CPAs on Second Life

CPA Island welcome Shapiro Negotiations Institute

When you visit CPA Island, don't forget to check out the virtual headquarters of the Shapiro Negotitaions Institute (jus tacross the bridge from the welcome center lighthouse).

SNI is a premier global provider of training and consulting (and a partner of the Business Leanring Institute) in the following areas:

• Negotiation
• Influencing
• Sales Optimization
• Conflict Resolution

The focus of SNI is on maximizing their clients’ ability to create mutually beneficial and profitable long-term relationships with peers, vendors, and customers – both internal and external to the organization.

SNI co-founder and president, Mark Jankowski appears in-world as Mark Wizenheim and has dived into the exciting medium of Second Life to bring interactive education on CPA island. Mark has really worked to use all of the features of teh 3-D immersive environment to enhance negotiation trianing. I have been in a couple os sessions and love it.

Look for their upcoming course on June 17th on CPA Island - check their website for details. Stay tuned for future CPE sessions with Mark by checking our CPA Island blog also.

We are proud to have them as our newest tenant (and partner)!

Is Second Life for real?

"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." - Mark Twain

Over the last month I have been reading about the death of Second Life as the news organization Reuters closed down their in-world offices and several big name brands exited the virtual world. But just like in real life, the recovery (in real life and second life) will most likely come not from the big corporations but form the nimble, entrepreneurial small and mid-size business sector. They will see the benefits of virtual worlds, not for just broadcast advertising and brand placement but for "real" uses like collaboration, training, recruiting and all the while saving money.

In her post, Businesses Not Stampeding from Second Life, SL blogger Tateru Nino over at Massively (news about MMOs) says it well,

"SME's, universities, colleges, training groups and health-care providers are all deriving benefits from their usage of the virtual environment and few of these successful models rely on drawing the interest of Second Life users at large or drawing large quantities of eyeballs.

The number of educational institutions operating in Second Life is literally countless. It's a mammoth task just trying to total them all up -- and by the time you're done there seem to be more of them than when you started."

We continue to get questions about what are we "really doing in Second Life" and is it "really worthwhile". Note the use of "really" that keeps coming up. Can a virtual gaming environment, "really" be an effective learning and collaborative environment? Read what others are saying:

SL Entrepeneur Magazine reporter Feldpar Epstein gets it right in his post Real Life in Second Life says the most important benefits of Second Life are:

1. Second Life can be used as an environment to be utilized for interaction, collaboration and training of your staff. This use doubles as a bit of advertising for your company that might prove palatable to the general public.
2. Using Second Life as an advertising-only vehicle is relatively pointless unless you are willing to experiment somewhat rigorously and learn from your mistakes.

He then goes on to profile our work on CPA Island,

"Another case in point is the CPA Island (http://www.cpaisland.com/) build. The MACPA (Maryland Certified Practicing Accountants) run conferences here on a regular basis; CPAs can attend these conferences in Second Life to earn CPE credit (this is a points system for the ongoing education of CPAs). The MACPA have engaged speakers from across the globe to lecture on a wide variety of topics; they started in the middle of this year, and the conferences have been so successful that they plan to continue into the foreseeable future. It has also raised the profile of CPAs within the consciousness of Second Life users."

Then there is Dave MacDonald with the Canadian Management Accountants - British Columbia talking about his "first time" taking CPE in Second Life, 

"So I went to the ampitheatre on CPA Island in Second Life and saw a number of other avatars present.  Many were CPAs with no affiliation in Second Life except for the CPA professional development - it was exceptional.  There was an animated talk on Enterprise Risk Management discussing myriad aspects of planning the prioritization of strategies with adherence to risk management principles.  The talk was great, but the medium was fantastic."

And Edith Orenstein, social media maven at the Financial Executives International (FEI) and her first experience with the virtual world in her post, Get a (Second) Life. We have hosted a couple of mixed reality (virtual & real) meetings with the San Francisco FEI Chapter and the Bay Area FENG.

Then there is Accounting Web editor, Gail Perry and her experience as she writes in, Flying around CPA Island with Tom Hood.

"After a few initial missteps, it became easy to move around. Avatars can stand up, sit down, walk, and even fly. At CPA Island we strolled through training and presentation facilities, trade show floors, kiosks, a media center, office space, and even break rooms (where my avatar stopped for a quick Red Bull). At various places throughout the island, we saw places where we could access PowerPoint presentations and direct links to schools and accounting firms. Several accounting firms and universities already have a permanent presence on CPA Island, as does Financial Executives International. The 3-D effect makes you feel like you're really in these rooms, whether it's sitting in the audience, speaking at the podium, or touring the booths."

We are currently building Accounting Web's booth for our EXPO right now...

Visit our virtual trade show and sessions during the second annual MDBIZEXPO on June 16th & 17th.

