Comptroller
Categories: Careers, Accounting
Hey, kids. Ever wanted to manage financial accounts and accounting systems of a business, department, or organization?
If you said yes, then you should either see a doctor or apply for the role of comptroller.
This person’s primary role is to see that projects or expenditures are within budget. A comptroller may not be an exciting person...but it can be exciting to have all your projects within budget.
The job is critical to human resources, because this person oversees the accounting staff and must make important decisions regarding expenditures, payroll, debt collections, and more. She is also in charge of a company’s general ledger, which means it’s usually important that she has a background in finance and accounting. You’ll typically see these big wigs’ offices adorned in CPA, CFA, or CMA certificates.
A comptroller typically reports to a company’s CFO, who in turn reports to the CEO. She compares budget and other financial guidelines, and is an integrator in the bean-counting function inside of the financial department of corporations and the government.
The comptroller role used to be a guaranteed safe job for hundreds of thousands of workers in the U.S., analogous to that of a dental hygienist or a bridge-welder. But over time, computer analysis of data is being done so proactively and, well...has taken away the need for tons of human comptrollers. They more or less manage a bunch of feeds into computers, and when little yellow or red lights flash, alerting them that a given set of numbers is out of order, or off-budget enough such that it warrants attention, then that comptroller springs into action.
Why are the numbers off? Was there an earthquake or a presidential tweet that changed "everything"? Maybe. If so, the error or red light is explained and life goes on. If not, then the problem gets escalated through the CFO and, if need be, the CEO. (Fraud will do that to ya, if it happens...
Here's to hoping you have a nice, boring life as a comptroller, should you choose to go that direction.)
Related or Semi-related Video
Finance: What is GAAP?21 Views
Finance allah shmoop what is a gap Yeah not this
Nor this Nor this gap is an accounting term that
stands for generally accepted accounting principles And it is basically
the accounting code of hammurabi or the ten commandments that
is There are lots and lots and lots of ways
that clever bean counters could define and or account for
the notion of profits lots of ways to recognize revenues
versus sales and lots of ways to think about how
much that ten commandment frisbee factory is appreciating in value
each year Well the world according to gaff outlines the
structure under which accountants must you know count beans the
basic idea Well sort of in the vein of the
golden rule that is do unto others as you'd have
them do unto you Gap requires that accountants always present
their numbers in the most reasonably conservative manner possible such
that they never overstate how profitable or how well the
company is doing Gap is the framework the map the
religion and the destinations we want to go inside this
neck of the accounting woods are three income statement cash
flow statement balance sheet will none of these three key
elements mean anything however unless they all follow the same
rules they're linked like gears in an overpriced swiss watch
and the eighteen zillion individual rules on their own mean
nothing like what is revenue Is it a dollar you
collect in cash at a video game arcade booth Is
it the promise to pay that dollar in a year
Well there are lots of ways to account for this
notion of revenue so don't think of gaff isa siri's
of rules rather think of it as this you know
key mathey kind of finance e a county religion it's
all about quote doing right unquote and part of that
issue is a natural conservatism that has to come with
it kind of amish you'd think would be a good
gap Accountants Well if you're thinking about how to account
for five dollars promised to you in a year well
you have to recognize that there is risk you won't
collect it and that money a year from now is
worth less than its face value and well that you
should categorise those revenues way off in the distance differently
from how you'd categorize collecting the five dollar bill in
cash that day and putting it in your cigar box
there right So gap is basically the force in accounting 00:02:26.44 --> [endTime] May it be with you