New Insights Gained at “Scaling New Heights” Conference
Three members of the GrowthForce management team attended a three day conference for Intuit ProAdvisors in Atlanta in May. Titled “Scaling New Heights,” the conference offered QuickBooks advanced training and updates.
Margaret Gow, Senior Manager Systems, obtained certifications in Intuit QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions and Field Service Management. Marsha Gibb, migration manager, attended classes toward her QuickBooks Advanced Certification. The designation demonstrates the highest level of proficiency in QuickBooks.
GrowthForce CEO Stephen King said that the conference was also a chance for the company to introduce SMARTBase, a proprietary QuickBooks product for Customer Relationship Management.
While at the conference, King and Gow enrolled in the newly-formed National Advisor Network (www.nationaladvisornetwork.com), an association of Advanced QuickBooks Pro Advisors and Intuit Service Providers. NAN is a forum for the highest level of QuickBooks experts to exchange questions, issues and technical articles with each other, thus providing a bigger QuickBooks knowledge base for their clients.
Intuit Statement Writer 2010
Marsha Gibb attended the Intuit Statement Writer (ISW) 2010 seminar at the conference. ISW is a new feature of the QuickBooks Premier Accountant and Enterprise editions. ISW is an excel-based report writer application that creates a permanent connection to the QuickBooks data file.
Gibb says that ISW “makes the accountant’s job easier” by allowing consolidation and customization of financial reports. “You can take several bank accounts and combine them and roll them up into a single workbook such as Cash,” she explains. In fact, Cash Flow and Retained Earnings Statements are two new financial reports that can be created through ISW 2010.
In addition, Word and Excel documents can be attached in the same ISW report. In doing so, each time the format of a template changes, the financial statements can be automatically refreshed from QuickBooks – for the whole report or just one report at a time. “That’s a real time saver,” Gibb exclaims.
Margaret Gow attended the QuickBooks Field Service Management certification session at the conference. She came away with new insight into the add-on to the Enterprise Solutions software that was released two years ago.
Designed for businesses which dispatch technicians, QuickBooks Field Service Management utilizes the Global Positioning System (GPS) and cell phones to track technicians in the field, assign them jobs and track their time on the job. Invoices can be sent to the technician at the job site and they can secure payment on the spot.
“This is a huge advancement for field service businesses such as repairmen and contractors,” says Gow. “ It allows for better job costing and, most importantly, increased cash flow.”
