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Invitation to attend the 2008 APS Annual Client Conference
APS is excited to extend an invitation for you to join us at our Annual Client Conference from the 6th to 8th November 2008. This year is the 17th Annual APS Client Conference and is also the 10th anniversary of our Australian business. It is the first time the conference has been held in Sydney, one of the most beautiful cities in the world.
The APS Client Conference has grown tremendously in size and reputation over the years and is renowned amongst our clients as being an informative, valuable and essential event for APS users to attend.
The theme for this year’s conference is ‘Building Practice Value’, threading in important aspects of Leadership, Innovation & Technology and the delicate commercial/cultural balance in the firm of the future.
The conference is a mix of seminars, discussion groups, keynote speeches and social functions, with our Saturday Night Gala Dinner always concluding the event with great style.
Our venue this year is the spectacular Star City in the Darling Harbour area of Sydney city. It is easily accessible from the Airport, and the central business district.
As in previous years, we expect the conference to sell out this year with over 250 delegates expected from the majority of Australian and NZ top accounting firms.
Why Attend?
At APS we firmly believe that the success of any organisation depends upon their ability to manage their resources and knowledge as efficiently as possible. This is particularly the case with professional service firms where skilled staff represent the biggest cost, as well as the biggest asset as a means of earning revenue.
We believe this year sees us fulfil our ‘roadmap’ with the final pieces in a comprehensive software offering without compromise.
This conference provides you with an opportunity to absorb a wide range of diverse topics, including seeing our new products and mixing with delegates from other successful firms. It also provides an opportunity to set you up for future strategies within your practice, no matter what your role is.
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APS Main Session
2008 has been a significant development year for APS, with a large number of development and integration projects due to be completed during 2008.
As innovation is one of the themes for this year’s conference, come and listen to our view on the changing technology landscape, our vision for the future and what it means for your practice.
After many years of planning and development effort, we are incredibly excited to be able to bring together a completely integrated solution on the latest Microsoft development and SQL platforms including;
Practice Management (PM), Workflow and Resource Planning (RP), CRM, Tax, XPA and Workpaper Management (WM), Business Intelligence (PIQ), Desktop Super (DS), Corporate Affairs (ACR), Document, Email and Content Management. This level of integration is an industry first and represents The Holy Grail for the accounting profession.
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Key Note Speaker - John Eales
Former Queensland and Australia lock John Eales will be remembered as one of the all-time great rugby players. His retirement from Rugby in September 2001 marked the end of an era for the Australian game. Not only is he the second-most capped Wallaby ever, he is also the most capped Wallaby captain.
In 2002, John started a new phase in his life transferring his leadership skills to the corporate world. He is now a Director of the Mettle Group and has an executive role with BT Financial Group. John holds positions on several Boards and was recently named an Australian Rugby Statesmen by the ARU.
As our Key note Speaker John will discuss how coaching, teamwork, leadership and the right culture in an organisation is critical to its success and longevity.
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Peter Sheahan – Building an Employer Brand
Peter Sheahan is globally recognised as a leading expert in workforce trends, generational change and employer branding. Peter's success is driven by his ability to identify areas of untapped potential within organisations, develop the unique thought processes and skills required to convert that potential into performance, then engage with key individuals at all levels to make it a reality.
Peter Sheahan is adamant that the worsening skills shortage and a rapidly ageing population mean organisations must start to compete aggressively to attract and retain the best talent. In order to remain competitive, Peter believes that firms must build an “Employer Brand” that “screams distinction, opportunity and value”.
Join Peter for an action packed keynote session followed later by a workshop on Employer Branding. Peter’s sessions will present the case for building an employer brand, provide a model for employer brand definition and suggest ideas to market that brand given the changing nature of the workforce. This is a must attend session for all firms.
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Practice Analysis – IT Planning as a Strategic Focus
When it comes to planning IT projects or building IT Strategies in the fast lane it’s all too easy to get consumed with an endless list of today’s tasks. Like all projects, what helps is structure. Holding a strategic approach is all important in this regard so as to avoid knee jerk solutions and maintain the confidence of IT stakeholders. This two part session will provide clients with frameworks that promote strategy and structure and assist the IT function have clearer communication with their management board.
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Shirlaws – Increase Your Practice Value & Develop Real Succession
“We want Andrew back please!”
An overwhelming response from last year’s conference brings back Andrew Mackenzie, CEO Shirlaws Australia. Shirlaws is the fastest growing Business Coaching organisation across Australasia and UK. Shirlaws and Andrew personally have extensive experience helping grow the value of Accounting Firms across Australasia over the past 5 years.
