Post by Lauryn Hanrahan:

With the March 15th deadline behind us and only twenty-something days of tax season left, WS+B Red Bank held their annual tax season bowling break. A few weeks ago, I received an email and was notified, to my surprise (and slight horror), that I was selected as a bowling captain. The email instructed all captains to recruit a handful of team members and to report back on their selections. Upon reading this, there was a noticeable bustle around the office as people hurried to secure their top picks for recruits. Trades and deals were made, and within the hour, emails were sent to report team rosters, names and team themes.

It turned out that some people chose their teammates without prior approval while others sought out their desired recruit to procure a verbal agreement. This, of course, caused mass chaos as the same person was frequently chosen by two teams, simultaneously. Sour thoughts grew due to the state of confusion, but the situation was remedied by a random draw, leaving everyone with a team of five or six.

Although competition can be healthy, this situation made me realize that sometimes taking something too seriously can drive all of the fun out of it. At first, many of us missed the mark, focusing too much on our teams and not enough on the idea of a fun break with co-workers. After all of the fuss, my randomly selected team was better than I could have wished. They were the perfect mix of people I knew, people I kind of knew and people who I hadn’t had too much experience with. With a little creativity, a good team attitude and two buffalo suits, we ended up winning second place in the theme contest — and had a lot of fun doing it!

My lesson learned for this week is not to sweat the small stuff. It’s understandable that there are situations in life that are stressful, but most things aren’t worthy of giving ourselves wrinkles over. So take a break, organize your thoughts, and when all else fails? Keep calm and…go bowling!

Lauryn

Post by Lauryn Hanrahan:

When I first came to Withum in October, I wasn’t what you would call “too busy,” so I would work on case studies, for practice, in GoSystems. I worked on each of them multiple times, studiously following the directions and then testing myself by not looking at the steps and trying again. For the first time this past week, I was assigned a few actual tax returns, as opposed to practice ones, ranging (in my opinion) from easy to medium to hard. It’s through preparing these returns that I have learned the importance of my prior year work papers.

During our Fraud CPE this past fall, Tim Gearty, Becker Professional Education class founder, spoke on how work papers can be your best friend or your worst enemy. I’ve recently learned that he was NOT joking. I was a little overwhelmed upon being assigned my first tax return of the year, especially when flipping through the giant envelope of client workpapers.  So, I did the only sensible thing that came to mind. Instead of staring blankly into space and spinning my wheels, I went into Go File Room and opened up the prior year workpaper PDF for that particular client. Hallelujah! A road map! I thanked God at the sight of the very detailed notes my predecessor had left behind. I also vowed that I would be one of these copious-note-leavers, just in case my successor finds him or herself in the same boat. Notes in hand (or, on the double monitor, rather) I felt confident in my ability to prepare the return.

Upon receiving the return back from the reviewer, I found that there were a few things I’d missed but that I don’t think I would have otherwise known before completing the return. To remedy this, I’ve started to keep a “tax cheat sheet.” In it, I take notes on any tax rule that is a little odd or that I wouldn’t normally think to do right off the bat. I also write down helpful hints or bits of information I learn from my co-workers.  The sheet doesn’t have much in it so far, but I’m sure it will be full sooner rather than later.

Looking back, I can’t help but think how lost I would have felt if it weren’t for the detail included in those particular prior year workpapers. The notes we take as accountants are so important because we work on many jobs that only take place once per year. Ideas and directions may seem sharp and clear five minutes from task completion, but trying to recall them a year later is no easy feat. Lesson learned for this week? A good work paper is worth its weight in gold.

Lauryn