How to Get the Best Value Out of Accountants and Auditors Using Resource Management Software

You may have a large pool of accountants and auditors in your consultancy but how many of them are utilized properly? If you measure everybody's role and their contribution towards the organization, then you will probably realize that most of them are underutilized. A huge part of the company's budget is spent on the human resource department as the payout is considerably more when compared to the other departments. Moreover, the resources that are required to plan, schedule, and manage their tasks is also expensive. These days, most accounting firms are taking steps to cut costs and boost their revenue through external investment techniques as opposed to the conventional internal improvement techniques. One of the most effective way adopted by most of the accounting firms to increase their utility and maximize their overall performance is using an effective resource management tool.

The importance of visualization, scheduling and forecasting future capacity vs. demand
Creating visualization of the resources that are spread across various locations is one of the most important elements of a resource management tool. An effective resource management tool is comprised of a visual scheduler that lets you add, modify, reassign, split and move the bookings using a simple drag-drop facility. This saves you a lot of time as you can do it at the click of the button. Moreover, a resource management tool also makes it possible to schedule essential tasks in units of months, weeks, days, hours and even as a percentage. When the data is consolidated and represented in graphical format, it becomes so easy for you to keep track of the utilization levels of your resources. A resource management tool also has the ability to determine the future capacity vs. demand to help you determine your resource gap. It differentiates your resources by considering various factors such as the employee's skill set, the resource's role in the team etc. Thus, it predetermines if there is a shortage or excess of resource for future demands.
Key features are as follows:-
• Identify the right resource - The right tool should help identify the most appropriate resource based on the skill set, training, location, role of the resource, availability, office etc.
• Boosts the utilization of your resources - It should provide accurate graphs and consolidated reports and make it easy for you to track the efficiency of resources. By knowing the utility of the resources, you can further filter and organize them at different levels.
• Manage various tasks - The right scheduling software should help you manage planned and unplanned tasks including leaves, vacations, On-duty visits, business activities etc. By keeping track of all these, you will be able to evaluate the utility of your resources much better.
• Track time, cost and variance - The resource management tool should generate easy-to-maintain timesheets that help track the actual time taken against each booking. It should also help identify the billing amount and the actual time taken by the recourse to perform a task against the forecasted time.