Xero Blog

Claire Mackay is nationally recognised as one of Australia’s pre-eminent financial planners. She is passionate about improving financial literacy for all Australians. Dean is a green-star certified, licensed carpenter and builder – with a green conscience.

Those that have lived and breathed Xero for some time will know that we’ve been updating our pages to make them more beautiful, intuitive and simpler to use. As part of this process, we’ve redesigned the User Permissions page, which we’ll be releasing to everyone over the coming week.

We’re pretty fortunate to have a fantastic software engineering team and culture here at Xero. Its not by accident, rather it’s cultivated and nurtured. We start with smart people and give them complex challenges to tackle.

With rapid change in technology comes an equally rapid change in expectation. The start of March marked the beginning of a change in the learning experience for students around the world through the Xero Lifelong Learning Platform (XLLP), a live version of Xero to teach and learn on.

Deadlines are part of every accountant’s day-to-day lives. Many in practice roll from one deadline to the next with hardly a breath to separate them. The problem with deadlines is not so much the rush and stress of requesting, collating, reviewing and submitting information, but more the myopic mindset that tends to develop as the deadlines loom.

Technology continues to revolutionise small business, and for those ready to embrace the opportunity, 2018 promises to be an exciting year.  So what are the top technology trends your small business or advisory practice needs to know about in 2018?

A small business’s survival isn’t defined by its ability to innovate, its market share, or its growth strategy. A great idea is only as good as the next one. A competitive playing field is inevitable.

We’re at an exciting inflection point when it comes to financial technology. With a proliferation of apps out there to help small businesses and consumers manage their finances, it’s important to stay on top of the latest news in fintech.

Artificial intelligence is advancing rapidly, but the technology will require human interaction to truly excel in the coming decades, said an AI panel assembled at Xerocon in Melbourne. “We know the technology will take us to an interesting place, and quickly,” said Xero CEO Rod Drury at Xerocon.” What we need to do is not passively accept the role that humans will play but actively design the role we want to have.