My organization recently decided to update its bookkeeping programs. Though it will probably improve efficiency in the long term, but presently, it puts me, as the office manager in an uncomfortable position. Over the years, the firm have tried several bookkeeping programs, but finally settled on Quickbooks, which frankly speaking, I am very indifferent to, but have gotten so used to it in the last few years. We probably won't know the fellow that took the decision to adopt a new bookkeeping program; nevertheless it was a wrong decision. There was nothing wrong in the existing bookkeeping program, and setting up a new one was created new problems, that has was never envisaged. First, everything had to be recorded to the new bookkeeping programs, and for this task, the boss hired a computer expert, who also happened to be his son. The task involved writing a macro that will convert all of the files from the old bookkeeping programs into the new one, and unfortunately, the project failed- just like everything the boss and his family do, on top of this is the problem of lack of compatibility between the QuickBooks and the new bookkeeping programs, which was a kind of general public access thing that was obviously produced by Linux nerds in their spare time. Though it is very stable and well coded, it is just not a user friendly interface. Of course I bore the brunt of the whole thing, so I had to learn how to operate this graphics free, all text interface, before entering the old bookkeeping program data. Of course the new program is more stable, and perhaps faster, but the point is it is boring and takes a longer period to learn. Even now that I have a full grasp of it, I still prefer one of the bookkeeping programs where I can click on a few icons and not bother about keyboard shortcuts. I resent this new program because I will have to use it all day, so I think I deserve something pleasant to work and interact with. But it seems no one is interested in that, as long as it is free, fast, and occupies less hard disk space, then it will do just fine.
