Kevin Stevenson retires as AASB Chair Essay Example for Free

Kevin Stevenson retires as AASB Chair EssayThis article is touch on with the accomplishments and achievements of Kevin Stevenson upon his retirement as the Chairman of the Australian bill Standards Board on 30th June 2014. During his tenure, Kevin Stevenson take c atomic number 18d that the long traditions of financial reporting were upheld both internationally and domestically and also provided counsel on issues concerning the FRC. Mr. Stevenson was an example of pioneer tired setters for generations down the line as he was among the founding members of the Accounting Standards Advisory Forum of the International Accounting Standards Board. Through his predateership, the AASBs Research Centre was established as Stevenson served the Asian-Oceanian Standard Setters Groups chair. His principal(prenominal) focus was to work in the interest of the public, as stated by Lynn Wood, the FRCs chair and regent of the IFRS Foundation. In concurrence is Ian Mackintosh, the former Ch air of the PSASB of Australia and Deputy Chair of IASB. According to Mackintosh, Stevenson largely contributed in the motions by Asia countries like Nepal and Korea to the IFRS. From the onset of the 1970s, Mr. Stevenson attention was driven towards setting principal based standards and developing a conceptual Framework to be used in financial reporting. He exponentd for bill regulations as evidenced by his association with the Accounting Research Foundation and later on watched over the growth of the AARF upon being plant its Director. He was at the forefront of setting the international pace in the evolution of common report standards for both the public and the private sectors. Stevenson largely contributed to the formation of the Public Sector Accounting and also compete a authoritative role in the establishment of the stable platform of International Financial reportage Standards in 2005 for adoption in Australia and the entire Europe.Concepts, ideas and facts Team work and leadership are two important components that must be in alignment so as to provide effective high quality and efficient bill services. A strategic human resource management model provides guidance to accountancy squads and leaders to contain high-quality services in a timely manner. Accounting operates inwardly a carrying into action measurement that tolerates no errors. Therefore, a state-of-the-art investigation regards scientific leadership working with major stakeholders as a team to provide the best accounting services to a fake investigation. The new techniques of accounting are significant steps in the right direction and they posit leaders with skills and business tools to apply concepts such as efficiency, cost benefit analysis, economies of scale and cost- effectiveness analysis that will measure continuous improvement on a regular basis. Effective leadership is needed to develop, design and implement a solution that would resolve the amount competency o f an organization. Strategic leadership in accounting provides quality and timely accounting services to a alliance. Such leadership like that o Stevenson brings together a fragmented system consisting of thousands of accountants working within a fragmented system of organizations. Effective teamwork and leadership in accounting shows the course through the development of new innovative fraud investigations for the future. Leaders in positions like that of Stevenson are encouraged to consider both the social and moral implications of their decisions with regard to how their decisions will affect the clients and shareholders of the company. It is the ethical responsibility of every employee to ensure their company does not illegally evade income taxes or allow questionable deductions. They should ensure that the company finds are allocated to the let activities based on their importance and determine the important elements of the business.The accounting issue One major way o f improving the confidence in financial reporting and accounting is to ensure that there is improvement in ethical standards, reporting mechanisms, strengthening of set upance and adequacy of financial management. It is ethical to maintain the right to the righteousness while practicing accounting and financial reporting. Those who use financial statements obligate the right to accurate and truthful teaching when engaging in investment strategies. Clients have a legal right to receive competent and lord services from accountants who have a legal obligation to perform their responsibilities within the constraints of their skills. It is often argued that most accountants lack ethical ability to recognize and solve ethical dilemmas. This has necessitated the need to include morality education as a major component of the accounting profession. The development of professional ethics and values should be initiated primal in the accounting profession and be emphasized throughout th e career.Major issue of the article Stevenson clear shows that it is the responsibility of management to serve the best interests of the company that they are providing auditing and accounting services for, investors and society as a whole. This can be done by providing truthful and accurate financial records. Ethical guidelines require that management should be honest, concise, accurate and complete while recording financial data to ensure ethics are held to the highest degree. It is also the duty of every employee to make wise, informed decisions about the future of a company. These accounting standards are useful in financial reporting and accounting as they are processes that are shortly under a great deal of scrutiny. The two are important functions that organizations should take care of and ensure that they exhibit a high code of ethics. This is because clients and shareholders use accounting and financial reports in their decision make process. Legal and ethical issue s are important elements of financial reporting and accounting as has been demonstrated by the positions assumed by Mr. Stevenson. These issues prompted Stevenson to establish financial reporting and accounting departments to set up specific sets of rules that govern the functioning of any organization.Relevant topics and theories The long traditions of financial reporting applied Positive Accounting accomplishable action by focusing on various(a) aspects that are of major interest to accounting techniques and the issues that provided an informative priming coat and the gives in depth details of the functionality of accounting in financial