ACCT205-1005B-18 Principles of Accounting I Assignment Name: Unit 5 Individual Project Deliverable Length: 1-2 Pages
Details: Selecting a for-profit organization of interest, you will research an unusual or conflicting accounting principle that has impacted your chosen organization. The research will require you to present, review and analyze the organizations published accounting statements of the last two years. Specifically, your research paper will:
* Identify the core functions of each department, their strengths and weaknesses, and make recommendations for improvement, as appropriate
* Identify and describe the underlying problem or conflict
* Compare the alternative courses of action
* Explain the effects at issue
* Recommend options that would be consistent with the organization’s accounting practices, accounting processes, and accounting-related departments.
* Include the last two years of published accounting statements
Present your findings as a 1-2 pages Word document formatted in APA style. Please submit your assignment. Submitting your assignment in APA format means, at a minimum, you will need the following:
1. TITLE PAGE. Remember the Running head: AND TITLE IN ALL CAPITALS.
2. ABSTRACT. A summary of your paper…not an introduction. Begin writing in third person voice.
3. BODY. The body of your paper begins on the page following the title page and abstract page and must be double-spaced (be careful not to triple- or quadruple-space between paragraphs).
The type face should be 12-pt. Times Roman or 12-pt. Courier in regular black type. Do not use color, bold type, or italics except as required for APA level headings and references. The deliverable length of the body of your paper for this assignment is 3-4 pages.
In-body academic citations to support your decisions and analysis are required. A variety of academic sources is encouraged.
4. REFERENCE PAGE. References that align with your in-body academic sources are listed on the final page of your paper. The references must be in APA format using appropriate spacing, hang indention, italics, and upper and lower case usage as appropriate for the type of resource used.
Remember, the Reference Page is not a bibliography but a further listing of the abbreviated in-body citations used in the paper. Every referenced item must have a corresponding in-body citation. This assignment will be assessed using additional criteria provided here. Please submit your assignment. For assistance with your assignment, please use your text, Web resources, and all course materials. Please refer to the following multimedia course material(s): * Unit 5: Financial Statement Analysis and Ratios * Unit 5: Four Analysis Tools Points Possible: 125 Date Due: Sunday, Feb 06, 2011 # Objective: Understand the meaning & effects of transactions on revenues, expenses, assets, liabilities & capital # Prepare a Trial Balance, an Income Statement, Owner’s Equity Statement and Balance Sheet Submitted Files: Submit Assignment Score: N/A Instructor Comments: Here is how I would approach this assignment. You need to use a company that you are VERY familiar with. The reason you need to be familiar with the company is that department core functions are generally NOT outlined in the company’s annual report. So you may want to use a department perhaps in the company you work for and keep in mind that the departmental issue you choose needs to relate back to the organization’s accounting practices.
Let me offer some ideas (please note that these examples you cannot use in your submission, you need to come up with your own ideas):
1. Identify the core functions - Let’s say you use your company’s accounting department and you examine the area of accounts receivable (processing the money from customers). You may note that some of the strengths is the quality (education and experience) of the accounts receivable personnel and that a weaknesses are there are only three people in the department making double checking of work and segregation of duties difficult.
2. Identify and describe the underlying problem – An underlying problem may be that the department receives all the checks in-house as opposed to a bank lockbox. This is an internal control weakness because it delays deposit and access to the money received from customers and also opens the door to potential embezzlement. This underlying problem has to have an accounting impact to it.
3. Compare the alternative courses of action – Alternative courses of action may be to: increase the number of accounting staff (you would indicate the advantage and disadvantage of this versus the other options); or employ the use of a bank lock box.
4. Explain the effects at issue – You can incorporate this discussion in deliverable #2 in which you describe the underlying problem or issue.
5. Recommend options – Remember whatever issue you choose you must relate it back to accounting. After comparing the alternative courses of action you will choose the best alternative and explain why you choose this option.
Grading Rubric Deliverable Points possible Identify the core functions 0-25 points Identify and describe the underlying problem & Explain the effects at issue 0-25 points Compare the alternative courses of action 0-25 points Recommend options 0-25 points Grammar, page length (2 to 3 pages) and APA style 0-25 points Total Points possible 125 Points
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