IRS Commish Doug Shulman was on form today. In remarks to the American Payroll Association and the American Accounts Payable Association, he offered some thoughts on a topic that’s never far from my mind: the symbiosis between tax and technology.

Setting his remarks in the context of a looming massive expansion of information reporting requirements that will have a huge impact on small businesses (see my earlier post), Shulman developed his theme of “don’t worry, tech will save us” by tracing a history of tax technology back to the 1970s and the end of the punch card era. In 1971, he said, the IRS received 360 million information documents, enough to fill more than 35 boxcars. But technology advances were already on the march; 70 million of those documents were submitted on magnetic tape. more

Last week, I got a call from Eric Krell, who also blogs in this space for Business Finance. He had been hired by a professional association to research the question: What will the finance function look like in the year 2020? He figured that because I have spent years writing about the role and people of finance, I’d make a good mark.

I do not opine about finance in the cloud and that sort of thing. But I do, always, wonder about finance/accounting people and their skills sets and how they evolve in response to changing business conditions and investor appetites for risk and reward. more

Remember the B2B commerce exchanges of a decade ago? At one point, new exchanges were popping up almost weekly.

By 2002, the concept was dead. Mohanbir Sawhney, writing in CIO Magazine in 2002, penned a eulogy here: “Just two years ago, business-to-business trading exchanges were the rage. Experts, including myself, waxed eloquent about the potential of B2B exchanges to act as hubs, connecting buyers and sellers in electronic marketplaces. Of course, we were all very wrong. Now, most B2B exchanges are either dead or on life support. However, it’s not the concept of the exchange that is flawed but the execution of that concept.”

The idea of using the Internet to mediate commerce between companies didn’t die completely. Some players, like Ariba, survived to introduce a cloud-based version, the Ariba Commerce Cloud. Validating the concept, IBM just dropped $1.4 billion to acquire Sterling Commerce, another old B2B exchange player. The value for CFOs lies in where and how this concept can save money. more

Sure, keeping tax liabilities to a minimum is important, but when it comes right down to it, the crucial thing is making sure the returns are timely and accurate. That’s according to 41 percent of respondents in a Grant Thornton survey of CFOs and senior comptrollers released today. more