THE SCRUTINY OF BEANS

Working in the nonprofit sector it's easy to forget about the resources in the for-profit world. So today, I'm going to recommend poking our heads out into the sun once in a while. I sat down to read a copy of CFO magazine. I figured it wouldn't have a lot to relate to, but was I wrong. Keep in mind no endorsement received, I love this rag!

One article in particular, Finance in History: Here's to the Bean Counters: A slur to finance folks and accountants, the term has a noble past byR.G. Voorhees captured my imagination.

I won't quote it away, but just give you the opening paragraph (emphasis mine):

"Bean counting" has long been an insulting term for what finance professionals and accountants do. Often, it's been used to tar CFOs as transaction processors—a role largely relegated to the back office. What's more, people like to use the phrase to ratchet up the pedestrian aspects of finance by tagging practitioners as "mere" bean counters or "little-more-than" bean counters or "simply" bean counters.

It is not a surprise that this should relate to my last post on IT (and Allan's comment on relegating IT to the backoffice), Giving: Donation or Investment? You decide

The movement toward integration (and mutual respect) is on! I'd love to think I was the first to spot the trend, but I think the CRM's (and even Microsoft) have their eye on convincing us of this new wave. Does that mean we should view it with skepticism? I'm sure. Does it mean it isn't valid? Not at all.



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