. Does your executive team continuously collect, track and analyze key financial and operational data?
  2. Does your business have a budget?
  3. Does your business have three to five-year financial projections?
  4. Does your business manage debt effectively?
  5. Does your business meet annually with your banker?
  6. Does your business have seasonal cash flow challenges?
  7. Does your business have a line of credit for access when necessary?
  8. Does your business monitor your equity to assets ratios?
  9. Does your business regularly monitor and track working capital levels?
  10. Does your business track and manage overhead cost variances and expectations?
  11. Does your business calibrate costs of production or customer service at least annually?
  12. Does your business have a travel policy?
  13. Does your executive team track key performance indicators weekly?
  14. Does your business plan strategic capital expenditures?
  15. Does your business have target ranges for cash and working capital?
  16. Does your business have meaningful conversations with your accountant each year?
  17. Does your business consider tax filings to be relatively stress-free?
  18. Does your business have a sales tax compliance plan?
  19. Does your business maintain compliance with multi-state income taxes?
  20. Does your business have a high level of confidence in your tax filings and income tax compliance?
  21. Does your business invest in annual tax planning?
  22. Does your business obtain quarterly or annual financial statements?
  23. Does your business analyze all available data your customers needs and desires?
  24. Does your business analyze data on the satisfaction levels of is products and services, to both current and historical customers?
  25. Does your business monitor and track gross profit percentages?

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