Monthly Archives: September 2014

Threat or Opportunity as H&R Block, Liberty Jump into Bookkeeping Services?

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Liberty Block logosWhat it means for independent tax and accounting firms.

By Hitendra Patil
Pransform Inc. 

The accounting profession in the U.S. has been shaken up by announcements from Liberty Tax Services and H&R Block that they are entering into core bookkeeping and accounting services business.

More on The Entrepreneur Accountant:  Six Steps for a Better Tax Season   •  8 Seconds into the Future: Meet Generation Z   •   5 Reasons Gen Y Will Make or Break Your Firm   •   3 Ways Amazon’s New Fire Phone Hints at the Future of Accounting   •   The 8 Traits Creating the Firm of the Future Today   •   Get More Done, Make More Money: Stop Doing These 17 Things   •   What Shopping Habits Reveal about Accounting Clients   •   Create Your “Not-To-Do’s” List   •   IRS Bitcoin Rule: 5 Things Accountants Need to Know   •   Tax Season Tips: Train Your Brain to Focus   •   What the Bitcoin Phenomenon Means for Accountants   •   Overcoming Your Clients’ Worst Fears   •   5 Tech Tips for Reigniting Growth   •   A Case Study in Using Linkedin   •   Accountants and Six Fundamental Human Needs   •   Client Satisfaction Starts with ‘Likeability’   •   Why Accounting? Your Clients Want to Know   •   What’s Next: Predictive Accounting

The news came as a surprise to many and I had a few discussions with some accounting professionals, especially smaller firms and some solo practitioners, on what they think of this new development. READ MORE →

The 6 Market Advantages of Women-Led Firms

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Ida O. Abbott, Sponsoring Women
Abbott

Changing marketplace demands changing firms.

By Ida O. Abbott
Sponsoring Women: What Men Need to Know

Most male leaders today under­stand how important it is to keep high-performing women in the pipeline and help them achieve their potential within the organization.

MORE on WOMEN in ACCOUNTING: Men, Women: A Tale of Two Brains for Business  |  Beyond Mentoring: Why Sponsoring Women for Leadership Matters  |  Firms that ‘Get’ Women Stand to Win the Talent Wars

These men are genuinely concerned about their firms’ inability to retain and advance the women they hire because having a substantial number of women leaders is a demonstrably significant benefit to the company, while a lack of gender diversity at the top of organizations can be very costly to the bottom line. READ MORE →

What a CPA Firm Is Worth

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calculatorLook at the revenue stream. Goodwill is another story.

By Marc Rosenberg
Retirements & Buyouts

To illustrate a CPA firm’s value, let’s use an example of a plain-vanilla or average firm:

  • Annual revenues: $6 million.
  • Six partners with ages spread evenly between 45 and 62.
  • Average partner income: $350,000.
  • Ratio of professional staff to partner is 3.5.
  • Firm is located in a city with a population in excess of 1M.
  • Clients are all in common industries such as manufacturing, real estate, health care, etc. No niches or specialties.
  • Services are all traditional annuity types such as accounting and tax.
  • The firm’s accrual basis capital, primarily WIP and A/R, is $1.2M.

Now, let’s compute the value.

READ MORE →

6 Simple Steps to Impress a Prospect

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Ed Mendlowitz CPA The Practice Doctor Q and AHow to walk in with head start.

By Ed Mendlowitz
The CPA Trendlines Practice Doctor

QUESTION: How do you make a presentation to get a new client when you do not know everything you should about the client’s business?

RESPONSE: No one can know everything about everything. Smaller firms have a harder time but they can reach out to others in their firm, or even partners in similar firms who have the knowledge to assist in the proposal, or friends in larger firms.

Here are six simple steps to learn as much as you can about a prospect and their industry.  READ MORE →

Three Tips for Creating Training Metrics

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Plus: Effective budgeting and management.

By Michael Ramos
Michael Ramos and Associates

CPA firms want to establish metrics for their learning function as a way to monitor and manage their learning activities. Ideally, firms would do their learning strategies and goals first and then use these strategies to drive the related metrics.

But we do not live in an ideal world, and some firms choose to establish metrics while simultaneously working on firmwide learning structures and goals.

MORE: High-Impact Learning: 4 Ways to Maximize CPE ROI

Recognizing the risks inherent in prematurely defining metrics, here are three tips for creating meaningful learning metrics at your firm that will help manage the learning function and drive performance. READ MORE →

NEW SURVEY RESULTS: Accountants Face Stiff Client Resistance to Cloud Accounting Apps

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cloud adoption likelihood
Likelihood of adopting cloud accounting

SMBs say cloud accounting is the last thing they want.

Accountants are encountering extraordinary difficulties in getting their small- and mid-size business clients to adopt cloud computing, according to new research findings made available first to CPA Trendlines.

Accounting is the last operation small business wants to update. Everything else comes first, according to Software Advice, Austin, Texas-based accounting technology reviews company.

Key Findings:

  1. Over half of respondents express moderate to high levels of confidence in cloud-based accounting solutions, with 32 percent indicating “moderate” confidence.
  2. With 5 percent already using cloud accounting, only 16 percent more are likely to move ahead anytime soon.
  3. The top concern with cloud-based accounting, cited by 46 percent of small business owners, is security. Cost and training were other key concerns. READ MORE →

Men, Women: A Tale of Two Brains for Business

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man woman brainWhat brain science tells us about how to work better together.

By Sandi Smith Leyva
The Accountant’s Accelerator

We need to acknowledge that in the tax and accounting workplace, women do not understand men, and men do not understand women. It happens in dating, so it should not be a surprise when it happens at work.

This isn’t a new topic. But what we’re doing now is not working, or it’s working at a glacial pace. We actually lost ground during the recession years and are now going backwards. The statistics are even worse in small firms, where 80 percent of the talent pool are women but only 12 percent are partners.

Luckily, we now know dozens of reasons why and have hundreds of tools and skill builders to help.

Here are just a few revelations from emerging brain science: READ MORE →

Mergers: 11 Lessons from Done Deals

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If they had it all to do over again…

By Marc Rosenberg
CPA Firm Mergers

As you might suspect, in 20 years of consulting to CPA firms, several dozen mergers of my clients have taken place.

From time to time, I meet with the managing partner of the firm that was my client and ask them how the merger went, what they would do differently and what advice they would give to firms contemplating a merger.

Here are some choice morsels… READ MORE →