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Back to School
As any parent will tell you, getting our kids ready to return to school involves quite a lot of preparation, not to mention, expense.
A new laptop maybe, a new knapsack definitely, pens, pencils, paper and lunch boxes, for sure. Then there’s the new cell phone or android, tablet or iPhone, of course. And then there’s the new case for the new gadget.
Not to mention a new wardrobe, as last year’s clothes are so 2010! And on and on it goes. I’m sure you’re probably hearing cash registers in your head going Ka-Ching!
Yep, getting our ‘Rugrats’ ready to return to school isn’t cheap!
But if they’re “A” students, it’s a small price to pay for excellence. Hey, wait a minute - that sounds familiar to me, does it to you?
Don’t we use a similar line with our clients, explaining the cost of excellence?
I know I often did back in the day. I explained to my clients why my firm was that little bit more expensive than other local firms. I offered them the opportunity to go where it’s going to be cheaper, and then I asked them ‘by the way, did you ever buy something great that was cheap?’
I have recently seen some of the best software for public accounting firms up-close and personal in the last few months, as I had to become familiar with a product as I recruited a key person for their new Canadian operation.
What does it do? It helps accounting firms make money.
Ah, when I put it that way, it doesn’t sound like an expensive piece of software any more, it sounds more like a wise investment!
But I don’t want you to think I am trying to sell you Bstar (the valuation software in question) it is a much wider issue I want to address.
In my dealings with thousands of public accounting firms and their people, over the years, I have come to discover that we, as a profession, have a severe problem: SWIC.
Self-Worth Inferiority Complex.
This is a disease that most accountants contract in the early stage of their career. They learn how to do something fairly quickly and perceive that anyone else could do it too. Then they do it for someone else and think ‘oh, it only took me two minutes’ I can’t charge for that (linked closely to the other syndrome we fall victim to (BBTH) “Bill By The Hour”.
If something takes so very little time to do, it MUST have a correlating value to the client!
WRONG!
But then BBTH kicks-in and we continue to bill little, if anything for tasks that take little time to do irrespective of the value delivered to the client.
Let me give you an example. Suppose you’re at the Dentist in agony and have to have a tooth removed.
Before you approve the work, you ask the Dentist how much this will cost.
‘$300” he says. “Not bad” you think to yourself “for getting rid of this terrible pain”. But then the accounting side of you (BBTH) kicks-in and asks: “How long will it take?”
The Dentist smiles back at you and says “Oh, about ten minutes”.
It’s at that point that you hit the roof “$300 for ten minutes work! That’s disgraceful”
Let me ask you two things:
- Before you walked into the Dentist’s office, what would you have paid to get rid of the pain?
- What changed to your perception of value when you knew how long the task would take?
It is precisely this concept of TIME = MONEY that we, as a profession, have to move away from. TIME never has equaled money. The new equation for the accounting firm of the future, I suggest, is this:
KNOWLEDGE = MONEY.
Think about it. Clients don’t care how long you spend on putting their financial statements and tax returns together. All they care about is “How much tax have you saved me this year?” Then they compare that amount to the level of your fees, they then can make a judgment on the value you have provided to them.
It’s time that we started to position ourselves, as a profession, not as the bean-counter or score-keeper, but as the trusted advisor or business mentor that our typical client desperately wants to work with.
The ‘Superman’ element in this relationship is where the accountant suddenly starts adding value to the relationship. It’s where you’re saying to your clients ‘How would you like to build a more profitable and valuable business?’ and then you use the tools you have recently invested in to help your clients do exactly that.
The truth is, that many family owned businesses are working with ‘Superman’ right now, except that because their accountant is not looking at value, but at hourly rates, and as a result has not invested in some of the tools necessary (such as Profit Driver, Bstar, or RAN-ONE, Principa or Business Mentors Network for example) the accountant is shackled in Clark Kent’s suit and glasses when he or she should be spinning in a telephone booth turning into ’Superman’!
Take a long hard look at yourself and give yourself the litmus test: What have you done for your clients lately that has helped them build a more profitable, valuable business?
What did you charge for this work? Did you bill based on hours, or based on the value you delivered to your clients? Time to go back to school yourself? Then look into www.partnerbootcamp.com for details of our September weekend course!
© 2003-2011,
Steve McIntyre-Smith. All Rights Reserved. |
