Financial Essentials: What the Executive Director, Chief Financial Officer, Accounting Staff and Board Members Must Know

Responding to numerous requests from legal aid financial staff and executive directors, MIE is pleased to offer a new financial training.  Space is limited, please register and reserve your room early.

Training Overview:

Sept. 21 and 22 – Financial Essentials: What the Executive Director, Chief Financial Officer, Accounting Staff and Board Must Know, September 21 and 22, two days

Sept. 23 -  LSC Essentials:  Ensuring Compliance with LSC's Unique Financial Regulations, one day

Here is the training agenda: http://mielegalaid.org/sites/default/files/civicrm/persist/contribute/files/agenda%20for%20web%20072016.docx

Training Details:

Sept. 21 and 22 - Financial Essentials, What the Executive Director, Chief Financial Officer, Accounting Staff and Board Must Know,  2 days

Ensuring Your Organization Is on the Same Financial Page   The financial strength of an organization and its continued viability is conditioned upon many factors. This opening session is intended to highlight on an overall level several key areas that should be considered by organizations and that will be covered in more detail in sessions offered throughout the conference.

Strategies to Promote Financial Stability  Developing Revenue and accurately projecting expenses are critical for managing the organization’s budget, but how do we ensure financial stability over longer periods of time?  This session explores a variety of strategies for stabilizing finances from year-to-year, and insulating the organization from the effects of drops in revenue.

Financial Reporting  Nothing can be more boring than financial reports, but they are the essential tools that management and Board of Directors need to monitor the financial health of your legal aid program.  The sessions will focus on the essential financial data to report, its purpose, as well as report models that provide the information in an easily understandable format.    

Essential Budgets  Why are budgets an important part of financial planning?  How much information should be presented to upper management and the Board and how should it be presented?  What are the essential budgets – multi-year planning, capital budgeting, personnel?  These questions and more will be answered.

Timekeeping Complexities for Multiple-Funder Organizations  Come to this workshop for an in-depth discussion of the complex issues and best practices related to timekeeping in the legal aid environment with multiple government and non-government funding sources.  Learn methodologies for tracking, analyzing and reporting time within a complex organization with multiple funders, including data needed to process payroll, manage grants, allocate payroll costs, and prepare for annual audits and funder monitoring visits. 

Multiple Funding Sources – The Interrelation between Budgeting, Billing and Management  Once your program receives more than one government or foundations grant, it must deal with a set of interrelated issues which, at times, can be very complex.  This session will provide an overview of key issues, how they relate and approaches to handling them.  Topics to be covered include:  staffing and tracking of time; full cost allocation – benefits, direct overhead, indirect costs and equipment costs; case number commitments; billing methodology and documentation; audit trail for government grants; difference between foundation and government grant billing; and lawyers’ salaries justification.

Setting the Billing Rate  Is your program capturing all the costs associated with the legal assistance provided when billing a grant for an advocate’s work?  Chances are high that you are not.  This session will focus on all the costs that should be included in setting a billing rate and different methods to capture the full cost that are acceptable to grantors and auditors. 

Risk Assessment Issues  Come to this session to understand risks inherent in all accounting systems and provide safeguards against theft, cyber-attacks, and fraud.  Find out what to do if you have determined there is a possible fraud in your program.  Learn steps to protect your computer system from hackers and file theft.

Understanding the Importance of Financial Statements and IRS Form 990  Are these documents really that important?  Do I really need to understand them?  Who really pays attention to them?  This session will answer these questions by reviewing the key components of documents, what they tell about your organization, formats that make them more understandable, as well as who and why certain people and organizations are very interested in the critical information they provide.   

The New Uniform Guidance and Its Impact on Your Federal Awards  The Uniform Guidance administrative and cost principle requirements became applicable to all Federal Awards made after 12/26/14 and its audit requirements were effective for fiscal years ending after 12/26/15. This session will discuss certain key areas of the Uniform Guidance and its impact on the management of your Federal Awards and your organization’s policies.

Also, Board Responsibility, Accounting Systems and Staffing, Problems and Solutions for Smaller Organizations:  A Roundtable, Problems and Solutions for Larger Organizations: A Roundtable

Click Here to Download the Final Program for this training.

Sept. 23 - LSC Essentials:  Ensuring Compliance with LSC's Unique Financial Regulations, one day 

Sessions include:  

LSC Accounting Guide

1630 Cost Standards and Procedures and Property Acquisition and Management Manual

Compliance Supplement for Audits of LSC Recipients

1614 Private Attorney Involvement - new regulations

LSC Visits

Discounted Registration for all three days of training

MIE subscribers $595.00

Nonsubscribers $745.00

Sept. 21 and 22 - Financial Essentials, What the Executive Director, Chief Financial Officer, Accounting Staff and Board Must Know,  2 days

MIE subscribers $465.00

Nonsubscribers $565.00.

Sept. 23 - LSC Financial Essentials:  Ensuring Compliance with LSC's Unique Financial Regulations, one day

MIE subscribers $240.00

Nonsubscribers $290.00

Hotel information:  Hard Rock Hotel Chicago, 230 North Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60601, is the training site.  Rooms at this hotel are now sold out.  

Our overflow hotel is the Silversmith Hotel, 10 South Wabash Avenue, Chicago, IL 60603, 312-795-6515.  Room rates are $205/night plus tax, with free internet. Reserve your room by contacting Dulce Rodriguez, 312-795-6518, dulce.rodriguez@silversmithhotel.com, before August 31, but Don't Delay! Rooms are limited.

Click here to book a room at Silversmith. 

The Silversmith block is also now full.  
Nearby reasonably priced hotels that attendees can explore on their own include:

The Hilton Garden Inn- North Loop
The Hampton Inn- North Loop
The Comfort Suites- North Loop

With thanks to our sponsors: