Accounting Software for Business: Hansen's Services Analysis Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Hansen Accounting and Business Services, a firm specializing in business consultancy, accounting, and auditing. It examines the company's organizational structure, operational challenges, and the need for strategic accounting software to improve efficiency and client satisfaction. The report explores the acquisition of ERP software, including commercial and custom options, and suggests the adoption of MYOB accounting software. It also includes a sales system flow chart to improve sales procedure. Furthermore, it discusses the competitive advantages of other firms in the market and the challenges associated with implementing accounting software packages, offering valuable insights into the strategic use of technology in the accounting and business services sector. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of accounting software adoption for the success of modern businesses.

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BUSINESS: STRATEGIC ACCOUNTING SOFTWARE PACKAGES
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Introduction
The modern corporate world is characterized by great competition in providing quality business
services to different clients. Many organizations are therefore seeking to establish a competitive
advantage in the areas of quality, efficient and cost effective service provision. With the increase
in organizational activities, the coordination of all activities to bring about quality output is
dependent on the organization management systems (Ismail and King, 2014, p. 13). Great
emphasis is laid to the performance measurement tools in any organization which necessities
organizations to develop and adopt software packages which can help them meet the business
needs as well as the needs and demands of their clients.
Some of these business software’s include the accounting software packages which have been
adopted by many businesses or organizations among them been the Hansen’s Accounting and
Business services firm in Melbourne, Australia (Chenhall and Moers, 2015, p. 6). This study,
therefore, seeks to provide an understanding of the structure of this organization or firm and its
interactions with business software and how the organization has adopted the use of accounting
software packages. It will also provide an understanding of the competition the company faces
from other users of the same software in a bid to understand what gives them a competitive
advantage in the market as well as analyze some of the challenges experienced by the users of
the accounting software packages.
The Hansen Accounting and Business organization structure
The Hansen accounting and business services firm was established in 1997 and has since been in
forefront of providing quality business services to their clients. The organization or firm is based

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in Waverley, Melbourne, Australia but has a wide network of clients in many other parts of the
world. The organization is specialized in providing business services across the fields of business
consultancy services, accounting, auditing and other specialist services. It has been recognized
for offering quality services to their clients such as provision of annual financial statements,
business activity statements, management consulting and reporting services and financial
budgeting as well as auditing services among others (Broida and Flora, 2015, p. 46).
The organization is structured into different departments which specialize in different business
services but all work together towards the common goal of achieving the objectives of the
company and that is to meet their clients’ needs in offering solutions and quality services to
problems or challenges from their clients. The organization has a business service department
which specializes in offering accounting services, business consultancy, booking keeping,
payroll among other services (Blount et al. 2016, p. 193). It has also a tax and audit department
which specializes in offering tax and audit related services to their clients as well as a specialized
services department which deals with special clients’ needs like customized client services.
However, the departments are linked together by the management and serve a common through
the efforts of specialized and competent staff.
Organizational operational problems
However due to the many organizational activities involving huge financial data and great
number of clients with high demands, the Hansen Accounting and Business Services company
has been experiencing great complaints from their clients most of which result from errors in
financial reports or budgets and increasing costs resulting from inefficiency of the current
systems (Lim & Perrin 2014, p. 3). Such problems having been analyzed by the management of

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the company were found to be very critical to the organization success as their clients needed to
be satisfied with the quality of their services as well as help them reduce the costs associated
with lack of utilization or adoption of accounting software (Mas et al. 2014, p. 103). The
management, therefore, seeks to acquire accounting information system software packages that
will help them cut the operational costs, improve their efficiency as well as perform the various
task in the shortest time possible to meet the rising demand from their clients. The software
should help the company eliminate some of the human errors reported by their clients as well as
allow for effectiveness and consistency by fulfilling the business needs.
Acquisition of system software
The management is therefore tasked with the responsibility of making a decision on acquiring a
system accounting software in which their decision can be to adopt or acquire commercial
software, custom software or ERP software. However the acquisition of accounting software
packages is supposed to fall under the context of the existing organizational structure and
depending on the organizational needs, the software should, therefore, be compatible with the
existing organizational structure as well as improve the efficiency of the currently existing
structure (Starinsky 2016, p. 3).
The commercial software’s are usually ready-made software’s for resale to the end user and
therefore in most cases they are used by small organizations at start-up of their business
operations however they may not be applicable to large organizations with an already established
structure as the system software may not be compatible with existing current structure (Chenhall
& Moers 2015, p. 8). The acquisition of custom software will mean that the company will have
to adopt software that is designed or developed to meet specific user or organizational needs.

