training

Train Your Clients Before They Train You

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Taking unscheduled phone calls and meetings wrecks your bottom line and theirs.

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

Many of the behaviors you rationalize as good client service are just desperate measures to avoid losing bad clients.

MORE: Why Time Tracking Still Matters | Business Owners Face One of Three Exits | How Small Firms Can Win the Talent Wars | Six Ways to Create a Millennial-Friendly Firm | Do You Know Your Turnaround Time?
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However, clients are trainable – at least as trainable as Jack Russell Terriers. That is to say they’re somewhat trainable. However, like Jack Russell Terriers, you train clients or they’ll train you. Somebody’s getting trained. Here’s an example of how that works.
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Mike Whitmire: Re-Think Your Hiring and Training Practices

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The Disruptors: Training can triumph over textbooks in the talent wars. 

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The Disruptors
With Liz Farr for CPA Trendlines

Mike Whitmire wants to transform the role of accountants in industry from mere counting beans (though that’s not a bad skill to have) to an operational role that leverages accountant’s knowledge of company finances and operations to drive efficiency throughout an entire organization.

MORE:  Hector Garcia: Success Strategies of a Quickbooks YouTube Superstar | Blake Oliver: Why Tax Work Yearns To Be Free| Private Equity Explodes in U.K. | Brannon Poe: The Status Quo Must Go  | Accounting Nerds, Unlock Your Super Powers  | Disruptor: Jason Statts Shakes Up the Status Quo | Think Small to Think Big with Matt Wilkinson | When Financial Statements Go Extinct with Corey Schmidt | Can Geraldine Carter Save Accountants from Themselves? | Re-Inventing Accounting with Tyler Anderson

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Whitmire, CEO, and co-founder of accounting software company FloQast, Inc., knows a thing or two about talent acquisition and development. Before founding FloQast, he managed the accounting team at Cornerstone OnDemand, a SaaS company in Los Angeles.

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Mandate Training Programs, Accountability

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Three young businessmen in office training sessionProcesses make it easier to achieve results.

By Roman H. Kepczyk
Quantum of Paperless

For many firms, the ability to identify, standardize and implement best practices is the last remaining competitive advantage in business today as communications tools and access to technology have become available to everyone.

MORE ON TECH SPENDING: Centralize Contact Administration | Standardize Your QuickBooks Support | Remote Banking Offers Instant ROI | How to Stop ‘Overauditing’ | Devil’s in the Details of Digital File Delivery
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To take advantage of the continuous stream of innovation and opportunities, firms must adopt a “learning culture.” This requires a formal process to capture and standardize best practices in every department within the firm so that every person can take advantage of them.
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5 Reasons Your Firm Training Needs Nano Learning

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Woman on city train using tabletMobility and repetition are points you may not have considered.

By Jassen Bowman
Tax Resolution Systems

Training employees effectively in our fast-paced, information-saturated world can be a big challenge for business leaders.

MORE: When Tax Filing Season Is Over, What’s Next? | How to End the Tax Revenue Roller Coaster with a Four-Season Practice Model | How to Turn Routine CPE into a New Marketing Opportunity

 
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In the past, you might have been able to get staff to sit through a three-hour training course without issue. Today, accomplishing the same can seem impossible.
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21 Staff Training Best Practices

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And the 3 types of training that all CPA firm personnel need.

By Marc Rosenberg
On Staffing

I cringe when CPAs use “‘training”’ and “‘CPE”’ synonymously.

  • CPE coursework is often reactive, taken to maintain a CPA license. It may or may not educate. It may or may not be the type of education an individual needs. Many look upon CPE as a nuisance to be complied with. The smaller the firm and the older the CPA, the more likely this is the case.
  • Training is primarily proactive, undertaken to expand a person’s knowledge, performance and capabilities. The training is in alignment with what the person needs to do the job and provide value to the firm and its clients.

MORE ON STAFFING: 8 Keys to Keeping Staff Engaged | How to Create a Talent Management Strategy | What Happened to the Relevancy of the CPA Profession? | Staffing: What CPA Firms Are Learning the Hard Way
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Ideally, the training identified as needed also qualifies as CPE.
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Forget Technology. The Last, Best Competitive Edge Is Now Your Firm’s ‘Learning’ Skills

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Office workers training on computersHow to build it and give chargeable credit to the coordinators.

By Roman H. Kepczyk
Quantum of Paperless

For many firms, the ability to identify, standardize and implement best practices is the last remaining competitive advantage in business today as communications tools and access to technology have become available to everyone.

MORE ON TECH SPENDING: Centralize Contact Administration | Standardize QuickBooks Support (and Bring Your Clients) | Remote Deposit Saves in Several Ways | How Efficient Are Your Audits? | Going Digital: How to Train a Client | Hit ‘Delete,’ But Only When It’s Time | Unified Messaging Offers Benefits | Remote Access: Giving Workers What They Want | Why Use Windows 10?
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To take advantage of the continuous stream of innovation and opportunities, firms must adopt a “learning culture.” This requires a formal process to capture and standardize best practices in every department within the firm so that every person can take advantage of them.
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When Silence Is Golden … and Not

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Businesswoman with hand to foreheadA cautionary tale about commitment for partners-to-be.

By Martin Bissett
Passport to Partnership

Ask yourself and answer these questions when considering the current and future “commitment” behaviors that you’ll employ.

MORE ON THE PASSPORT TO PARTNERSHIP: What Commitment Means Now | 13 Steps to True Commitment | When to Ignore a White Lie: A Cautionary Tale | Communicate Your Worth and Value | Best Practices for One-on-One Communication | Learn to Read Your Firm’s Culture | Experts Advise What Partnership Takes
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1 – What is my first reaction to being asked to work outside of my normal hours?

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What Commitment Means Now

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Smiling woman with colleagues in backgroundDo you and your firm have the same perception?

By Martin Bissett
Passport to Partnership

The Passport to Partnership study collated a number of responses in a conversational style. The need for commitment is showcased below and was repeated many times in various different ways.

So many use us as a stepping stone and we’re now trying to determine who those are at the interview stage.

MORE ON THE PASSPORT TO PARTNERSHIP: 13 Steps to True Commitment | How Good Is Your Network? | RFPs: 7 Things NOT to Do | 5 Ways to Evaluate Your Communication | 7 Levels of Communication Management | 5 Ways to Get Buy-In for Firm Culture | Partnership: Competence Is Just the Foot in the Door
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Proof – if any were needed – that long-term commitment is not a given in the next generation of accounting professionals.
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