Noah's Ark is the oldest example of a contingency plan, described in the Hebrew Scriptures as a great boat designed to save Noah, his family, and a fair few animals from the great flood. It's nothing new, therefore, to plan for the unexpected whether that is natural or man-made disasters. And there are plenty of examples to glean lessons from, including the recent fires of southern California, Hurricane Katrina, the U.S. terror attacks of 9/11, to name only a few.

Internal audit departments are in the middle of "an evolutionary transition" facing great opportunity and challenges, according to Ernst & Young's 2007 Global Internal Audit Survey, which analyzes current developments and identifies future trends and leading practices based on findings from a survey of Internal Audit directors of 138 predominantly public companies.

Your success as an entrepreneur comes down to whether or not you can pay your bills and still turn a profit. Seems obvious, right? It is, but achieving a healthy balance between monetary intake and output is an art form that confounds many entrepreneurs. According to entrepreneurial guru Ty Freyvogel, your ability to manage your cash flow will either make you or break you. Eight cash flow secrets of entrepreneursBy Ty FreyvogelI have seen otherwise successful entrepreneurs crumble under the stress of poorly managed cash flow.

In a letter to Robert H. Herz, chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), two committee chairmen of Financial Executives International (FEI) have requested that FASB delay implementation of SFAS No. 157 - Fair Value Measurements (FAS 157) for one year in order to allow companies and their accounting firms time to prepare for implementation. Currently, FAS 157 is effective for fiscal years beginning after November 15, 2007. The Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) has also requested the delay, CFO.com reports.

AccountingWEB is pleased to offer a presentation of Small Business Trends Radio. This is an hour-long broadcast that can be downloaded as a podcast or played on your computer.Starting your own small business can be an exciting venture. However, there are several things that many do not think about in advance that could put them out of business before they have barely begun. And attempting to handle some of these problems on your own may ultimately lead to negative results.Michael Rozbruch, CEO of Tax Resolution Services will assist you in steering clear of these costly pitfalls.

Fraud investigator Andy Wilson has produced a list of self-tests that companies can use to measure how well defended they are against receivables fraud.Here's a rundown of his guidelines..."I don't understand it. Business is as good as it has ever been ... but there is no money in the bank," said the owner of a floral business to a group of anti-fraud professionals he had retained to determine if the business was bleeding cash via internal fraud.Two days before the fraud examination was to begin the bookkeeper failed to report to work.

Businesses that are eligible to elect S corporation tax treatment now have a simpler process for requesting relief for late elections under a change announced this week by the Internal Revenue Service.Revenue Procedure 2007-62 allows small businesses that missed filing Form 2553, Election by a Small Business Corporation, before filing their first Form 1120S, U.S. Income Tax Return for an S Corporation, to file both forms simultaneously.