Remote work, along with the tools used to connect teams and apps, is on everyone’s mind these days. How do you know when it’s time to automate processes? How do you know when you need tools to connect teams? As usual, the big brains at Amazon are way ahead of us.
Consider this: The Guardian reports, “In the early days of Amazon, Jeff Bezos instituted a rule: every internal team should be small enough that it can be fed with two pizzas. The goal wasn’t to cut down on the catering bill. It was, like almost everything Amazon does, focused on two aims: efficiency and scalability.”
With small teams being more efficient, the two pizza rule offered a straightforward measure of when a team was too big to be maximally effective. The effect of the two pizza rule on Amazon’s second aim – scalability – was a bit more complex.
The value of automation
“Perhaps the best example of that approach in action is the birth and growth of AWS (previously called Amazon Web Services). It started, like so many things at Amazon, with an edict from the top. Every team, Bezos ordered, should begin to work with each other only in a structured, systematic way. If an advertising team needed some data on shoe sales to decide how best to spend their resources, they could not email analytics and ask for it; they needed to go to the analytics dashboard themselves and get it. If that dashboard didn’t exist, it needed to be created. And that approach needed to cover everything.”
How did they do it? APIs.
According to TechCrunch, “It began way back in the 2000 timeframe when the company wanted to launch an e-commerce service called Merchant.com to help third-party merchants like Target or Marks & Spencer build online shopping sites on top of Amazon’s e-commerce engine. It turned out to be a lot harder than they thought to build an external development platform, because, like many startups, when it launched in 1994, it didn’t really plan well for future requirements.”
“Instead of an organized development environment, they had unknowingly created a jumbled mess. That made it a huge challenge to separate the various services to make a centralized development platform that would be useful for third parties. At that point, the company took its first step toward building the AWS business by untangling that mess into a set of well-documented APIs.”
Though you may have heard it described using many differently apt metaphors, an API (or application programming interface) is simply a set of instructions for computers. You can imagine an API as a waiter who takes your order, communicates that information to the kitchen, and returns with the dish you requested.
As Amazon learned, with APIs you can:
Automate key processes and reduce hours spent on non-billable work
Avoid entering data manually to reduce the risk of errors
Increase visibility of client needs with connected solutions
Connect otherwise disconnected third-party systems
Gain insights for analysis and decision support
Although APIs are enjoying a surge in popular understanding they’ve been around for a long time and are well understood, both in terms of security and implementation.
Considerations for evaluating an API
Thomson Reuters currently offers API integrations in GoSystem Tax RS, GoFileRoom, FirmFlow, SurePrep, ONESOURCE, Checkpoint, and Confirmation, with more in the works. As you’re evaluating which product fits best with your current tech stack and workflow processes, here are a few things to consider.
Documentation
Data
Authentication
Connectors
Lower environment testing
Utilities
1. Documentation
What is the quality of API documentation? Look for robust developer documentation with examples in different programming languages. The documentation should cover the purpose of the API, the type of data being returned, the parameters required for a successful request, and the API endpoints and http methods it supports. Thomson Reuters offers dedicated resources to help your technical staff implement API tools and engage with third parties through the Thomson Reuters developer portal.
2. Data
What data is returned from the API? A “good” API will let developers pull additional info, through lots of variables and different ways of calling. Understanding the format and body of data being returned from an API before you invest time in creating an application around it is essential. Use an API testing application to send test requests and evaluate the data returned.
3. Authentication
Check the authentication requirements for the API you’ve chosen to work with. Does the product authentication use Basic Authentication (username and password), API Key (a unique key for access), OAuth, or OAuth 2.0? Today OAuth 2.0 is highly considered as the best authentication method when using APIs.
4. Connectors
A connector is a user-friendly wrapper around an API that allows the underlying service to talk to applications. Connectors allow the implementation of APIs without the need for development resources or programming expertise. Thomson Reuters partnered with Microsoft to release a GoFileRoom connector within the Microsoft Power Automate ecosystem, enabling GoFileRoom users to automate over 45 (otherwise manual) GoFileRoom actions. You can combine these actions together to create automation within your firm processes.
5. Lower Environment Testing
Lower environment testing is a simple idea – does the software offer a non-production environment so you can test APIs without affecting the day-to-day operations of your staff?
6. Utilities
Thomson Reuters provides a wide range of prebuilt utilities and has dedicated teams ready to assist you in transforming your ideas into fully realized projects. With our expertise, we can help you navigate the development process seamlessly. Among our offerings are prebuilt utilities such as Power BI dashboards, specifically designed for reporting out of GoFileRoom and GoSystem Tax.
How are Thomson Reuters APIs different?
Another important aspect of evaluating APIs is the quality of the APIs themselves. Thomson Reuters has a team of developers who are constantly working to build the most current and modern APIs that create reliable connections across your tech stack. We are proactive in our efforts to ensure seamless connectivity between all your platforms, and we use customer input in the process of creating the best-in-class APIs you need to make your practice run smoothly.
Connecting the two pizza rule with automation
Whether you’re feeding your team with two pizzas or ten, the value of IT automation remains. APIs allow firms to do more with less, reduce human error, connect teams and clients no matter where they are in the world, and allow your firm to make data-backed business decisions with built-in analytics.
Give your firm a competitive advantage, unlock endless ways to increase efficiency and better serve your clients with Thomson Reuters tax and accounting APIs – and this is just the beginning.
Learn more about Thomson Reuters tax and accounting APIs
Also, check out our recent white paper, Automate with APIs to solve pain points, for more information about how APIs can help your firm.
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