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MANAGEMENT

Are You Aware of Your Firm’s Culture?

four colleagues chatting around a water cooler

Five ways to make it work for you.

By Martin Bissett
Passport to Partnership

Cultural issues are dynamic, very broad and unique in each firm. As such it is a challenge to summarize them accurately and comprehensively.

From our research, however, the wise choice for anyone wishing to get their passport to partnership appears to be to study

  • their firm’s existing culture,
  • that of its senior individuals and
  • that of those who have the ear of those senior individuals

to understand not only the route to partnership, but the terrain that they need to cross too.
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MARKETING & SALES

Bissett Bullet: What Are The Outcomes?

Today’s Bissett Bullet: “Listing the services of your firm – bad. Demonstrating the outcomes in clients’ lives as a result of the implementation of your expertise – good.”

By Martin Bissett

Hopefully, this needs little more of an explanation than you see above. If we decide to talk about services, expect the prospective client to glaze over. If we talk about their lives and how we can get them closer toward their dreams, expect to win high-quality new Grade A fees. It is no more complicated than that.

Today’s To-Do:

Today’s action point is to review your last meeting with a potential client. Did you talk about the features and services that you provide or did you talk about the client and their ambitions? Which was the greater of the two? If it is the first, change it. If it is the second, you are on the right track.

See more Bissett Bullets here

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PRICING, FEES & BILLING RATES

Answer Three Questions about Your Leadership

confident businesswoman seated at desk

Do others think you’re ready to be partner?

By Martin Bissett
Passport to Partnership

The Passport to Partnership study collated a number of responses in a conversational style.

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But two brief but succinct examples on the realities of how a firm assesses an individual’s “competence” for leadership are showcased really stood out:

  1. They need to explain technical data to me in a way that I know they understand.
  2. What kind of lifestyle does this person have outside of work? We’ll be looking at Facebook, X and Google to find out.

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MARKETING & SALES

Bissett Bullet: Saving for a Rainy Day

Today’s Bissett Bullet: “Debt leverage is a very risky business, especially for smaller firms. I appreciate that it’s not always avoidable, but proactively planning and saving for a rainy day is a far better strategy.”

By Martin Bissett

In an ideal world, if the unexpected occurs and you need to draw on an emergency fund, you turn to your cash reserves, the money you have saved to allow you to continue drawing from your business in the event of a temporary shortfall in income. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, those businesses with a three- to six-month reserve saved for a rainy day found that it didn’t rain quite so hard as it might have done.

The lesson? Be financially wise. Treat the funds in your business as sacred and plan for the unknown. You will sail through whatever emergencies come your way without accumulating debt to repay.

Today’s To-Do:

How much can you reasonably afford to save each month to build your rainy day fund? Plan to start doing so immediately.

See more Bissett Bullets here

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PRICING, FEES & BILLING RATES

Competence: First of the Seven C’s

BONUS: Eleven questions about your ambitions and finances.

By Martin Bissett
Passport to Partnership

Staffers aspiring to be partners must learn the key characteristics of successful partners. They also must learn how to develop their own personal plans to achieve partnership. Firms and staffers alike need a clear set of procedures, processes and milestones for turning top talent into the next generation of firm leadership.

MORE by Martin Bissett
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There are seven critically important criteria by which partners assess partners-to-be. I call them:

The Seven C’s

1. The first is Competence. As a prerequisite, but only a prerequisite, accountants must master their technical abilities and qualifications, whether it be audit, tax or management accounting. Whatever your area of specialty, as a staffer the partners expect you to be able to know at least as much as anyone else who may report to you.
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