Sarbanes-Oxley Act and Corporate Responsibility
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) greatly expands corporate governance requirements, protecting investors by improving the accuracy and reliability of corporate financial disclosures. Initially created for publicly held corporations, SOX enactment in fact created a ripple effect for all companies. Private, nonprofits and smaller public firms are also instituting corporate governance reforms due to expectations set by business partners, financial institutions, prospective investors, and auditors.
SOX principles form the foundation of sound financial management — and simply make good business sense. For the interests and prosperity of your company, begin implementing best practices in financial management today.
Compliance Readiness: Our People, Our Products
Deltek recognizes the importance of SOX to both public and private organizations. A highly experienced Deltek team of executives, directors and consultants have created a Sarbanes-Oxley task force to proactively address the effect of SOX on our clients — and our solutions. Working closely with clients and risk management consulting experts, Deltek is firmly positioned to address the evolving challenges in the new world of corporate governance.
Deltek products are designed primarily by degreed accountants, including CPAs, with years of experience in financial reporting — Deltek solutions are closely integrated in the initiation, recording, processing and reporting of financial transactions. Internal controls are always a design objective, and these, along with industry tenure, play a significant part in Deltek products’ role in SOX:
Regardless of whether or not your organization is being formally reviewed now, you could find your current operations under evaluation in the near future.
Performance Management
The ability to plan is directly related to the ability to access current and historical data – with an accurate picture of the past, you possess a clear vision of the future. For project-based businesses, visibility of project performance is critical to project management and overall financial results.
With Deltek products, project accounting is integrated with financial reporting, giving ultimate performance visibility. Deltek, in partnership with Cognos® Corporation, delivers comprehensive performance management, giving real time access to trends and patterns, so you can make timely, informed decisions.
Control Points and Section 404
Designed primarily by degreed accountants and CPAs with years of experience in financial reporting, Deltek products feature hundreds of control points. In our solutions, controls are always a design objective.
To maximize the usefulness of Deltek software within a variety companies, however, flexibility is also a requirement. Therefore, a multitude of options for setup and control points are available during implementation.
Control and Reporting: Section 404
Complying with Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404 is taking substantially longer than most estimated, and the deadline looms near for many companies. In response to Section 404, Deltek is now offering clients the Deltek Control and Reporting solution – identifying specific automated controls within specific Deltek products.*
The control elements documentation has two major components – the control elements matrix and the control elements reporting solution. The matrix provides a list, by module, of all system control elements in a series of Microsoft® Excel workbooks. The reporting solution, powered by Cognos® Corporation, is a series of reports that can be run against the database at any time, showing which system controls are activated.
If you would like to request a copy of this documentation, please contact your Deltek account manager.
*Available for Deltek Costpoint® and Deltek Time Collection™.
Education and Training
Educated, informed users of your financial application are a key component to good internal controls. To help develop your team’s knowledge, Deltek has more than 25 unique training courses offered in our training centers nationwide. Alternatively, we can come to you with on-site training to help you meet training requirements.
As always, Deltek consultants are available to assist you. From understanding your system to the implications of your control choices, our consultants sole purpose is to serve you. With our experts on hand, the standardization of your business processes and the documentation of your internal controls will go smoothly.