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Employees at DNB, a Norwegian-based insurance company, are speaking up against a new surveillance system that notifies their managers if they spend too much time away from their workstations.

In Brief: Last month’s increase in payrolls was the most since April, and the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level since February 2009. The report far exceeded the expectations of most economists, who were predicting an increase of 130,000 jobs and the unemployment rate to remain at 8.5%.

Our View: The latest employment data shows that the economy is improving and the job market is stabilizing. However, a cautious outlook remains warranted.  . While the unemployment rate declined to 8.3%, it will remain volatile in the coming months, as almost 3 million marginally attached and 8 million underemployed workers – in addition to millions of unemployed workers – search for full time jobs. Moreover, the US economy is still vulnerable to external shocks due to the relatively modest pace of the recovery; the escalation of the Iran conflict, the EU financial crisis, or another showdown in Congress, could derail the current positive trend. As Michael Griffin, executive director and head of global research for CEB explains in this article, “Even though we’ve seen the outlook improve in the last few months, there’s still a lot of risk and uncertainty out there in the business environment. Generally speaking, we see executives developing a cautious posture.”

In Brief: One innovation expert says, “most large organizations aren’t built to innovate” and recommends instilling such incentives as compensation plans that encourage measured risk taking and “trigger points” at each development stage of a new idea to determine funding.

Our View: Leading companies approach innovation as a continual learning process involving finance, strategy, and innovation leaders in a collaborative conversation validating, evaluating, and prioritizing opportunities for new growth. Keep in mind that biases can creep into any stage of the strategy development process and can come from multiple levels of the organization (from leadership all the way down to the R&D team). Therefore, in addition to process and tools, it is equally important to establish an environment that encourages new ideas, principled risk-taking, challenging assumptions, and fast failure.

In Brief: The Vietnamese General Department of Taxation is urging businesses to implement an e-invoice system to help businesses reduce costs on printing, delivering, and storing paper invoices.

Our View: Shared services organizations in our network are increasingly deploying e-payables software solutions to automate and reduce manual workload in the invoice-to-payment cycle. Factors leading to a successful implementation include 1) commitment from senior management and 2) effective communication to cross-functional business partners on the benefits they will receive from the e-payables solution.

In Brief: FASB recently issued a new proposal that would give companies more flexibility in how they determine whether intangible assets should be tested for impairment. The proposal, which is similar to a rule approved last year that allowed companies to make “qualitative” assessments of fair value, would enable companies to skip calculating the fair value of indefinite-lived intangible assets they determined are “more likely than not” higher. The comment period for this proposal ends on 24 April 2012.

Our View: While many controllers believe that performing qualitative assessments will result in less complex impairment testing processes, goodwill should still be tested at least annually and between annual periods if an event occurs that would reduce the fair value of a reporting unit below its carrying amount. Controllers should review this proposal from FASB to determine if in fact it will lead to significant cost savings and take advantage of the comment period to become part of the debate. Offer specific opinions on the proposal, and make your comment letters as constructive as possible by offering alternative ideas and solutions.

In Brief: A recent study found that 57% of US consumers surveyed believe the main purpose of customer satisfaction surveys and feedback is to help improve the company. Customers also expect a response from companies, but only 35% of the respondents recall receiving a reply.

Our View: Run your shared services organization as if it were an independent business. Talk to your customers regularly in order to both understand what they need and articulate what you can do. Don’t expect your customers to embrace change unless you can explain “what’s in it for them.”

In Brief: Results from a new survey show that finance teams are taking a stronger role in setting strategy. However, CFOs indicated that their staff members still need training to improve their “analytical” and “political acumen” before they can successfully adjust to this new transition.

Our View: Our research shows that controllers who don’t realize the breadth of skills that their teams need to succeed in today’s business environment are not only likely to underperform, they are likely to lose valuable staff. Today’s controller teams are often asked to help business partners make key strategic decisions, develop recommendations to improve organizational effectiveness, and aid in organizational change; financial knowledge is only one competency they need to perform their jobs. We advise controllers to start by developing a competency and assessment model that evaluates staff not only on their financial acumen, but on their communication, partnering, risk management, and technological skills as well.

In Brief: Starbucks is teaming up with the Tata Group to open outlets in Mumbai and New Delhi by the summer and a total of 50 cafés in the country by the end of the year. Coffee consumption in India has almost doubled in the past decade, partly due to the popularity of internet cafes, and a coffee culture may be coming to fruition.

Our View: The real key to success in emerging markets is not more market research but rather building new value propositions and capabilities that resonate locally. Keep in mind that the most popular strategies are not necessarily the ones that have the greatest impact on profitable growth. The strongest strategies require a high degree of capability evolution.

In Brief: New research indicates that voice-recognition software can be used to gauge the tone of executives’ voices on earnings calls, enabling one to more accurately predict if a company will restate its earnings. As this article explains, the lesson for CFOs and CEOs is, “don’t just watch what you say – but how you say it.”

Our View: Regardless of the effectiveness of this software and its long-term implications, our research shows that finance departments often neglect to examine their approaches to issuing earnings guidance. This can cause them to miss potential opportunities to communicate more effectively with analysts and investors about company performance. A complacent attitude in regards to historical reporting policies can put organizations at a significant disadvantage. Equally dangerous, however, is a tendency to frequently change the information provided. CFOs and IR teams should liberally examine alternate guidance options, but conservatively apply them to their own organization. Striking this balance is critical to effective communication about company performance.