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However, the development or acquisition of ERP software allows the organization to use a
system of integrated applications to manage the business and also automate many other office
functions related to technology, services and also a human resource (Cassidy 2016, p. 2).
Therefore, in this case, Hansen Accounting and Business services are likely to acquire ERP
software as it will provide a platform for the company to integrate the functions of various
departments according to the specific client needs to improve efficiency and effectiveness of the
existing organizational structure.
Organization sales system flow chart
The success of an organization is not only dependent on the services provided but also on the
sales strategy adopted by the company. For Hansen Accounting and business services to attain its
success objective in service delivery to their clients, it needs to develop a systems flow chart for
the company sales procedure (Peppard & Ward, 2016, p. 2). A system flow chart is a
representation of the steps or actions that the organization or company needs to take in order to
achieve maximum effectiveness in service provision to their clients. The figure below is a
sample of system flow chart showing the sales procedures that Hansen Accounting and Business
Services can adopt and implement to help integrate the sales objectives of each and every
department in the company.

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The figure above shows some of the processes involved in the company accounting department
involving the sales. It outlines the office interactions channels with their customers and the steps
the company needed to take to ensure they offer effective, transparent and consistent services to
their clients (Simkin et al. 2014, p. 4). It is important for the organization to follow and assess its
sales flow chart as it ensures the company achieves financial success and helps to eliminate the
financial errors resulting from the business transaction. Such a flow chart provides the
organization with an opportunity to monitor the sales procedures and is able to solve any
complaints from their clients.
Part two
Understanding of development of accounting software in the organization and its
importance
With the extensive growth of the Hansen Accounting and Business Services, the company is at
the threat of experiencing financial frauds, errors, lack of consistency or having a prompt

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repository mechanism to deal with client complaints or even address their concerns (Hafeez &
Andersen 2014, p. 46). It is, therefore, necessary for the company to adopt or develop an
accounting software package that will help the company to manage payments with the
organization for employees as well as their contractors, process invoice for their clients, ease the
employee’s workload of calculating payment and tax deductions for each and every employee in
the organization. The accounting software package will help the company to record as well as
process all accounting transactions within functional module developed through the ERP
integrated system such as accounts payables, accounts receivables, company general ledgers
(Starinsky 2016, p. 2). Some of the available and most applied accounting software packages
include Quick Books, MYOB, Cash flow managers, Zero-online, sage among others however the
adoption and implementation of any of the packages are dependent on the business need of the
company, its compatibility with the existing organization structure as well as the existing
company technology.
It is therefore recommended for the organization to develop or adopt the use of MYOB
accounting software package. The software has gained the confidence of many businesses across
Australia and New Zeeland with over 1.2 million businesses using the package. The software
offers a range of solutions and products which make it applicable to both small businesses as
well as large businesses. It provides an easy and fast way to manage an organization or company
cash flow and also ensure compliance with ATO requirements. It’s cost effective as it helps the
organization to reduce the costs of having accountants as its simple to use and anyone can use it
and it also automatically updates the system in any incidence of the tax change. The software
will, therefore, help the organization manage its client purchase orders, work with multiple

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clients’ accounts as well as manage employees job time sheets (Geary et al. 2017, p. 703). It is
also easier through MYOB software for the management to track job progress, track the
organization profit and loss as well as the inventory levels. It completely revolutionizes clients
experience by offering products which the range can integrate with the existing accounting
software to add immense value to the organization.
The competitive advantage of other organizations over the Hansen Accounting and
Business Company
The existence of other firms and companies offering the same services in the Australia
accounting market has increased competition faced by the company. The Hansen Accounting
and Business services are a privately owned firm and have a range of 11 to 50 employees with
over 40 years of existence. However, the company has not grown its networks to other nations
other than serving clients from different regions (Mueller et al. 2014, p.8). Their client base cut
across several nations with some of their great clients been Price Waterhouse Coopers among
others. However, it has not established partnerships with other small firms in different regions as
compared to their competitors and other leaders in the industry such as the Greenberg and
Companies which has partnerships with other firms locally and internationally. The partnerships
have given these companies a competitive advantage in that it has helped them reduce their
operational costs in other regions (Chang 2016, p. 3). The companies can also learn from the
different organizational structures used in different regions that enable them to understand their
market well and also strategically plan for their future strategies. With the companies enjoying
the economies of scale, they can offer affordable prices to their clients for their products and
services and therefore increase their competitive advantage in the international market.

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However, the development and adoption of accounting software packages in most businesses
have encountered a number of challenges. With organization having different organizational
culture, the adoption and development of these packages has interfered with some organizational
culture and in most organizations the idea has not been implemented as may prompt the loss of
jobs to certain groups of people in the organization including accountants, financial controllers,
analysts and experts (Seethamraju 2015, p. 483). The system is also bound to have technical
challenges which mean that the management cannot write off the functions of accountants in the
organization yet maintaining both the system software as well as the accountants may increase
the cost element of the organization. The software’s in another case may not be user-friendly as
not everything that can be integrated to meet the employer’s requirements.
Conclusion
The development and adoption of accounting software packages are very paramount to the
success of modern businesses. However, it calls for great efforts from the management team to
ensure that the software developed or adopted meet the needs of the business as well as those of
their clients. With increased competition been experienced in the modern corporate world, the
quality of services provided by the businesses and their competitors will determine the success of
the businesses. It is, however, important to note that it would be difficult for businesses to
survive in the current corporate world without the effective use and implementation of business
software’s compatible with the current technology.

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List of References
Blount, Y., Abedin, B., Vatanasakdakul, S. and Erfani, S., 2016. Integrating enterprise resource
planning (SAP) in the accounting curriculum: a systematic literature review and case study.
Accounting Education, 25(2), pp.185-202.
Broida, M. and Flora, D., 2015.The status of computerized accounting software in small
American businesses. Journal of Small Business Strategy, 1(1), pp.44-51.
Cassidy, A., 2016. A practical guide to information systems strategic planning.CRC press.
Chang, J.F., 2016. Business process management systems: strategy and implementation. CRC
Press.
Chenhall, R.H. and Moers, F., 2015.The role of innovation in the evolution of management
accounting and its integration into management control.Accounting, Organizations and Society,
47, pp.1-13.
Geary, N., Jarvis, B., Mew, C. and Gore, H., Precisionpoint Software Limited, 2017. Method and
apparatus for automatically creating a data warehouse and OLAP cube. U.S. Patent 9,684,703.
Hafeez, A. and Andersen, O., 2014. Factors Influencing Accounting Outsourcing Practices
among SMEs in Pakistan Context: Transaction Cost Economics (TCE) and Resource-Based
Views (RBV) Prospective.
Ismail, N.A. and King, M., 2014.Factors influencing the alignment of accounting information
systems in small and medium sized Malaysian manufacturing firms.Journal of Information
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Lim, N. and Perrin, B., 2014. Standard Business Reporting in Australia: Past, Present, and
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Mueller, D. and Mousseau, C.A., Bmc Software, Inc., 2014.Method for customizing software
applications.U.S. Patent 8,832,652.
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Simkin, M.G., Norman, C.S. and Rose, J.M., 2014. Core concepts of accounting information
systems.John Wiley & Sons.
Starinsky, R.W., 2016. Maximizing business performance through software packages: Best
practices for justification, selection, and implementation. CRC Press.
Starinsky, R.W., 2016. Maximizing business performance through software packages: Best
practices for justification, selection, and implementation. CRC Press.