Reporting Practices and Ethics
HCS 405
January 15, 2015
Reporting Practices and Ethics
The Four Elements of Financial Management
The four elements of financial management involve controlling, decision making, organizing, and original records. The Controlling involves management’s responsibility to ensure that the unit follows organizational plans and objectives. Controlling also involves studying current reports, comparing them with previous reports, and using the information to determining better ways to achieve efficiency (Baker & Baker, 2011). Decision making involves management’s responsibility for analyzing tasks ad performing evaluations to help make decisions and provide solutions for employees to meet performance standards and increase efficiencies and productivity in an effort to meet agency goals (Baker & Baker, 2011). Organizing involves management’s making decisions that improve the effective use of organizational resources. Organizing involved daily record keeping, creating reports, and providing daily supervision to ensure the agencies resources are used efficiently (Baker &Baker, 2011). Planning involves management’s role of identifying ways to accomplish organizational objectives by breaking them down in to steps. Original records include entering information into a database based on information provided by the client (Baker & Baker, 2011).
General Accounting Principles
According to Financial Dictionary.net (2014), General accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) are the basic rules, regulations, and guidelines that are followed accountants in the United states to ensure that they practice legal and ethical accounting standards. GAAP provides accounting standard for managing fincial accounts, preparing financial statements, and establishing accounting methods ad techniques that are issued and governed by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), and the Internatioal Accounting Standards Board (IASB) which provides equal and comparable accountant stands throughout the world.
GAAP principles included regulatory, consistency, sincerity, permanence of methods, non-compensation, prudence, continuity, periodicy, full disclosure, and materiality (financialdictionary.net, 2014). Regualatory princiles ebsures the timely updating of books and accounts and the submission of timely tax returns. Consistency ensures that the same accounting methods are used throughout the year.