Revenue recognition: A timeline for the new standard

The new standard for revenue recognition is a significant change that will come to all public company financial statements in 2018 and all other entities by 2019. While the amount of time and effort will vary based on the different circumstances of each entity, organizations shouldn’t wait until the last minute; there’s a lot of work involved in implementing the new standard.

We recommend that non-public companies initiate the implementation process in phases, with a 2015–2016 window to begin assembling and training an internal task force and testing the new standard on a sample of contracts; a 2017–2018 window for impact analysis and implementation; and a last phase to finalize and go live in 2019.

While every step in the process is important, the success of the implementation depends on the careful planning and execution of your organization’s strategy very early on. If you’ve done the groundwork in 2016 and 2017, you should be ready for a smooth transition. Read the full article to learn how to optimize your plan.