Passionate Practice

Double the amount of time you spend in front of qualified prospects.

Forgetting short-term sales targets for one moment, shouldn’t you be aiming to do this anyway?

Get out of the office!

Today’s Pre Budget Report provided an opportunity for me (and fellow tax professionals) to demonstrate our expertise.

Herein lies the danger…

Experts in their field find it difficult to talk in plain English.  Experts rarely remember what it is like to know the basics only.  Experts forget that they are immersed in their field all day every day. Experts often talk at high level.  Experts tend to only see the obscure rather than concentrate on the (seemingly) obvious.  Experts try to outscore fellow experts – intellectual sparring – and can lose their target customers and clients’ interest in the process.  Experts wonder if they’ve missed anything and concentrate on what might not be there rather than what is.

I was reminded of this today – but after the event when I had the luxury of reflecting.

As professionals / consultants, what are the essentials we need to be able to deliver a 1st class client service?

1. A laptop
2. An internet connection – most coffee houses have wifi these days
3. A mobile phone – iphones now available in Tesco…
4. Skype for free calls / videoconferencing over the web
5. Some occassional (e.g. serviced) office space – although you should be aiming to spend the majority of your time with clients or working on the fly / out of coffee houses (see 2 above)
6. A Flip camera for (those all important) testimonials and to capture training points and thoughts
7. Google Documents and or Zoho for web services e.g. spreadsheets, word docs etc
8. Basecamp for project management
9. GoToMeeting for conducting meetings where you want to show what’s on your screen online
10. A blog for PR and to demonstrate expertise e.g. wordpress, typepad etc

If we’re honest, what else do we really need?

…it’s what you achieve in the (short?) time you are doing your work.

Monday Morning Focus:

Make every minute count.  Catch yourself shuffling paper or doing easy tasks that are of no real value to the firm or your clients.  Focus on the important stuff.  Focus, focus, focus (then leave early!)

1. Re:thinking accountancy
2. Being passionate about client service
3. Embedding innovative thinking
4. Exploring creative thinking tools
5. Creating a WOW! experience for clients
6. Exploring new ways of working
7. Cross-pollinating ideas
8. Applying visual thinking
9. Making cool stuff (services)
10. Asking the BIG WHY?  Always
11. Presentation bullet-point dodging
12. Leadership skills – a brand called YOU?
13. Improv tools for a fast changing business world
14. ‘Playing together nicely’ aka utilising collaboration tools
15. Re:thinking professional roles and structure
16. Identifying new services aka blue oceans
17. PUTTING PASSION INTO PROFESSIONAL ACCOUNTANCY SERVICES!

“Strategy is a series of trade-offs”

- Michael Porter

I was discussing strategy with a client of mine recently and she mentioned the above quote that she had heard at a Michael Porter seminar.  I think it sums up STRATEGY perfectly.

In my view great strategy demands:

• laser-sharp focus
• stubborness
• persistence
• unflappability
• coolness
• anti-herd mentality
• bravery
• self-belief
• adaptibility
• conversation (listening is implicit)
• clear future vision (that’s well communicated and shared)
• overall, great leadership

Never has there been a better time to hone these skills than right now. 

Any further traits to add?

MILTON GLASER DRAWS & LECTURES from C. Coy on Vimeo.

“When children are prevented from drawing their brains stop developing properly”

Yikes !- so when did you last scribble with your crayons?

Drawing is:

• thinking
• seeing
• understanding
• identifying issues
• solving problems
• seeing connections
• answering questions
• paying attention
• enhancing curiosity
• seeing possibilities

Hat tip to Digital Roam

Most professional advisors prefer to work with ambitious entrepreneurial businesses yet it is important that as accountants and business advisors we also reflect this mindset and behaviour in our own dealings and actions.

We need to become more entrepreneurial.  But this shouldn’t be restricted to an ambitious handful of rainmakers.  Entrepreneurship should be reflected across the firm and become part of its culture. We could and should all do our bit.

In a nutshell, we need to become more entrepreneuri-all.

