Thomson Reuters Urges Accounting Firms to Embrace Technology

Accounting firms elevate their relevance and provide more value to their clients by embracing technology and better aligning their services to meet the needs of today’s business owners and personal clients, a Thomson Reuters executive told 1,300 tax and accounting professionals at the company’s annual users’ conference last week. These business owners and personal clients have been significantly influenced by our current mobile web, consumer-oriented world.

“Many accounting firms still favor dated and inefficient ways of doing business, effectively trying to serve their clients in the same manner they always have, even though that world may no longer exist,” said Jon Baron, managing director of the Professional segment in the Tax & Accounting business of Thomson Reuters. The company’s Professional segment provides accounting, tax, and practice management software and technology infrastructure to the accounting profession in the U.S. and Canada.

“Overall client experience matters more today than it has before,” Baron said. “It’s no longer enough to provide after-the-fact reporting and compliance work. Clients expect to benefit from the expertise and experience of the firm in the form of driving improved business and financial results, better tax planning programs, and more proactive, strategic direction and advice. They have been influenced by phenomenal changes in technology as consumers and want to interact with their service providers in a manner consistent with today’s digital, mobile, always connected world. They want communication and collaboration with their accounting firm to be seamless, accessible 24×7, and delivered in a convenient, simple, accessible, and secure format, with an easy-to-understand design interface across a myriad of devices.”