In an effort to gain a clean audit opinion by 2007 and to comply with the 1990 Chief Financial Officers Act, the Defense Department will take advantage of a rarely used direct-hire authority to immediately bring 300 experienced auditors on board over the next few years.The authority was approved Monday by the Office of Personnel Management, and allows the DoD to hire auditors at grade levels 11 through 15 for the Office of the Deputy Inspector General for Auditing, Government Executive reported.The direct hire authority allows agencies to hire qualified candidates without the long drawn

Ernst & Young LLP has learned that staying connected to employees who leave the firm is good for business.About five years ago, the Toronto-based accounting firm decided to ask former employees what the company could do for them, even though they no longer drew a paycheck from E&Y. Colleen Albiston, E&Y's director of national marketing, traveled around Canada and found a strong desire for continuing education. Former staffers were given the same access as current employees to E&Y-sponsored webcasts that discuss developments in the field.

By Lisa A. Rozycki, Marketing Director, Reinsel & Company LLPIn a firm-wide marketing survey, employees were asked what would motivate them to market the firm’s services. Not surprisingly, the top two answers were "incentive compensation" and "recognition" for their efforts.Like many CPA firms across the country, we’ve had the standard commission structure on new business and cross-selling services to existing clients for a number of years. Three years ago, the paper forms that needed to be filled out for compensation almost never left the shelf.

Men in the accounting field aren't alone anymore on the path to becoming partners in their firms. CPA firms are making great strides toward assuring women the same opportunities as men by providing mentoring and a clearly defined path to success.The latest data available from American Colleges and Universities shows that in the 2001-2002 academic year, 57 percent of those receiving bachelor's degrees in accounting were women, compared to 43 percent male accounting graduates. Over one-third of all these graduates will take their first job in public accounting.

Pay disparity continues to be a concern for one-in-five women who say they are paid less than men with similar talents and experience. The same amount of women reported they have fewer opportunities for career advancement than men at their current organizations, according to a new CareerBuilder.com survey. The CareerBuilder.com "Men and Women at Work 2004" survey of men and women was conducted from April 6 to April 19, 2004. When asked why they think men are paid more, four-in-ten women attribute it to favoritism shown by men in management to other men in the organization.

Do you feel like your boss doesn't communicate very well? You're not alone. A new survey finds a majority of professionals across many industries rate their boss average to poor when it comes to communication skills.A whopping 91% of those surveyed said effective communication is "critical" to leadership, yet less than one third said that there were enough true voices of leadership in their organizations.

Corporate executives are not the only ones whose pay is being scrutinized — top officials at nonprofit organizations can expect regulators to take a hard look at how much they earn.The Internal Revenue Service and state regulators are planning to contact hundreds of nonprofit organizations about pay practices for their top officials. Some groups may be audited.Steve T. Miller, director of the IRS' exempt-organizations division, told the Wall Street Journal that the agency has identified between 100 and 200 groups in which an executive or board member earns more than $1 million a year.

The nation's Better Business Bureaus (BBBs) this week reported that services provided to consumers and businesses in 2003 surged to 52.9 million, up 27 percent from the 41.5 million instances of service provided in 2002. Pre-purchase Information: Pre-buying inquiries in the United States increased to 48.8 million in 2003, up nearly 28 percent from 38.2 million in 2002. These requests included 30.8 million BBB reliability reports on businesses located in the U.S.

Feeling guilty about spending time away from the office this summer? You may be doing your company a favor. More than half (51 percent) of executives surveyed recently said employees are more productive after a vacation than before one. The survey was developed by Accountemps, the world's first and largest specialized staffing service for temporary accounting, finance and bookkeeping professionals.