In recent years, there has been an ongoing effort to introduce new financial reporting technologies to modernize financial reporting by state and local governments. Two such states at the forefront of this effort are California and Florida. For instance, California’s proposed SB 598 would transition municipalities within the state to the XBRL system, which allows for state and local financial reports to be both computer-readable and human-readable. Similarly, Florida enacted HB 1073, which seeks to introduce the XBRL system in state and local financial filings. In Canada, Montreal appears to have gained traction in this area by adopting emerging technologies, and it has even instituted real-time reporting. This article reviews the opportunities and challenges of adopting emerging technologies for real-time reporting by the approximately 38,917 counties, municipalities, and townships across the United States (https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/governments/cb12-161.html).

近年來，美國各州和地方政府一直在努力引進(jìn)新的財務(wù)報告技術(shù)，使財務(wù)報告現(xiàn)代化。在這項努力的#前線的兩個州是加利福尼亞州和佛羅里達(dá)州。例如，加利福尼亞州提出的SB598將把州內(nèi)的市政府過渡到XBRL系統(tǒng)，這使得州和地方的財務(wù)報告既可以計算機(jī)可讀，也可以人為可讀。同樣，佛羅里達(dá)州頒布了HB1073，該法案試圖在州和地方的財務(wù)文件中引入XBRL系統(tǒng)。在加拿大，蒙特利爾似乎通過采用新興技術(shù)在這一領(lǐng)域取得了進(jìn)展，甚至建立了實時報告制度。本文回顧了美國約38917個縣、市和鄉(xiāng)鎮(zhèn)采用新興技術(shù)進(jìn)行實時報告的機(jī)遇和挑戰(zhàn)。

(https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/governments/cb12-161.html)

Although real-time financial reporting presents several opportunities for organizations, it also creates some challenges related to the complex and costly nature of its implementation. These difficulties often arise from the cumbersome process of integrating an organization’s existing data warehouse and enterprise resource planning (ERP) system into a real-time reporting system. Current technological solutions for real-time reporting pull from several sources, including business process management (BPM), mobile devices, cloud computing, business intelligence, and enterprise application integration. Business Process Management Suites (BPMS) have enabled real-time data with a Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) module that presents real-time dashboards to monitor a variety of business processes for enhanced decision making. This trend related to BPM readily presents the opportunity to implement a BAM for real-time accounting information and continuous auditing. While the opportunity exists, creating a BPM and BAM to generate accounting data is a challenging process that requires organizations to invest considerable time, energy, and financial resources to implement in a manner that complements their unique business processes and needs. Such integration is not necessarily straightforward; while both BPM and financial reporting for a given organization may arise from the same activities and events, they may come from different perspectives due to the purely economic nature of financial reporting.

雖然實時財務(wù)報告為各組織帶來了一些機(jī)會，但由于其執(zhí)行的復(fù)雜性和成本高昂，也帶來了一些挑戰(zhàn)。這些困難往往是由于將一個組織現(xiàn)有的數(shù)據(jù)倉庫和企業(yè)資源規(guī)劃系統(tǒng)（enterprise resource planning, ERP）納入實時報告系統(tǒng)的繁瑣過程造成的。當(dāng)前用于實時報告的技術(shù)解決方案來自多個來源，包括業(yè)務(wù)流程管理（business process management, BPM）、移動設(shè)備、云計算、商業(yè)智能和企業(yè)應(yīng)用程序集成。業(yè)務(wù)流程管理套件（Business Process Management Suites, BPM）通過業(yè)務(wù)活動監(jiān)視（Business Activity Monitoring, BAM）模塊啟用了實時數(shù)據(jù)，該模塊提供了實時儀表板，以監(jiān)控各種業(yè)務(wù)流程，以增強決策能力。這種與BPM相關(guān)的趨勢很容易為實現(xiàn)用于實時會計信息和連續(xù)審計的BAM提供了機(jī)會。雖然存在機(jī)會，但創(chuàng)建BPM和BAM以生成會計數(shù)據(jù)是一個具有挑戰(zhàn)性的過程，需要組織投入大量時間、精力和財務(wù)資源來實施，以補充其獨特的業(yè)務(wù)流程和需求。這種集成并不一定是直接的；雖然給定組織的BPM和財務(wù)報告可能來自相同的活動和事件，但由于財務(wù)報告的純經(jīng)濟(jì)性質(zhì)，它們可能來自不同的視角。

Cloud computing solutions offer many advantages for implementing real-time financial reporting compared with BPM software, which does not make use of this technology. Cloud-based solutions that are available on the market, including Oracle Fusion Financials and NetSuite Financials, address several challenges tied to feasibility, scalability, and costs. Cloud computing provides access to real-time financial data and reports from smartphones and laptops, eliminating the need for excessive hardware and software requirements. Moreover, cloud-based tools make real-time reporting solutions more feasible for small and medium-sized organizations that would otherwise only be available to large enterprises with abundant resources.

與BPM軟件相比，云計算解決方案為實現(xiàn)實時財務(wù)報告提供了許多優(yōu)勢，BPM軟件不使用這種技術(shù)。市場上提供的基于云的解決方案，包括Oracle Fusion Financials和NetSuite Financials，解決了與可行性、可擴(kuò)展性和成本相關(guān)的幾個難題。云計算提供了從智能手機(jī)和筆記本電腦獲取實時財務(wù)數(shù)據(jù)和報告的功能，消除了對硬件和軟件要求過高的需求。此外，基于云的工具使實時報告解決方案對中小型組織更為可行，否則這些解決方案只能用于擁有豐富資源的大型企業(yè)。