reporting. Positive Accounting gives a holistic description of what is currently unknown and proposes future considerations. Financial reporting and accounting apply to any stinting entity relating to the companys future business. The major ethical elements involved are objectivity, competence, independence and integrity. These ethical e lements require that accountants and financial reporters are independent of the clients to whom they provide financial and accounting services. Ethical obligations help to determine the effectiveness of accounting and financial report and redress any imbalance that may alter information symmetry. The move by Nepal and Korea followed the ethical guidelines of financial reporting and never let the desire for a better vivification and acquiring more possession get in the way of their financial obligations. It is ethical for any employee of the accounting or financial department working in the public or private sector to delay loyal and impartial to ethical obligations when reviewing both individual and financial reports. It is usual for one to encounter various ethical issues and it is therefore important for one to remain vigilant to resist temptations to manipulate financial records that could spoil ethical guidelines. Transparency and integrity are important ethical elements of normative accounting theory. Some companies may receive pressure from management to maintain a certain public image. This is because some public companies have the burden of succeeding at high levels and it becomes an ethical issue for them to maintain true reports of the company assets, winnings and liabilities without succumbing to the pressure from management. It is unethical for management to alter the financial records of its company and manipulate the numbers to create a false image of the success of the company. This only leads to prosperity in the short term since such fraud cases are discovered by the Securities and Exchange Commission ultimately spelling the downfall of the company. For these reasons, accounting theories allege that companies must remain ethically vigilant to avoid breaching the code of conduct. High standards of ethical behavior are expected for those people engaging in accounting and financial reporting. These standards provide rules and guidance to em ployees in the performance of their professional obligations. Poor decision making by management based on faulty or manipulated financial records aimed at deceiving the public about a companys financial health has negative consequences on the business. It is therefore unethical for management to overlook such behavior. Given how tempting it is for companies to manipulate their financial records in order to portray an image of economic health, management should provide the last defense contingent to prevent accounting fraud.In comment earn 1, the Financial Reporting Committee of the IMA wrote to express its views on financial accounting standards on simplification of the income statement presentation through the evacuation of the concept of uncomparable items. The FRC is in charge of several accounting books of different companies this in essence means that they are aerated with the responsibility of making timely responses to statements, pronouncements, research legislations, p roposals and pending legislations. Their main concern in this letter is the manifold spirit of financial statements in FASB comment letters. They support the simplication initiative adopted by the board as regards to making the financial statements easier to understand by the common folk CITATION Sch l 1033 (Schroder, 2014). Their support is on the elimination of elimination of particular ordinary items as in most times this criterion is not always met.Their proposal and then rids of the tedious work in the preparation of financial documents and whether this requirement is met by auditors in the process of doing their work. Their support is based on the fact that it reduces to a great extending the complex nature of the time for the allocation of the provision of income tax by reducing the occurrence of other income items occurring. They hence advocate for a thorough examination of the details of this suggested proposal CITATION Sch l 1033 (Schroder, 2014).In comment letter num ber 2, Marcum Accountants and Advisors write to the FASB regarding the proposed accounting standards through the simplification of the income statement by elimination of the concept of howling(prenominal) items. Their letter is generally a response to several questions regarding the process of simplification of the income statement. They support the concept of elimination of special ordinary items from the General Accounting principles. Their contention is based on the difficulty of application the extra ordinary items in accounting practice CITATION Giu14 l 1033 (Giugliano, 2014). They thus support the application for extra ordinary items in previous accounting periods. A sudden change of the rules would otherwise lead to bewilderment in the accounting practice. The ease of application of the proposed update makes it easy to make these recommended changes quite easy to adopt. They thus suggest the immediate adoption of the proposed update.They are in agreement with the decision by the board to suffer to the principle of separate disclosure of infrequent transactions. Items must thus meet the definition of occurring infrequently in recurrent expenditure. They list the following examples as those that should not be classified as unusual or infrequently occurring occupancy related expense, routine tax audit returns and losses and gains from reimbursements from insurance CITATION Giu14 l 1033 (Giugliano, 2014). They thus suggest the importance of offering guidance on the determination of unusual items. Proper definitions should thus be provided of the unusually occurring items.In comment letter 3, Ford Motor Company also writes in support of the simplication initiative by FASB. Their agreement is based on the objective of evaluation, identification and improvement of the generally accepted accounting principles CITATION Cal14 l 1033 (Callahan, 2014). This thus means that the reduction of the cost of complexity is possible with the simplification of the incom e statement. They are also in agreement with the board that such an update would not lead to data loss. The overall benefit would be to the end users of such financial statements.ReferencesCallahan, S. (2014). Ford Company.Giugliano, G. (2014). Marcum Accountants.Schroder, N. (2014). Institute of way Accounting.Source document