How to move from a commodity to a valuable adviser.
CPA firms need to do a better job of showing clients that they are not an expense, but a value, according to a leading bank CFO, CPA and — most importantly — a buyer of auditing and accounting services.
“They’re the ones that can tell a business how they’re doing. They’re the ones that can help them get lending. And certainly that’s key in today’s economy,” Sara Mikuta, CPA, CFO of Leaders Bank, Oak Brook, Ill., and 2010 chair of the Illinois CPA Society tells CPA Trendlines.
“The board and the audit committee just think it’s like buying insurance,” she says. “But as the CFO I need for my accounting firm to make sure that I know everything I need to know.”
“I don’t want to see them in just September and January,” she says. “I want to hear from them all year round. I need to have that touch.”
2 Responses to “What Do Clients Want? Take It from This Tough CFO Client [VIDEO]”
Anonymous
Kevin Phillips is very insightful and articulate. He bridges the gap from financial prodct to value in two paragraphs.
Kevin Phillips
Even tough CFO’s come to work with anxiety associated with their responsibility for the financial health of their company. Often clients present a tough exterior. They can appear demanding, skeptical, analytical or even sometimes rude.
Value is always a human quality. A balance sheet has no value. A financial report or audit has no value. Value is created where the financial information connects with a human heart.
A CFO must make very difficult decisions in a very confusing and fast-changing economic environment. The accountant with the competence to penetrate a tough exterior and get inside to the place where the CFO nurses anxiety about the reliability of her financial data is the accountant who can transform financial data into VALUE.