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Welcome to the new AGA program year. We have the entire fall lunch meeting schedule updated for speaker/topic information already. Take a look at the Calendar of Events on page 11 of the September Footnotes or on our website.

For 2014, we had a goal of increasing CPE opportunities for the membership. We will be offering 4 live audio conferences this year. We tried to pick from different topic areas to hit on items that would appeal to the most people. These are all included on the Calendar of Events, and more details will be announced ahead. AGA National conducts the audio conferences and they are worth 2 CPE each.

If you were to attend all events listed on our calendar, you would earn 20 CPE!

As always, if you have any suggestions for speakers, topics, or locations, please feel free to contact Education Chair Mary Laufenberg or myself at any time. It is never too soon to start our process for developing the Symposium agenda!

I hope to see you at the September lunch!

Highlights from this month’s AGA National News – AGA Chapter Insider

• Collaboration Issues Call-to-Action on Government Guidance
• Help Promote AGA’s 2013 CFO Survey — Chapters Can Win Cash!
• AGA 500 Race for Retention

Highlights from this month’s AGA National News – AGA Chapter Insider:

• AGA Membership Renewals
• Upcoming Habitat for Humanity Project: Atlantic City, NJ
• PDC Community Service Raffle and Silent Auction

PDC Training Event: Big Challenges. Bigger Solutions.

July 14-17| Dallas | 24 CPE Hours | Register Now

This week, D.C.-based, Federal News Radio, featured the ‘Rise of the Money People’. The stories are in celebration of YOU!

“Financial management moves front and center as agencies make the final assault on wasted billions,” zeros in on CFOs and their soldiers who are in the financial wars, their strategies and tactics for waging the fight, the current and emerging weapons in their arsenal and how their future battles will unfold.” Read more

Circumstances are tough and heroes like you need to constantly train to stay on top of the best practices and lessons needed to advance government accountability. Join us in Dallas for our premier national training event. This year, the PDC will explore the enormous fiscal challenges facing our nation and offer innovative solutions to solve them.

Highlights from this month’s AGA National News – AGA Chapter Insider:

• Chapter CCR Logo Contest
• AGA Membership Renewals
• Upcoming Habitat for Humanity Project: Atlantic City, NJ

 

From AGA eNews:

Webinar: Citizen-Centric Reports – Communicating to Your Constituents

April 24 | 2-4 p.m. EDT
Communicating to the public remains a difficult task for governmental entities. To assist this effort, AGA created the Citizen-Centric Reporting (CCR) initiative. In 2006, we developed a template for entities to place the most important financial and performance information into an easy-to-understand four-page document. The four pages give citizens the information they should know about the jurisdiction. The citizens that require more information are led to the entity’s website through helpful links.

AGA will host a complimentary webinar led by two CCR preparers offering their first-hand experience in the preparation of their reports.

Speakers:

• Kim Wallin, Nevada State Controller. Her office has prepared several CCRs. She will explain the CCR creation process, how it has evolved, and also how her office uses the report to communicate to the citizens.
• Stephen Marshall, finance director, Syracuse City, Utah, recently prepared its first CCR. He will explain their process, why his leadership wanted to prepare the document, and how they plan to use it in the future.

Don’t miss this opportunity to hear from these practitioners!

So the season has turned and it appears that the weather may finally be changing. Of course, this is Wisconsin, so we all know it can change back just as quickly.

I bring up change, because during our March luncheon meeting, David Cagigal, CIO of the State of Wisconsin, discussed the State’s current enterprise resource planning process. He spoke of the changes the State is currently facing, and the difficulties it will encounter in meeting those changes. While the final cost of the ERP process was uncertain, it is expected to be significant; however, David felt this enterprise resource planning will be critical to ensure that the State’s information systems remain secure and competitive. More information about this presentation is provided in the April Monthly Footnotes on page 5.

Thinking beyond our March luncheon meeting, spring is a time of changes. We are not always ready to make them and they may not always be easy. We have to try to remain optimistic and flexible. We also have to remember that changes don’t always work right away. They take continued management, monitoring and adjustments. This is important, because we need to assess all along the way whether it appears a newly implemented process is working successfully, or if we need to refine our strategy – or even develop a new one altogether.

I’m sure there is a change to manage in everyone’s life. Whether it’s a small challenge, like cutting back on the amount of coffee you drink each morning, or whether it’s something more significant, like a major life challenge, change is all around us. In fact, change is something of an underlying theme of our upcoming 36th Annual Spring Symposium on Tuesday, May 14th at the University of Wisconsin Union South. I hope many of you will be able to attend this 7 CPE event, since we have a great lineup of speakers.

We’ll begin the day with Tom McHugh and Amy Banicki from the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development speaking about the Unemployment Insurance Fund. The economy’s changes in recent years have definitely affected that part of the State’s operations.

Next, we’ll have Mary Peterman, CGFM, CPA, of Savantage Solutions (and AGA National President-Elect) presenting Get in Control! Leveraging Your Internal Control Work. While internal controls don’t always lead a person to think of change, internal controls should be the backbone of an organization. As such, internal controls should be considered as part of any organizational changes, since operational changes may signal a need for control changes.

At the end of our morning, we’ll have Matt Stohr from the Wisconsin Department of Employee Trust Funds discussing the operations of the Wisconsin Retirement System. I’m sure they’ll be some members of our Symposium audience that will soon be contemplating the major life change of retirement, even as others will have only recently changed from being a college student to entering the workforce in a new career.

Beginning our afternoon, we’ll have Douglas Raubal, a Special Agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, speaking about cyber-based threats. Obviously, the technology environment is one that is always changing – changing in ways that bring with them new and ever more serious risks.

Closing our day, we’ve asked Sarah Gibson of Accent Learning and Consulting, LLC, to speak on managing change. Since change is everywhere, hopefully we’ll all pick up a few tips from her, so that we are able to implement and adjust to change in the most successful way possible.