AT LARGE: What Business Do You THINK You’re In?
With busy season ended, accountants and financial managers assess the meaning of it all.
By Rick Telberg
At Large
What business are you in? Or rather, what business do you THINK you’re in? Now that the busy season is over, many CPAs are taking the time to assess and re-assess how it went, how they feel, and what they’d REALLY like to do in the future. So this is a good time to ask yourself if you can readily define your business mission.
What business are you in? Does any of this sound familiar?
“Babysitting my clients.”
“Handholding.”
“The peace-of-mind business.”
“Solving people’s problems.”
“Measuring and improving performance.
[Planning a leadership strategy meeting? Request your FREE Situation Assessment Discusson Guide]In fact, 85% of our CPAs say they do know what business they are in. But 15% don’t. And, while that ratio might be roughly expectable, surprises – and a lack of agreement – came from the 10% who went on to try to define their business for us. Significantly: Not one person mentioned numbers.
Almost everyone seemed to recognize that the accountant’s product is a process, a service involving relationships, empathy, and an urge to help. V.A. Sonny Julian, in Independence, Mo., sounded like a cross between a father and a shepherd, describing his business as “looking after the small business person.”
A quarter of our CPAs use the word “help” or “service,” many with phrases worthy of a self-help book. Peter Giammarinaro, managing partner of a small firm in Basking Ridge, N.J., said, “Helping clients solve problems and achieve their goals.” From Joe Eckelkamp, a partner in St. Louis: “Filling client financial needs and helping them keep what they reap.”
It happens in industry, too. James Barnes, a senior executive in Vernon Hills, Ill., confessed a little corporate confusion. “It’s not as obvious as I would have thought,” he wrote, “and many managers do not act in a manner consistent with what business we are really in.”
Joseph A. Lania, a CPA working out of Pembroke Pines, Fla., came from a different angle. “I am in the business of selling,” he wrote. “?selling my time and knowledge to clients who can buy elsewhere but CHOSE me. There are more CPAs in my state than trees, so I have to be mindful that I have to sell. Sell and keep my customers satisfied.”
A handful seemed to lean toward the touchy-feely. “We are in the peace-of-mind business,” said one. “It’s the people business,” said another.
From Manhattan, Kan., Harley W. Pottroff wrote, “Emotional business of solving people’s problems and making life better for them.”
Somebody in a small firm in Renton, Wash. has gone beyond audits: “We measure and improve performance. We help companies develop information sources and metrics that help them make business decisions.”
Now and then we found a CPA striving to limit his or her business mission. Liz Hegarty wrote from Atlanta to say, “I’ve pared off some of the types of work that don’t fit in with my line of expertise and that I don’t enjoy doing.”
Same problem at a small firm in Jackson, Tenn. “I know where I feel really comfortable and experienced,” Fancher Sargent wrote, “But that doesn’t stop my managing partner from going after projects I feel are outside our expertise.”
CPAs are, of course, engaged in a wide variety of businesses, from information technology to financial management to tax prep to a thousand kinds of consulting. But it’s always service, always involving human relationships. And of course there’s the numbers, too.
(Appeared originally at www.cpa2biz.com/news/telberg)
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