Boardroom Rivals | Business Simulations for Higher Education

Inside The Closing Cycle

What your students see

Screens from a class in progress. Click any screen to see it full size.

Each team runs a company's month-end close

The team home shows the Close Score and what students' calls did to the books: staff hours against this close's budget, uncorrected errors against materiality, and any restatements or control findings.

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Team home for Copperfield Group: Close Score 46, two open inbox items, uncorrected errors under the materiality line, staff hours over budget, a restatement notice and control findings. — Each team runs a company's month-end closeThe team home shows the Close Score and what students' calls did to the books: staff hours against this close's budget, uncorrected errors against materiality, and any restatements or control findings.

Inbox item on a lease modification from the senior accountant, with a note on the renegotiated HQ lease and three treatment options labeled 3, 6 and 2 staff hours. — Every call costs staff hoursStudents make the call on each item, here an ASC 842 lease modification. The sound treatment uses 6 of the close's staff hours; the quicker options use 2 or 3 and get it wrong.

Close calendar table for Sentinel Corp listing three closes with hours used against a 67.5-hour budget, days to close, errors at the materiality test, and results including one restatement. — Each close is tested against materialityThe close calendar shows each month-end close: staff hours against budget, days to close against the target, and uncorrected errors at the materiality test. Close 2 went over materiality and was restated.

Cohort leaderboard ranking eight teams by Close Score, with days to close, restated closes, errors on the books, four pillar scores, responses, expired items and response quality. — Same items, same days, one rankingTeams are ranked on the Close Score, where each pillar blends 60% graded calls with 40% measured from the books. The table also shows days to close, restatements and errors still on the books.

About This Simulation

The Closing Cycle puts each team on the close desk at a public company, a PE-backed private manufacturer or a nonprofit foundation. Every active day (professor picks Mon-Fri or any weekday pattern) the same 1-5 items reach every team: a late vendor invoice three days post-close, a bank reconciliation out by $87K, a warranty accrual running 22% light, a PCAOB inspection letter, an ASC 606 revenue-cutoff question, an ERP outage 48 hours before publish. Most are multiple-choice; the rest require a written memo that a senior controller / audit partner LLM grades 0-10, with the team's books and earlier work on the topic in front of it. Every 5 active days is one month-end close with a budget of staff hours: thorough treatments cost hours, shortcuts save them and can leave a dollar error on the team's uncorrected-error list. At each close the list is tested against the company's materiality; over the line is a material error and a restatement, and errors passed on carry into the next close. Running over the hours slips the close past the company's days-to-close target. Control lapses are graded deficiency, significant deficiency or material weakness, and the Final Report is the team's audit report: opinion, proposed adjustments, control findings and a management letter. One Close Score (each pillar 60% graded calls, 40% measured from the books) is the number on the leaderboard, final report and gradebook. Teams split four light roles (Controller, Senior Accountant, Technical Accounting & SEC Reporting, Audit Liaison) with a second-person review: every memo prepared by one teammate and signed off by another, and a memo without a sign-off is a light approval gap in the audit. Each student writes a reflection on each close, worth 20% of the suggested grade with their owned work once the class uses roles.

LMSCanvas + LTI 1.3 compatible platforms·SSO + one-click grade publishHow it works

Share this with your team— printable one-pager for a chair or procurement./for-your-team/closing-cycle

Learning Objectives

Run a month-end close against a days-to-close target with limited staff hours
Judge errors against materiality, alone and in aggregate (SAB 99), and carry deferred errors forward (SAB 108)
Make defensible judgment calls on accruals, reserves, cutoff and disclosures
Recognize control lapses and how auditors grade them (deficiency, significant deficiency, material weakness)
Read the year-end audit report: opinion, proposed adjustments and management letter

Week-by-Week Overview

1

Days 1-5: Close 1

Items from every part of the close land from Day 1. Teams read their company profile (materiality, the days-to-close target), claim their roles (the inbox marks each item "For:" its owner), settle who signs off memos, and learn what each treatment costs in staff hours.

2

Days 6-10: the first test

Close 1 is tested against materiality and its days to close are counted. The first close review asks the team to book its corrections or carry them into Close 2.

3

Days 11-15: errors add up

Small passed-on errors and new shortcuts meet at the Close 3 test. Teams that keep picking the most thorough treatment watch their closes slip; teams that take every shortcut watch the list cross the line.

4

Days 16-20: controls under watch

Control lapses accumulate toward deficiencies and material weaknesses. Memos are graded with the team's own earlier positions in view.

5

Days 21-30: the last closes and the audit

The final closes are tested, then the auditor issues the team's audit report: the opinion, proposed adjustments, control findings and the management letter. The debrief starts from it.

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The Closing Cycle