Creating a Custom Spreadsheet Template from the Trends Area

Introduction

CFO Scoreboard has full automatic compatibility with today's most widely used accounting systems. But, if you don't use one of these in your business, that doesn't mean you're out of luck. With a little manual work on your spreadsheets, CFO Scoreboard can support virtually any accounting system in existence. To get your spreadsheets into the proper format and layout, check our  General Requirements page.

Once you've gotten your spreadsheets loaded into CFO Scoreboard, we'll see how the intelligence of CFO Scoreboard will save you from having to repeat that manual work in your future uploads!

In the  Trends area of CFO Scoreboard, you'll see that all your accounts have been laid out in a neat hierarchy, which we can use as a  template for your future uploads. From this area you'll want to download both your Income Statement  (Detailed) and Balance Sheet. Check out how in this video:

From here, just a couple more steps:

1. Re-upload these docs into CFO Scoreboard

Before we can use these as templates for future uploads, we need to reset the chart of accounts that's already in CFO Scoreboard. To do this, simply re-upload the Balance Sheet and Income Statement that you just modified! Once the upload is complete, you should see that the   accounting data within CFO Scoreboard has not changed, but the hierarchy of accounts may have changed. This is good!

2. Set up these docs as templates

Note: This step is optional. Rather than deleting all existing columns (instructions below) you can just add new columns to the end of the document whenever you upload the next month's books. We happen to think that the approach below makes ongoing uploads easier to manage, but this change is not required.

To get these ready to use as templates for future uploads, we want to   keep your chart of accounts intact, and delete the previously uploaded accounting data. You need to do this for both the Balance Sheet and Income Statement. To do this, simply select all columns with a date heading, and clear them out entirely:

When you're done, you'll want to save this new   blank Balance Sheet and Income Statement in a safe place. Next time you make an upload to CFO Scoreboard, you'll make a new copy of this pair and fill in the new month of accounting data.

3. Upload a new month of data

A month or two later, whenever you're ready to upload new data, just make a new copy of the blank Balance Sheet + Income Statement pair, create a new column for a new month, and paste in your new data where it should go!

You can add as many new months at a time as you prefer, using this same method in both the Income Statement and Balance Sheet. From there, upload the new pair, and your data will add to what's already in CFO Scoreboard.

If you ever need to add   new line items to your chart of accounts, simply use the Excel Insert function to put the new account wherever it should go in the hierarchy, and continue with this same method. New accounts will get added into the CFO Scoreboard chart of accounts wherever you've decided to place them!

Conclusion

Using this method, CFO Scoreboard can easily support   any accounting system on the planet. All it takes is a little manual work for the first upload, and a few more steps to create this template. From there, you'll be able to make new uploads indefinitely, without being concerned about formatting or layout of your spreadsheets. Have fun, and good luck!