Mind The Gap

This past week I finished all of the work for the Spring I semester. Spring II starts on March 31, but I’m only taking one class so it might not be too bad.

Spring I was pretty hectic, but probably due more to work work than to the school work. I took accounting information systems, and entrepreneurship.

Accounting Information Systems

I decided to take this class because of my recent work on reports from our customer information system that are used in derivatives accounting schtuff. I thought taking the class might help me learn an thing or two about the systems that accounting types use to do the things that they do. And maybe I could also learn a thing or two about “internal controls” that I could apply. I needed to pick an upper division business elective, so this seemed like a good one.

The course description says: “Principles involved in establishing an accounting information system. Included are source documents, internal controls, and the interfaces needed for managerial control of the business. The integration of managerial accounting information needs with the design and implementation of systems is studied.”

My only flub here is that by the word systems, I assumed we meant software systems, and so I had hoped we would be talking mostly about databases, and authentication, and stuff like that, and how those things apply to the accounting world. We don’t, necessarily mean software systems though. Accounting information system could also mean a series of paper files, paper ledgers, and adding machine tape. The term refers generally to the series of processes and pieces of information that move around and get stored during the course of carrying out the company’s accounting tasks. I am aware that my initial hope for more technical content was wishful thinking on my part, because this is a business program elective, not a technology program elective. There was some more general technical content starting about half way into the course, so that’s when my interest level really kicked in.

So, for the first couple weeks my assignments consisted largely of entering data into QuickBooks Online Edition. Point to note here is that the online edition is pretty slick, better than what I expected out of an online ledger/invoice/bank account/etc entry system. I was kind of bored during this part on account of the drudgery, but at least there was that slick UI to check out. The text appears to have been written by a gator fan as well due to thinly veiled references to Gainesville and the Gators (mostly in the screen shots of data that we’d have to mimic as we entered information).

Then we switched from the QB focused textbook to another package, which was basically a business in an envelope. It came with lots of documents (invoices, fake checks, etc) journal and ledger workbooks, transaction lists, and even some flow charts explaining who did what and what the various procedures are. I was scared to death I was going to be asked to enter and file stuff and somehow mail this package back to the instructor.

Fortunately, this was not the case, and instead we were supposed to take the various transactions, look up the flow chart on how they are processed, and identify the internal controls, and control weaknesses, and describe them. Now this was muuuuuch more along the lines of what I was looking for. This made up for the first couple weeks.

The last couple of assignments were also focused on controls, but in those assignments we read a short case study out of a book and then answered some questions about it and gave recommendations on preventing or being better prepared for whatever type of fraud or disaster occurred. There was even a case on disaster recovery!

My inner process nerd rejoiced. I practically even enjoyed the assignments. Insanity!

A++++ would learn again!

Entrepreneurship

Course Description: “This course introduces the student to the process used in the creation of an effective business plan. The economic, social, and cultural impact of entrepreneurship in the United States will be investigated. The analytical tools necessary to evaluate business strategies and creating a market-based competitive advantage will be stressed. Topics such as forms of ownership, franchising, and the analysis of purchasing an existing business will be covered. The students will be taught the basis of developing a financial plan, managing cash flow, and integrating the marketing plan with the financial and legal analysis to produce a business plan.”

The textbook was jam-packed with business examples and all kinds of “real world” information, but there were so many words that I mostly skimmed it. A thorough copy-edit with a focus on paring down would probably improve readership dramatically, at least for us NADD kids.

The aspect of writing a business plan was interesting to me. The incessant desire for it to be in APA format was not. I received a zero on the first assignment for doing it in outline format instead of a normal paragraph format. At the midterm point I was told I was failing the course, but only 3 weeks worth of assignments had been graded and included in this figure (8 week term, so theoretically midterm grade should have included week 4′s work as well).

The syllabus had a requirement to log in to the WebCT site at least 4 times per week, which I found odd as due dates were such that one could log in twice per week to do the assignments by their due date, and thus meet all requirements aside from the 4 logins/week rule. This does not seem to have been counted against me, although after the midterm grade incident I tried to deliberately log in a lot.

Overall I found it kind of awkward and tiresome, which disappointed me because the class had a lot of promise and I started out pretty pumped about getting to spend time creating this business plan that I could later use should I ever venture out as a for real entrepreneur. I think my spiral downward is because I get sort of automatically turned off whenever too much structure is imposed (focusing on format over content, or seemingly arbitrary requirements, KILLS me). I feel like my creativity is inhibited, which causes my giveacrap to get inhibited, and I go into “what will pass?” mode.

Despite all that, putting together the power point to present the business plan for the last assignment was pretty fun, and the business plan itself seems like a valuable exercise. Those items raise my personal enjoyment of the class to D+, maybe a C on a good day. I wonder if the grade I earned will be much higher…

So, I received one of those things from a friend of mine where they ‘tag’ you, and you’re supposed to write a few random things about yourself, share it with them, and then tag a few other folks. I’m going to skip out on the tagging others part, but the writing random things part sounded kinda fun, so I’ll do that part.

I’m breaking the rules by posting the content here instead of on myspace, but hey, that’s how I roll.

Without further ado, my 16 random things:

1. I read a lot of web comics.
2. I find value in the grainy popping sound sometimes found when playing real vinyl records on a real record player.
3. I like retro tacky stuff. A lot.
4. I’m shocked and amazed on a near daily basis that I figured out how to get someone to pay me for being a process nerd.
5. I want to learn how to sew more adeptly than I do now.
6. A not-so-secret goal of mine is to show Corporate America that tattoos and purple hair do not mean that you are either dumb, or smart but so ‘artistic’ that you are totally impractical.
7. I get a high from operating the whiteboard in a really good design meeting.
8. I use twitter.
9. I wish I could adopt every single lonely little puppy in the county and keep them at my house.
10. I really, seriously dig rock band and the nerdy crew that lets me play it with them.
11. I refinished a formica countertop all by myself and it actually came out looking good. Then Ryan scratched it accidentally.
12. One of my most prized possessions is an antique copy of Dante’s Divine Comedies.
13. I think it’d be really cool to learn how to build and fix things and generally be handy.
14. I am a COMPLETE slacker about vacuuming.
15. I always procrastinate on homework for school. Pretty much always have too.
16. I’m working on perfecting a recipe for corn bread fritters.

Thanks to Ryan’s diligent efforts, and some futzing I did with the gimp, the recipe recording wiki is up, and I’ve started pouring data into it.

Woo! Data!

http://heather.unwashedmeme.com/wiki/

Did a little refreshing of the old hair color last night.

Now that we are over halfway through the week, I reckon it’s time to blog about last weekend. Since I remembered to stick my camera in my purse, there are many photos.

FRIDAY

Flowers seen while on a nice walk on a break at work:

Yummy dinner cooked Friday night with friends.

I can’t help but think this would make a cool wallpaper.

There was even a delicious dessert.

SATURDAY

After a quick stop by the tattoo shop (Evolve) to talk to Suzi about some work, we went over to Russ’ house, and shortly thereafter to Nathan’s house. We elected ourselves to the dinner committee and began operation Get Lost At Fresh Market, which was a HUGE SUCCESS. The food was good too.

The Rock Band was better though, and so I have pictures of it.

SUNDAY

On Sunday I went up to the shop and got the red/orange/yellow on my back touched up. It hurt. Woo!