While they wait for the Securities and Exchange Commission to publish its proposed roadmap for the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards by domestic companies, it seems that some companies may want to use the time to get up to speed on the standards, according to the results of a recent poll.

While a Grant Thornton survey of 250 U.S. chief executive officers found that 61 percent say they have “some” or “a lot” of experience in preparing financial statements according to IFRS, 20 percent have “very little” experience, and 19 percent have none.

A lack of familiarity with the standards among companies and their various financial statement users has been one of the concerns raised as the SEC has taken steps toward moving U.S. issuers to IFRS over the next several years.

The SEC voted Aug. 27 to publish for comment an updated roadmap proposal for phasing domestic issuers to IFRS beginning in 2014, with an option for a small group of issuers to voluntarily adopt as soon as 2011.

Not surprisingly, the draft of the proposed roadmap has yet to emerge. In the weeks since the vote, the SEC and other regulators have had their hands full trying to calm investors and slow the bleeding in the U.S. capital markets, so the IFRS roadmap and other previous regulatory priorities have moved to the back burner. In an Oct. 14 e-mail response to a request for comment on the roadmap, SEC spokesman John Nester told Compliance Week there’s “no date set for publication.”

Meanwhile, roughly 97 percent of the CEOs surveyed say accounting practices become somewhat more complex or much more complex when dealing with foreign businesses and customers, as opposed to just domestic companies and customers. Most CEOs cited complying with U.S. accounting practices as the most challenging aspect in relation to managing accounting practices when dealing with foreign businesses, followed by loss of managerial control, dollar or currency volatility, and political risk.

Three-quarters of those polled rated their accounting and financial systems as very or somewhat capable to manage business with foreign businesses/partners, while the remainder said their systems are somewhat or very incapable.