This year Andrew will run interactive workshops. He will share his experience of how you can sustain an increase in practice value including:
· How some Accounting Firms have doubled their valuation in 3 years
· How to value your practice differently
· How to develop succession within your firm and ensure fair value for equity
· Why “Income” vs “Equity” decisions need unanimous partner support
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Quickbooks QBi
This address will focus primarily on the new QuickBooks 2008/09 QBi series. The new QuickBooks QBi release is a step change in technology and the most significant since 2000. Since QBi now scales to 30 concurrent users it becomes viable as a cost effective, back-office General Ledger, creditors and payroll solution for APS clients as well as a mid-range enterprise solution for your clients.
This update will cover the enhanced integration between APS PM and QBi (both revenue journals from PM and disbursements & expenses to clients WIP).
The presentation will also cover the Accountants Edition of QBi which has been developed specifically for accountants, with many new features designed to improve the workflow and level of interaction between APS users and clients who are QuickBooks users. Some of the key features covered include the ability to work on the same ledger simultaneously with your clients and electronically send back all adjustments to be merged with your client’s file.
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Interwoven and Advance
We will be profiling the web version of WorkSite called WorkSite Web.
This delivers WorkSite’s collaboration WorkSpaces, content KnowledgeSpaces, and document management capabilities via the Web. See how you can use WorkSite Web to aggregate critical information and deliver a 360-degree view of the most up-to-date information. WorkSite Web consolidates other internal or external systems to establish a “one-stop shop” all via your intranet, extranet or the Internet. WorkSite Web is fully integrated with WorkSite’s document management capabilities, and therefore Advance, which organises and manages all related paper, electronic, and e-mail documents in a single system.
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Advance Corporate Register
Advance Corporate Register (ACR) has been specifically designed and built for simplicity and ease of use in managing corporate compliance. It allows users to create and maintain professional corporate registers and minutes, lodge the appropriate forms directly with ASIC using cutting edge security and encryption techniques over the internet.
ACR provides immediate, online access to ASIC EDGE, ECR & DATASTREAM services allowing users to generate, lodge and track a wide range of ASIC agent forms, company registrations and name reservations as well as company and director changes.
Using the latest .NET and SQL technology platforms, ACR is integrated with Advance PM and its client database. This means changes to data such as names or addresses, change of registered office made within the PM, will be queued within ACR, requiring only a simple acknowledgement to then be submitted electronically to ASIC. No more dual data entry!
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Practice Management
Taking on board feedback from clients after Conference last year, we decided to bring forward the release of version 9.1. We have been our own beta site since May 2008 and 9.1 will be available for limited release from July 2008. At conference this year, we will show you what’s new in the released Version 9.1 including new Fees features, new Budgets, new Advance Document Management, new Straight Profit Fees, new Outlook Contact Integration and new Console layouts.
We will also showcase the next release of Practice Management - Version 10. This release is significant in that it is the framework and underlying engine that has been built to facilitate the migration of PM to the new Microsoft .NET framework. PM provides the platform for the new integrated suite of products as well as further enhancements not seen last year.
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Advance Document Management (ADM) and AdvanceDocs
Advance Document Management (ADM) was released as part of PM Version 9.1. We have re-modelled Notes and Links for the .NET world and introduced a separate documents area, which gives us far greater email and document storage and retrieval capability going forward. We will also show you enhancements to the latest release of Advance Docs that will further enrich your PDF, scanning and document management experience.
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PM Workflow and Resource Planning
A hot topic for the profession right now! If you are serious about Resource Planning, these sessions aim to show you how and why we have arrived at our design and the benefits of integrating this system with Practice Management. Come along and see how your firm can lower operational costs and maximise resource utilisation with this exciting new offering.
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Xcede Professional Accounting
This past year saw the completion of XPA V.9.0. See what we have done with Comparative Journal entries, Asset Comparatives (including prior year additions and disposals) and Asset Un-Integration. We will take a look at best practice for; Group/Consolidation Reporting; Account Code Translation and Trust Distributions. We would also like to show you how to add value with advanced Xcede reporting.
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WorkPaper Management (WPM)
We will demonstrate the new WorkPaper application, including seamless access to documents from within XPA V.9.0. See how you can organize client work via templates and create ad-hoc work papers on demand. Keep track of client work via the Project Manager, roll documents from one year to the next, link to scanned images, and more…
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Australian Tax
Tax Software must keep pace with legislative, ATO and technology changes. Building a product that allows for this is a serious challenge. Legislative changes drive content and the smart use of technology is a catalyst that drives improved processes, adaptability and flow on cost savings. Melding content with process is the key focus of the new Advance Tax product.