Look for us at the AICPA Tech Confence on Monday June 15th at the lunch keynote session, CPAs and the Virtual World of Second Life for details see the brochure Download 09_TECH_2r.

For more on our events in Second Life see our post 2008 Year in Review - CPAs start adopting Second LIfe for training

For upcoming events visit our blog at www.cpaisland.com

See our intor to Second Life movie on Youtube

Well what do you think is Second Life for real?

Ernst & Young Uses Second Life to Train Auditors

Remember when you were in school or on your first job as a CPA and people were training you on how to account for manufacturing processes? or accounting and auditing inventories?

Using the accounting theory you were taught and having someone explain what the real life would look like, with at best a couple of 2-D pictures just did not seem to cut it. You really did not grasp it until you got out "on the job". I don't know about you, but that was a hard way to learn those important concepts.

Well now Ernst and Young is training their auditors using a Cookie Manufacturer. According to the article in Outsourcing Journal, "Learning how to audit physical inventories is a critical accounting skill because they are an important element in determining actual profits for the year. The auditor's job is to test the accuracy of the company's recorded inventory counts. To do that, the young auditors had to navigate an unfamiliar warehouse and randomly select inventory items for test counting. "

So, how do you teach these young auditors the critical skills needed to perform inventory audits? It turns out it's a generational thing. The article goes on to say,

"Last year the firm completed a generational study, which pointedly asked Gen Y to list the differences between themselves and the baby boomers. "We learned this group has a greater comfort and confidence with technology," says Hamilton. The team responsible for creating audit training within E&Y proposed a 3-D virtual world learning pilot to see if virtual world technology could enhance the learning experience when compared with traditional classroom training."

Using the 3-D virtual world, E&Y has created a cookie manufacturer that lets the students walk through the company with their avatar and experience the inventory process first hand. It gives them the experience of really being in the situations that they most likely will encounter in the real world. I think that is a great example for using the power of second life for training.

Turns out one of our accounting educators, Dr. Mike Kraten (Suffolk University) has already been doing this - he used Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream, factory in Second Life to explain the accounting concepts around manufacturing processes and inventories with a tour of that "factory". He also uses Second Life to bring guest from around the world for interactive discussions in his "virtual class" on CPA Island.

Then there is Dr. Steve Hornikfrom University of Central Florida who has created several 3-D accounting models for his students.He is currently teaching close to 900 students in a semester using Second Life.

You can view a three minute video tour here

Resources:

See the article in Outsourcing Journal

See the post in the Second Life blog titled, Ernst & Young's Cookie Factory for Auditors

See our blog post Accounting for Second Life

See our video about CPAs in Second Life

My preso on CPA Training in SL

Saving Real Money in the Recession With Second Life Meetings

How about $320,000 - is that real savings?

That is what was just reported that IBM saved in a blog post over at the Virtual World News, titled IBM saves $320,000 with Second Life Meeting. The savings is net after an $80,000 investment that IBM made in holding a major international conference in the virtual world.

Here is how to save money on business travel and meetings. What if you could be at two places at the same time without ever getting on a plane?

Last year at our MDBIZEXPO, we featured John Zdanowski, CFO of Linden Lab "live" from his San Francisco offices to our EXPO floor in Baltimore via the virtual world of Second Life. Without getting on a plane he spoke to an international audience at our conference center on CPA Island (in Second Life) and our live audience in Baltimore and had both groups interacting with each other.

Who said you can't be two places at once?

In a recent podcast with John, he said this about saving money using Second Life for real meetings, "Second Life is more compelling than a conference call, less intimidating than a video conference, and a hell of a lot better than business travel."

Sometimes it takes a recession to force new and innovative ways of doing business. CNBC's Julia Boorstin recently featured a report about how companies are using Second Life to save money by hosting meetings, conferences, recruiting, and speeches. Read the article Virtual Meetings Get a Second Life or watch the short video clip below:

We have been "bullish" on these type of uses for Second Life for the past two years. See our post about our last year's activities, titled 2008 Year in Review - CPAs start adopting Second Life for training. That is why we will be offering 24 hours of free CPE to our members for the upcoming year -with at least 14 hours via the virtual world of Second Life (including webcasts out of SL). It is our way of helping them out during this downturn.

We have also held plenty of meetings like this already - XBRL, Increasing Business Transparency, Leading Knowledge Workers, Fair Value Reporting, Going Private to name just a few.

We will be hosting a series of meetings over the next year where we can bring in experts "virtually" through Second LIfe to expose our members to thought leaders, innovative ideas, and breaking topics without spending their money or our money. I think that is pretty cool!

What do you think? Are you ready to give it a try?

Resources:

Presentation to NE CPE Conference about CPA Training in Second Life

See our Youtube Video - CPAs in Second Life

CPA Success blog post - Accounting for Second Life

CPA Island blog post - First CPE in the Virtual World of Second Life