Making your Financial Statements
Tell the Truth, and the Story
What’s Better?
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Your Presenters:
Lisa H. Kruger, Chief Financial Officer,
United Way of Central New Mexico (Albuquerque, NM)
Krista Ivey, Assistant Controller,
Valley of the Sun United Way, (Phoenix, AZ)
Ken Euwema, Director-Member Financial Accountability,
United Way Worldwide (Alexandria, VA)
Brandon R. Booker, VP of Finance & Controller,
United Way of Tarrant County, (Fort Worth, TX)
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Agenda
• Context
• Telling the Truth
• Telling your Story
• Your Questions
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Context
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Assumptions
1. We all prepare financial statements in line with GAAP
2. We all fill out a disclosure checklist to help us figure
out what disclosures are required
3. The primary users of our financial statements are the
Board members (representative of the community of donors)
and
a. All have some knowledge of GAAP
b. Some have a lot of knowledge of GAAP
4. Other users of our financial statements may or may
not know GAAP but they are all looking for something
specific.
Lots of Discussion at FASB
• Nonprofit Financial Statements Standard Setting Project:
 Operating Measures
 Net Asset Classes
 Statement Format
 Liquidity
• Telling the Story Research Project
• Use of XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) within
the NFP Sector Discussion
• Going Concern Disclosures Standard Setting Project
• Disclosure Framework Project
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Disclosure Framework Project
Objective: Improve effectiveness of footnote disclosures by
clearly communicating information most important to
users
• Two components that will result in separate Exposure Drafts
1. Financial Accounting Standards Board’s Decisions Process

Series of decision questions for the Board to identify
relevant disclosures

Define the purpose of the notes and the type of
information to include in the notes
2. Entity’s Board Decision Process

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On-going Field Study to understand how discretion works
in practice
So, for each of the following examples...
we will go beyond just looking at what’s required and
attempt to answer this question:
“How can we simplify or add value for
our users?”
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Telling the Truth…
(or at least not misleading the user unintentionally)
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Do You Use Consistent and Easily
Understood Descriptors/Terms?
What is the
difference
between
these?
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Maybe the footnotes will help…
Kind of but... How does
this relate to the second
note? Are they different
or the same things?
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How much of
this is really
“available” to
use?
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This is better but
I still don’t know
what working
capital is…
Maybe the
notes will
tell me…
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Not so much… I have
to believe some of
this isn’t really
“available.
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Now this
is clear.
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Oops…
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This makes more
sense than saying
“Less Designations”,
but…
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What is the
difference ?
Can be a bit
confusing, no?
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Is there such a thing as
Too Much Information?
This is a lot of
“white space”
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What’s the “value
add” here?
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As my kids say,
“TMI dad”
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Seriously, a
whole column
for this?
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Do the “Dots” Connect?
Great
breakdown
but…
Can you
reconcile this
to …
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This?
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This one
connects based
on this line…
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The terms
don’t line up,
do they?
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Something else is
lost in translation…
can you spot it?
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“Textbook”
format and
the total
ties…
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Not really
telling you
about our
impact
priorities is it?
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Do the Notes really “tell the story”?
This is cool, I
wonder what
they got?
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Ah, now that tells
the story.
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Telling Your Story
Why are our Notes “Boiler Plate” Accounting Speak?
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Boiler Plate
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Blah, Blah, Blah… so
begins 5 pages of notes, on
investments, including 3
pages just talking about the
retirement plans.
Speak in terms everyone understands!
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And remember, sometimes “less is more”…
Why say all this:
When this would really do:
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But not always…
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Paint a picture…
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Tell your Story…
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Tell users what you need them to know about you…
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Seriously, if we are
about impact, is
this what we
“need” people to
know?
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Questions?
Thank You!
Lisa H. Kruger - lisa.kruger@uwcnm.org
Krista Ivey - kivey@vsuw.org
Brandon Booker – brandon.booker@unitedwaytarrant.org
Ken Euwema – ken.euwema@unitedway.org