march2021 - 23

BRIDGING THE GAP

4 KEYS
AMANDA WILKIE

Consultant, Boomer Consulting, Inc.
Lean Six Sigma Green Belt,
Certified Blockchain Solution Architect
amanda.wilkie@cpapracticeadvisor.com

TO SUCCESSFUL
TECHNOLOGY PLANNING

TECHNOLOGY IS INGRAINED in virtually everything accountants do to run their firms and
serve their clients. To take advantage of opportunities and position your firm for long-term
growth, you need a good technology plan. When most of the firm is focused on busy season,
it's an excellent time to focus on technology planning. IT's priority during busy season is
to keep all of the firm's existing technology running smoothly, handle issues quickly and
prevent downtime. But beyond those immediate needs, the IT team often has time to plan
for upcoming projects to ensure they can hit the ground running after April 15.

MANAGE EXPECTATIONS

PRIORITIZE PROJECTS

One of the problems IT teams run
into with their technology plan is that
many firm leaders and administrators
don't truly understand how different
IT projects may be intertwined and
how long they'll take.
For example, say a firm wants
to change its practice management
system, moving from an on-premises
solution to the cloud. Firm leaders
may not realize how much planning
and time a project like that takes.
Your IT team needs to:
■ Vet available options and make a
selection
■ Create a full inventor y of all of
the firm's data assets that will be
impacted and scrub that data to
ensure a clean move
■ Understand how other applications
will be affected by the new system
■ Onboard, migrate and train employees to use the new system
■ Work with the old and new solution
providers to address data mitigation
efforts
■ Ensure you have measures in place to
secure data from loss or errors during
the migration
That's likely not something you
can decide to do in July and have up
and running before the fall deadlines.
However, it is possible to meet that
deadline if the IT team can start the
planning process now and be ready to
kick it off in earnest once busy season
is over.

Another hurdle to effective technology planning is prioritizing projects.
We use what we call the " puppy
analogy " to talk about technology
planning. You have your small dogs,
medium-sized dogs and Great Danes.
If you have Great Danes, you can walk
one at a time without issue. If you
have small dogs, you can walk a few
at a time.
However, anyone who's brought a
puppy home knows that even small
dogs can be a lot to manage when
they're puppies. Every project - large
or small - has its puppy stage, and
some puppy stages are longer than
others. Data manipulation, clean up
and transfer are the puppy stage of
a project, and they take a lot longer.
Any technology project that impacts
the firm likewise has a longer puppy
stage. So it helps to be realistic about
what you can accomplish at any given
time and space out those Great Danes
and puppy stages.

SEEK OUTSIDE HELP
So how do you plan for and prioritize
those projects? It helps to have a technology assessment from an outside
facilitator.
Something we often hear from
firms is that they have trouble building consensus among the leadership
team. Different people have their
own agendas or are only thinking
only about their own department,
which hinders progress. When you

bring in an outside facilitator, you
have a neutral third party leading
visionary discussions with the team.
This encourages active participation
and improves buy-in to develop one
core vision.
A technology assessment can:
■ Educate partners on technology
trends in the profession and the
required level of investment for
different projects
■ Recommend strategies to increase
success and help make your firm
future-ready
■ Identify significant technolog y
objectives for short-term and long
term action
■ Ensure your technology plan support
the firm's overall strategic plan
■ Help you evaluate applications and
integrations
■ Assess your IT governance, workload
and staffing model
■ Review current technology infrastructure and processes

CREATE A 3-YEAR PLAN
A technology assessment led by an
outside facilitator can also ensure
that you make a plan, complete with
timelines and responsibilities. This
tends to increase commitment to
projects. It also ensures that when
someone insists we need to add a new
project to the list, the IT department
can say, " Great, which existing project
in the plan do you want to scrap? "
We've worked with firms who
tried to conduct their own technol-

MARCH 2021 ■

ogy assessment and roadmap, only
to find that dates keep shifting and
deadlines aren't met, which pushes
projects past the ideal timeline for
proper planning and execution. This
can throw the overall roadmap
off and decrease success.

Creating a three-year plan
ensures:
■ You give your team adequate time for
project planning
■ You identify potential roadblocks and
determine strategies for overcoming
challenges
Once again, an outside facilitator
can help by holding people accountable for meeting deadlines and providing change management strategies
to increase buy-in across the firm.
So what IT initiatives do you
want to do this year, next year and
beyond? Now is the time to start
planning and prioritizing those
projects. Priorities may change, but
you can revisit your plan quarterly
to ensure you're on track and make
adjustments. Remember, this doesn't
have to be a do-it-yourself project, and
you don't need to reinvent the wheel.
Seek outside expertise to bring in
some much-needed perspective and
increase commitment. ■

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march2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of march2021