Mahatma Gandhi once said that “As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world – that is the myth of the atomic age – as in being able to remake ourselves.” This is a profound statement on the ability of the human character to evolve and become something better.
Gandhi was right about humans, but wrong about technology.
Courtesy of industryleadersmagazine.com
At the same time, Gandhi was wrong about remaking our world. With the continued power of software design and programming, we are able to remake our world into something better than its current state. We know, because our revenue recognition software has, among other things, reduced our IT spend, including eliminating our need to build a data center to support our hosted solutions.
As an example, let’s examine the progression of revenue recognition software as it evolved to remake our world.
Good Revenue Recognition Software
When they first start out, most software and professional services company purchase QuickBooks as their accounting software. In general, QuickBooks is a good entry-level software that offers a number of advantages to its users including ease of use and low cost.
However, as the company grows past a few sales a month, tracking revenue in QuickBooks becomes extremely cumbersome. The software is found wanting especially when the company wishes to produce GAAP compliant financial statements.
In order to remake the world into something better, alternative revenue recognition software is needed.
Better Revenue Recognition Software
When QuickBooks becomes insufficient to address the needs of the company, most seek an alternative solution within spreadsheet software. When tracking the multiple requirements of SOP 97-2 (regarding VSOE compliance), SAB 104 (regarding evidence of delivery), and ASC 605 (regarding multiple elements in a contract), spreadsheet software appears to be more than up to the task.
And perhaps it is sufficient…in the beginning. However, there are also a lot of dangers regarding spreadsheets. There are concerns regarding keying and formula errors as well as the need to port data between spreadsheets and reports.
Although spreadsheets help remake the revenue recognition world into something better, they still are not the best solution.
Best Revenue Recognition Software
Revenue recognition software that remakes the revenue recognition world into something better would contain the following three characteristics:
- GAAP Compliant – Since the main aim of revenue recognition software is to create GAAP compliant financial statements, this needs to be considered a primary component of the best revenue recognition solution.
- Single Database – Frequently, it is necessary to perform some kind of additional manipulation before revenue is booked. Rather than doing this outside the system, it would be nice if these calculations occurred within the system
- Automated Revenue Recognition – Calculating revenue by hand and then booking it into the general ledger can be an arduous process. A system that does this for you would be a life saver.
NetSuite has solved the Revenue Recognition Problem
Courtesy of zdnet.com/
Bi101 is a professional service firm dedicated to finding the right software solutions for our client. We struggled with revenue recognition software within our own company, until we discovered NetSuite. With its single database, automation features, and cloud connectivity, NetSuite has remade the software revenue recognition world.
If you would like to know more, please contact us.