How can we achieve this?  Here are some suggestions:

• Be quick to identify gaps in services.  Opportunities to fulfill.  New emerging sectors  to service.
• Instill a culture of asking WHY?  Ask why we do everything we do?  Every internal and external process should be questioned with the underlying theme of “is this action or process bringing value to our client?”  If not, consider culling it to save on cost and redirect resource elsewhere.
• Share the vision of where the business is going to all members of the team.  This helps everyone understand where they fit in and how they can make a contribution.
• Provide regular updates on financial results of the office – good and bad.  This reminds everyone that it is a business after all.
• Make team members accountable for their own results.  As long as everyone is clear on the vision, their individual role and objectives and regularly appraised of the wider results then this helps instil a sense of empowerment and responsibility – which in turn leads to entrepreneurialism.
• Encourage ideas and risk-taking on internal initiatives within the firm e.g. experiment with new marketing ideas, embrace change and be quick to spot new solutions.
• Listen and respond quickly to changing client and market needs.  Develop new services.  Try new stuff.
• Keep asking why?  Have fun.

How else could we as professionals become more entrepreneuri-ALL?

Just think….. if you (+ your team) could do one thing to reach out to clients and targets every day.  Or even every week. What difference could this make to your Firm?

All it takes is: Just one thing.

A client touch. An interaction with a target. For example:

• An email invite for coffee – “Hi + coffee”.
• Popping a relevant marketing flyer in the post or out via email.
• A call to say “Hi”.  No agenda.  No requests.  Just thinking about your client.
• Adding contacts via LinkedIn. (+ getting back in touch)
• Registering for a networking event. (+ attending)
• Checking newsfeeds for recent articles on your clients and targets.  A reason to get in touch.  To say “congratulations” or “disappointed to hear…how can we help?”.
• A quick search through Twitter for mentions of your specialism and (ideally) cries for help.  (Use advanced search option to restrict to UK search results.)  Tweet with offers of help if you can.
• Picking up the phone to a client for a quick update chat.
• A congratulatory note to a local company that won that recent award.
• Reconnecting with old colleagues or Uni friends – search on LinkedIn.
• Seek feedback from clients on your service so far – where good, seek referrals; where bad, address pronto.
• Ensure you have a coordinated calendar of Firm events – fire out invites (in good time).
• Think of old clients.  Ex clients.  Near misses on tender lists and proposals.  Those that said NO… now it might be a YES.
• Write an article.  Something that can demonstrate your expertise and keep your name front of mind with clients and targets – post online or submit to local papers.
• Say Thanks to your long-term clients.  Appreciate them.  Cherish their loyalty.

Monday Morning Focus: Review the above list.  Add to it by all means but make sure that you do a least one thing today and every day.  Share with your team.  At the very least do one thing every week.  Keep it going and enjoy the results.

Remember, all it takes is just one thing.

Design Thinking brings about a new way of thinking about client interactions and experiences of working with your firm.

Applying design thinking to an accountancy firm might result in:

• First impressions – the look and feel of the office reception. Any nice surprises? e.g. the offer of a lavishly made cup of coffee and freshly made cookies?
• Meeting rooms that inspire creativity and a sense of possibilities – flip charts, colour markers, giant stickies, sharpies, building blocks, play-dough etc
• Reports and correspondence that are sleek, unfussy and easy to understand (+ recycled of course – or the offer that all correspondence can be sent in digital form only)
• An ethos that seeks to (and actually manages to) exceed expectations in terms of timetable for delivery and quality of work. Going the extra mile to achieve a WOW service.
• A Firm that has a social purpose. A social object. Something that binds its team and its clients together for a higher purpose e.g. a proportion of its profits being reinvested in local aspiring companies?
• Constantly reinventing services. Always fresh. Always invigorating. Clients leave an interaction with your Firm feeling that they are at the cutting edge.
• Seeking feedback on a continual loop. Was that report good? Easy to understand? Was the presentation good? Did you like the use of graphics? Was that strategy meeting useful? Any suggested improvements? Note comments – then reinvent.
• Asking better questions. Eliciting new insights. Moving forward with new (potentially game-changing) ideas for clients.
• Flexible one-size-fits-NONE approach to client work. Assume nothing. Possibility seeking. Yet a turn-key system for internal things that work / need doing e.g. adminstration.
• Building a porfolio of clients that turn into fans. Where ideas can cross-pollinate. A support network. A tribe. A community.

Think about it…