Last week Thursday and Friday, I had the opportunity, along with 13 other Siouxland Chapter members, to participate in the Heartland Regional Conference in Council Bluffs, IA. This was the 11th year of the conference, and it was another great turnout and another great experience! Including speakers, there were 92 attendees, with the majority of those from the Kansas City, Nebraska, Iowa, and Siouxland chapters. On Wednesday, prior to the conference, there were also seven individuals who sat for the CCIFP exam and several accounting software user group meetings. These opportunities created additional value for numerous attendees!
The conference planning committee did excellent work, pulling together great speakers on a variety of different topics. Tim Spiker, leadership speaker and coach, kicked off the conference leading us through several exercises to expose the hidden truth about leadership..."who not what." I would encourage you to check out The Aperio website to learn more about Tim and his leadership passion and business. Eide Bailly's Jim Jarding, Jr. and Ben Ellingson followed the morning break with a tax and accounting update, sharing information about the R&D tax credit, 179D deduction, ACA reimbursement of premium requirements and reporting, deferral (again) of revenue recognition effective dates, accounting for goodwill, and more.
Following an excellent lunch, the afternoon included a fraud presentation by Shauna Woody-Coussens, an expert on the topic from BKD, an employment law update from Bob Overman of Stinson Leonard Street, and a presentation by Bob Nizzi of Enterprise Risk Services, explaining a newer alternative insurance model now being offered in the marketplace and how the 831B election applies. From a fraud perspective, the measures that an organization takes to prevent and detect fraud typically falls on the plate of the CFO or Controller. Are you doing enough? From an employment law perspective, "ban the box" is now in place in 14 states and prohibits employers from asking the "convicted felon" question on initial job applications. Also, there is a new requirement effective January 1, 2017 for paid sick leave that will impact those doing federal contracting. There is expected to be more information coming related to this, but at this point the law requires paid sick leave of 1 hour for every 30 hours work, up to 56 hours per year when a company is doing federal contracting work. If you get involved in any federal contracting, this is something you will need to start considering over the course of the next year. Following these speakers, a networking reception concluded an excellent first day of the conference.
On the morning of the second day of the conference, attendees welcomed back economist Chris Kuehl. This was the fourth Heartland Conference that Chris has spoken at, and he provided another informative and entertaining economic update covering oil forecasts, interest rate forecasts, and more. Following Chris, Buzz Hillestad, who previously presented at one of our local Siouxland Chapter meetings, spoke on the cyber security threats to our businesses. Because of the size and nature of our businesses, many times this responsibility also falls on the construction financial manager...how are you addressing this risk in your business? At a minimum, are you doing security awareness training and testing?
Overall, it was another excellent conference! A total of 10.5 CPE's were available to attendees, in a great venue, and with numerous options for networking with others in the industry. I am already looking forward to another excellent conference next year. If you have a desire to get involved with the planning for next year's conference, contact one of the current planning committee members from our chapter: Arin Powell, Ron Heemstra, Kevin Moore, or Jarrod Muller.