Advance Tax is a new 100% .NET application that has been developed from the ground up using some of the latest technologies and tools from Microsoft. Using these tools, it is designed from the ground up to easily leverage, adopt and incorporate emerging technologies such as the new Standard Business Reporting and ATO requirements. Advance Tax has been built for change!
This is a must see session for any practitioner involved in tax planning, compliance, preparation and filing of Australian Tax returns.
New Zealand Tax
A 'Tips and Tricks' session on functions and options that you may not be aware of. We'll walk you through each one so you can take this knowledge back to your office to share. Often the smallest 'tips and tricks' are of great benefit when processing returns. We will also review what we have in store for next year’s tax release.
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Innovation through Technology – Case Studies
As a people led organisation, our role is to identify what each client wants to achieve in their business and work with a range of proprietary and third party software applications to help the achievement of those goals. We make promises, we ask for the trust of clients and, importantly, we deliver.
This exciting session will see APS clients showcase how they have best harnessed the power of APS applications to provide crucial business information to executives, decision makers, their clients and internal resources.
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PIQ
Come and see Advance PIQ V.9.1 and how we have implemented some long awaited features as well as some new ideas.
Report Save and Incremental Update will be highlighted along with some new reporting options available through Microsoft Reporting Services which caters for larger more granular reporting and printing. See how the structures put in place in PIQ V.9 for SQL2005 will stand the test of time through SQL2008 and beyond.
See the outstanding new management and workflow reports now available because of new PM functionality. Gauge for yourselves just how valuable these will be to your firm. With developments happening all the time, come and see our vision for the future of your Business Intelligence investment.
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CRM 9.1
Developed specifically for professional services firms, Advance CRM 9.1 includes major enhancements to all aspects of the product we launched 3 years ago. Integrated to Advance PM and benefiting from the improved console navigation of Advance PM 9.1 clients will be suitably impressed with this new version. Not content with building a CRM solution within the Advance console framework our development team have been busy creating a web based interface and integration to Outlook. Extending access to the Web, Outlook and even your PDA has been a key focus of this next evolution of CRM and demonstrates our strong commitment to building the most integrated business platform for professional firms.
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Desktop Super
Two years on and still going strong. Seen the rest, now come and see the BEST. We will show you why Desktop Super is better. Come and see “How to Produce a Super Fund in 30 Minutes”. Review Auto Income Allocation, Integrated Investment Register, Flexible Financial Accounts and Member Reports, Integrated Minute System and Tax Preparation and Lodgement.
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CONFERENCE ENTERTAINMENT
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James Reyne
James Reyne was founding member, lead singer, musician and songwriter of Australian Crawl, one of the biggest bands of the eighties - having sold over 1.5 million copies and received eight Australian Music Awards. ‘The Boys Light Up’ album is acknowledged as one of the classic Australian rock albums of all time, while the No.1 hit song ‘Reckless’, is still one of the most requested Australian songs on radio. James’ solo career has enjoyed even greater success with several top ten albums and numerous number one singles.
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Reverend Funk
Reverend Funk and the horns of Salvation is a Melbourne based 7-10 piece line up, playing Soul, Funk, R&B and Disco dance music made famous by the original Masters from the 60's till now. A Corporate and Live act who really know what they are doing. Time after time, and time and again the band is met with satisfied clients and guests. Often quickly re-booked for the same event, this band has performed in almost every corporate venue around Melbourne, every Hotel Ballroom and major event space.
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Saturday Night Gala Dinner
The Saturday Night Gala Dinner marks the end of the three day conference, and provides an opportunity for everyone to relax, socialise and enjoy some great food, wine and entertainment. Those who have attended a Saturday night gala dinner in previous years know that it’s one big party!
In celebration of the Australian business’s 10th birthday, the theme for the Saturday Night Gala Dinner this year is “Black Tie”. Everyone who attends is encouraged to suit up and frock up, and get ready for a night out to remember!
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Copyright Advanced Professional Solutions © 2008
© 2008 Advanced Professional Solutions Ltd. All rights reserved.
All other trademarks are acknowledged.
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Company Details:
APS AUS
Advanced Professional Solutions Pty Ltd, Level 7, 65 Berry Street, North Sydney NSW 2060
Tel: +61 (2) 9965 1300 Fax: +61 (2) 9460 2630
APS NZ
Advanced Professional Solutions Ltd, ITC House, 9 City Road, Auckland, New Zealand
Tel: +64 (0) 9 302 2228 Fax: +64 (0) 9 302 2121
APS UK
Castle Gate House, 14 London Road, Reigate, Surrey, RH2 9HY
Tel: +44 (0) 1737 24 26 96 Fax: +44 (0) 1737 303 045 |
