The key purpose for the 2021 Good Bad Ugly technology poll is to provide clients and the profession with an answer to a very common question our account managers at Business Fitness receive, “What software are other firms using?”
This year the primary area of focus was on practice software, as opposed to previous years where third party app providers and client accounting systems were included. Like prior years, we have segmented the 205 participating firms based on revenue after fully analysing and cleansing the data for illegitimate contributions. The top challenges remain for the accounting profession as revealed in previous years, although it seems data security has taken a step back over mounting software subscription
costs:
• Fully utilising your existing
systems
• Lack of integration
• Software subscription costs
What does fully utilising your existing systems mean in your practice? What steps does your practice need to take to achieve full value and ROI from your existing systems and consequently software subscription costs? Is full integration between software suppliers possible? Is full integration between modules by the same supplier possible?
Is internal server infrastructure still common in 2021? It is for 39% of participants, but data shows it is a dying environment having reduced from 64% of participants in 2017. Size does matter when it comes to server infrastructure as a clear majority of firms exceeding $1.5m in revenue either run a server internally or hosted by a specialist provider.
The poll also reveals the technology accountants find most frustrating is practice management and workflow. The potential reason behind this frustration comes from being core to a practice and most used daily, therefore leading itself to this frustration. A special mention must be made of tax and SMSF technology registering the least levels of frustration. The future spend of practices over the next 12 months has client portal (including e-signatures) and workflow high on the wish list, although one in four practices say they will not be purchasing new technology this year.
In relation to the technology stack, below you will find the preferred options based on revenue groups. As previously highlighted in prior year reports, enterprise firms are embedded with industry suppliers such as MYOB and APS with Xero now entrenched at the smaller end of the market and slowly making progress with larger practices. Most notable in many firms technology stack is the increase in Zoom and Microsoft Teams with the former leading the way.
Business Fitness has always been on a mission to help accounting practices boost productivity and growth, and the current environment has been a timely reminder of what we set out to do when we started Business Fitness 20 years ago – and that’s to help you standardise, streamline and systemise your processes. This ethos has never been more significant as we all adapt to new ways of working. We hope you enjoy the 2021 edition of the Good Bad Ugly technology poll.
Click Here to download your copy of the 2021 Modern Technology report