Project management and project accounting are complex, even for a simple project. Still, suppose your family office runs projects across multiple entities. In that case, Sage Intacct project management software can improve the accuracy of your records while streamlining your project management and project billing processes. Most importantly, you are very likely to see improved profit margins.

Let’s look at some of the key benefits of implementing project accounting and a full-featured project accounting software:

• Provides up-to-date information on the project’s progress and profitability.
• It helps educate project teams on how every factor can impact a project’s cost and profitability.
• Provides your customer with accurate billing data and keeps tabs on project progress.
• Provides important insights to project managers.
• Allows management to identify issues with projects and make quick decisions to get back on track and reduce costs.
• Real-time data and reporting help you gather valuable insights for making bids on future projects.
• Improves resource management.
• It assists you in determining the scope and pricing for similar projects by analyzing actual costs versus estimated costs.
• Improves the overall financial management of your family office by integrating your project management accounting into the comprehensive financial accounting for a broad look across every aspect of your business.

Project accounting is a bit different from general accounting in that it is more specific and focused. The Project Accounting Software Sage Intacct offers is specifically designed to focus on financial transactions related to project management. This includes costs, revenue, and billing. You can assign financial tasks to specific projects. This makes it easy to track, measure, and report project progress and success.

With centralized reporting, you can see all aspects of your project in one place, including your time, expense, and financial and non-financial project accounting data.

Generally, you will follow the steps below to set up your project accounting.

1. Set up a system for tracking tasks and associated costs.
2. Create a project budget. Creating a budget can help you maximize a project’s profit margin. Your project budget should include estimates for costs, including labor, materials, and other expenses.
3. Track the transactions, time, and resources used.

With a good project accounting foundation in place, you can begin to track costs. It’s important to emphasize how crucial accuracy is when inputting this data because it can skew the reporting. This is where AI automation helps with data accuracy.

Project accounting isn’t something you can set up once and forget. Regular check-ins and reviews on project progress ensure things are going as planned and allow your project team to identify any problems that need to be addressed. With real-time reporting, you can see whether the project costs and progression are aligned with the forecasted budget or if changes are required. Without an ongoing review of project accounting, you could find your company in financial trouble if the project starts to lose money.

The key takeaway is that project accounting and the right project accounting software, such as Sage Intacct, can help you reduce the risk of project failure by improving overall project management.