Question 1

You have been hired as the new Internal Auditor for Ashton Company, a public company. Here's your concern that you bring to the Board of Directors. You wonder if, within the financial industry, public companies are properly valuing long term liabilities on their financial statements. The Board of Directors asks you to prepare a report for a follow-up meeting indicating whether or not their long term liabilities have been properly valued. What key points would you address and why? Share thoughts and suggestions with classmates.

Respond to this...When it comes to valuating long term liabilities, having accurate numbers is one of the most important things for a company to know about. Making sure that all of these items are laid out in the notes and off-balance sheet world, can be crucial to how a company acts in the future and what its current standing is for the board. Having all relevant information is key to a company's long term success. I would concentrate on the matter of making sure everything is on the books first and then determine what valuation has been used. Making sure the proper valuation has been used and updated accordingly can change perspective outlooks for the worse if they have been improperly done. The second thing I would concentrate on is making sure that things are in the proper locations on the off-balance sheet. Improper valuations and locations can have the same effect as before. And finally having all of the proper notes in place will allow investors to make smart decisions for the long term. Happy investors mean happy boards! When I went back to the board I would really make sure that all things are presented in a goodly fashion and tell them what I changed to make sure we are all on the same page.

Question 2

A cost driver is typically a variable like the amount of activity used, that impacts the costs of the process over time. This cost driver creates a cause and effect relationship between the process and the costs associated with it because of the driver. In cost accounting we typically focus on the different cost drivers of key activities to ensure that proper cost management is in place to limit their impact on the financial returns of the business.

Looking at this concept, select two examples of cost drivers and explain the processes they are associated with, their cost impact, and how you would monitor and manage their impacts on the financial performance of the business.

Respond to this..."A cost driver is a variable, such as the level of activity or volume, that causally affects costs over a given time span" (Horngren, 2014).

My examples of cost drivers come from a position I used to hold with a curriculum business that shipped monthly curriculum education packets to daycare centers. The monthly curriculum was created internally and the curriculum had a set price that was charged per month that was for the curriculum and shipping that never changed for each month.

Two price drivers that would be associated with the curriculum would be the number of items needed for each month's curriculum and the weight of the items for each month. If the items needed for a certain month were more than the usual items for a packet, the costs associated for that month could be higher than usual which would cause there to be less income per packet for that month. If the weight of the items were heavier for that month, the shipping would cost more which would also affect income per packet for that month.

The ways in which I would try to monitor and manage the cost driver impacts in these situations is to have lists of items which should not be done together in the same month because their uses together cause the costs to be too high for products or shipping. I would also look into bulk purchases and lighter items that could replace heavy items in creating the crafts in the curriculum packets. By keeping these things in mind during the creation process, it will allow for these drivers to remain at bay and for there to be less fluctuation in financial performance of the business if costs remain at a more consistent level.

Horngren, Charles T., SrikantDatar, MadhavRajan. Cost Accounting, 15th Edition. Pearson Learning Solutions, 02/2014. VitalBook file.

Question 3

Why do you think leading-edge retailers such as Dell and Wal-Mart have such a hold on the market? Is it their technology or their management - or something else?

Respond to this...The two firms listed, and many others as well, hold market shate because of many things.

One is vision. They look ahead and see what customers need and are there to fulfill it. Other than that, it is not just technology or management, but a comination of the two and the way management point toward the vision.

Technology can help with many things, from payroll to inventory to logistics to everything in between, but it cannot do the work on it's own.

A company needs it's technology to evolve while it grows too.

Question 4

This week, your Online Exploration is an exploration of online mapping systems. Visit two of the following sites: MapQuest (http://www.mapquest.com), Rand McNally (http://www.randmcnally.com), and Google Maps (http://www.google.com/maps). Use the interactive capabilities of these sites to plan a trip from your home to any destination more than 100 miles away. As you explore, try all the features of these sites. See what sort of driving directions are available. See what information you can find about businesses and services along the route. Compare the accuracy of this information between sites.

Once you are done exploring, write, your starting point and destination, the sites you explored, and a brief summary of the information you found. Include which site you would use in the future (consider ease of use, costs (if any), clarity of the maps, reliability of the information, features of the website). What about this information system led you to make the decision you made?

Respond to this...For you response post, choose a student who selected a different site than youself, and try to convince them that your site selection is a better choice.

Starting place 724 peppergrass ln 54956Ending 819 S 60th st 53214
I chose starting at my home and ending in one of my offices

Google mapsWith Google Maps, I can choose route in miles or Kilometres or automatic to the regionI can also choose to avoid highways, tolls, or ferries route optionsdirections viaI-41 directly 1hr 29 min without traffic 1hr 31 min with traffic now 101 miI-41 and I 164-S 1hr 42 min without traffic 1hr 45 min now 106 miI-41 and I-43 S 1 hr 58 min 2 hr 3 min now 119 mi MapQuestGave me same options to narrow my search to avoid highways, etc and to do in Kilometres or miles.Gave me routes that literally took me all over the state in addition to the same "direct" routes I got from Google maps. These directions were about the same.Mapquest had integrated buttons that allowed me to see hotels, food, gas, grocery, coffee, parking, bars (great while driving), postal offices,airports, atms...well, you get the idea, everything you cvan think of. I chose to look at grocery stores to check what it would show me and found10 stores, most in the Milwaukee area with none, including the 3 within a mile of my house.I found driving directions a bit harder to find than on Google Maps.Could not find the times and distances on the direct routes that I got from Google.Both sites easily reversed directions for return home.

My opinion is that, if I am taking a recreational trip and want lots of trip info like gas and grocery, then I would choose MapQuest.Fo just plain directions that get me there and back with pretty much no frills, it is Google Maps.