The WhIP Journal
June 2004 Power Your Practice – THE WhIP JOURNAL [What Helps In Practice]
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In This Issue:
IT’S HOW YOU PLAY THE GAME – Public Accounting, Not Golf
THAT IS SUCH A GOOD THOUGHT…
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IT’S HOW YOU PLAY THE GAME
Public Accounting, Not Golf
It has been said, in recent months (and perhaps years), about the difficulty of attracting professionals into public accounting and how the number of young professionals is in serious decline. We simply do not have enough practitioners to meet the increasing growth of SME’s.
According to figures for 2002, the number of accountants who choose to go into public practice is only 45% (and I wonder if that number has declined in the past two years).
The practitioners who do choose public practice will often move into industry after they find that they are overworked, burnt-out and don’t want to manage one more tax season. I once had a Senior Manager-desperate-to-be-a-partner who told me I was expected to be in to work before her (7:00am) and to stay until after she left (7:00pm) and this was not during tax season. I didn’t stay.
We’ve just got to break the cycle. There must be ways for firms to attract professionals and offer them challenge, with work-life balance, great training, rewarding growth, inspiration, and a great team environment. There are some things that can be done that will have a positive effect on the profession, on a firm by firm basis. It may not be THE answer, but it is a start.
How are you playing the game? Are you making a positive difference to public accounting?
1] How is your firm helping to change the ‘image’ of public accounting?: Have you considered if your firm is a ‘great’ firm? Do you treat your staff with respect, and honor work-life balance, and provide the necessary tools and environment to make a wonderful work experience? Do you listen to staff and gain feedback as to how your firm you can meet your staff’s needs?
2] Attracting and retaining staff: If you’re a great firm to work for, you will find your greatest recruiting tool is your own staff. They are the ones, given the opportunity, who will sing your praises. A professional who is considering joining your firm will be very pleased to have a private, honest conversation with any of your current staff members. Those conversations will provide the answers about your firm philosophy and how you act on it.
3] Choose your clients wisely: Not at all prospects should become clients. In fact, not all current clients should stay on as clients. There are some clients who will have a negative impact on your staff and your firm. You know who they are. They will use/abuse your staff, your energy, your time, your goodwill and willingness to serve. They are difficult, demanding, rude, or careless. They may make you and/or your staff uncomfortable with their demands, language, or hazy grasp of accounting rules. The amount this client pays you during a year has little bearing on whether or not you should move them out as a client. You can, and no doubt will, replace them with one or more clients who will more than make up for it.
4] Technology: This is a critical issue that holds back many firms. To be a firm who can keep up-to-date and make great gains in this day of accounting professional shortages, you absolutely MUST keep on hardware, software, programs, document management, productivity and processes. You will attract and retain professionals who are pleased to be with a leading-edge professional firm, small or large.
5] Training and Education: Providing training and professional education is another critical area to address. One of the important aspects of attracting and retaining the best talent available is setting high standards and providing the training and development to maintain those standards.
6] Accounting Standards: We know that it has been a year of changes in accounting standards. For many this has been a source of frustration and despair. I’ve heard from many professionals who grieve for the ‘profession’ they once knew and loved. If you’re counting yourself in the numbers of professionals who are distressed during recent times, I challenge you to find the good in the profession today and focus on that. I challenge you to accept the things you ‘cannot’ change (change the ones you can) and work your best into all that you do, for its own sake and for the sake of your staff (and eventually the whole profession). How are you implementing changes and standards into the firm? Do you present the changes with great grief and frustration or do you also encourage an acceptance that will allow staff to also accept and move ahead with? Do your staff see a future in the profession or are they starting to think about ‘getting out’? Make sure you give them a reason to see a future in the profession.
7] Document Management: I’ve added Document Management as a point item because I believe that it has such an impact on today’s firm. Implemented into a firm it has the ability to increase efficiencies, decrease low level tasks, and provide integrated information storage and retrieval. It will have some positive influence in a firm and on staff. Please let me know if you would like more information on this key business area.
8] Inspire: As I mentioned in the last eNews, many firms cultivate an atmosphere of fear with their staff (sometimes unknowingly and sometimes not…). Are you making your small place in the world a better place? Is your office a place of truth, values, new ideas, questions, respect, and integrity? This is the kind of firm that will always attract and retain professionals who are joyful about their decision to stay in public practice. Professionals who tell others about the great career and life they have. Professionals who attract and encourage others to join the profession.
“THAT IS SUCH A GOOD THOUGHT”,
Thoughts worth reading, thinking, repeating and embracing.
"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted."
~Albert Einstein
I hope you’ve found value in this month’s copy of THE WhIP JOURNAL.
My best regards to you,
Debra Dowdell
Power Your Practice
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This is an Opt-in No-Fee monthly ezine/newsletter from Debra Dowdell. You are receiving this because you have subscribed to it. You may unsubscribe or change your information at any time at Details@PowerYourPractice.com. Your information will never be given away, sold, or rented. Ever. Thank you.
Power Your Practice© 2007
Power Your Practice does not warrant or guarantee the accuracy of any statement or other information and materials provided in this newsletter. All articles and other information and materials in this newsletter are provided for general information purposes only.