ACCOUNTING AND RELATED CAREERS

A FORMULA FOR Success

Regardless of the form or size of a business, there are certain attributes that most successful businesses possess. The business has to define a market and serve that market. It has to have a competitive advantage—a patent, a superior technology, or special skills. It has to sell or market itself to that market. And most importantly, it has to spend less money than it takes in.

To be successful, a business must have capable employees empowered to do their jobs successfully. These employees provide five basic functions for business—marketing; human resources; production and operations; finance; and accounting and information systems.

The marketing functional area determines the wants and needs of consumers and devises a system for distributing the goods and services the customers demand. It is customer focused and governed by the four P's—product, price, promotion, and physical distribution. Marketing is concerned with issues such as global markets and customer satisfaction.

Human resources management is the function responsible for ensuring that capable employees are given the opportunities to succeed in the workplace. Human resources must be concerned with issues such as diversity in the workplace and employee empowerment.

The production and operations management function is responsible for planning, organizing, directing, and controlling the operations of the business. Production and operations occur at all levels throughout the company, from line managers responsible for overseeing production to the chief executive officer responsible for overseeing the entire company.

Finance is the functional area responsible for managing the financial resources of the business. It is concerned with issues such as when and how to raise money for the company and where to invest that capital.

Finally, accounting and information systems is the functional area responsible for providing the information for the other functional areas to enable them to do their jobs and for reporting the results to interested parties. This function is crucial since, without it, the other functional areas cannot operate. This is why accounting is commonly called the language of business.

Date: 2015-01-02; view: 682