practice-management

Four Ways to Practice Entrepreneurial Perseverance

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How to change your thinking to prevail over the toughest of circumstances

Perseverance is a skill that anyone can learn to not only survive, but thrive through life’s curves. When adversity strikes, it’s not what happens to you but how you respond to what happens to you that has the greatest impact on your life.

More for soloists and small firms: How to Win New Clients with a Freebie Strategy  • The Success Secrets Women Already Know  •    Why You’re Missing Out on 98% of Your New Business Potential  •  The Missing Ingredient in Your Marketing That Will Make All the Difference • 3 Steps to Start Running on Millionaire Time  •  On the Road to a Stress-Free Life: Identify Your Character Strengths   •  The Power of Deadlines in Closing a Deal   •   His and Her Brains at Work in Tax and Accounting • 5 Mistakes to Avoid When Seeking New Clients • The Top 12 Business Card Blunders Accountants Make •

Here are four specific ways you can change your thinking to persevere in the toughest of circumstances, from Sandi Smith, CPA, “The Accountant’s Accelerator:” READ MORE →

Can You Teach Judgment?

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Empowering staff to make mistakes, safely.

Here at CPA Trendlines, Ed Mendlowitz answers some of the toughest questions practitioners can throw at him. He’s the right one to ask. After more than 40 years in the business – building his own practice, running the firm, and eventually selling it to a major regional firm, WithumSmith+Brown, where he remains a senior partner and consultant to professional services clients – he has the answers. We’re happy to have him at CPA Trendlines. Send your questions for Ed here, or chime in with Comments below.

Get more Ed: Clients’ Calls At Home  • What You Need to Know before Expanding into Business Valuation  • Asking an Attorney for a Referral Fee  • Are Partner Retreats Really Worth the Cost? • Audit Reports Without Doing the Work? • Should I Really Spend the Time Making Checklists? • What’s a Tax Practice Worth Today? • Preparing to Sell Your Practice in a Few Years? 13 Things You Need to Know Today • 10 Questions to Ask Yourself Before You Decide to Add Financial Services to Your Practice •  Why Selling Your Practice Is Not a Retirement Strategy •  Congratulations! You Bought a Tax Practice. Now What? • How Accountants Can Keep the Business When a Client Wants to Sell Theirs • 10 Reasons Clients Don’t Pay, and What To Do about It • 13 Reasons Timesheets Will Never Die

QUESTION: Recently a colleague asked me: “How do you teach judgment?” and before I could respond, he answered it himself with “You can’t teach judgment!” READ MORE →

The First Nine Questions Your Partner Team Needs to Embrace for Optimal Profitability

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And six rules for keeping partners happy and productive.

by Marc Rosenberg, CPA
Special to CPA Trendlines

“When a corporation says move left, everybody takes a step left. In a partnership, when you say move left, three people go to the bathroom, four people move right, and five people leave the firm.” — Richard Ungaretti, Ungaretti & Harris

Related: Compensation Issues for the New Managing Partner | 20 Decisions for Your Firm’s New Partner Compensation Committee | Three Ways to Break Partner Gridlock in an Accounting Firm | What Partners Are Entitled To, and What They’re NOT Entitled To | How to Make Partner? | Why Accounting Firm Partners Are “Popping Prozac like M&M’s” | More…

In CPA firms, as the partners go, so goes the firm. The partners bring in most of the business, manage most of the client relationships and engagements, develop and mentor the staff and manage the firm. If the partners don’t perform these functions effectively, it is virtually impossible to be profitable and successful. READ MORE →

Five Skills that Separate Winners from Losers in the Accounting Business

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Super-successful firms are experts at achieving one or more these…

by Marc Rosenberg, CPA
The Rosenberg MAP Survey

If CPA firms did everything “right,” they could easily double or triple their income. Doing things right includes effectively bringing in clients, charging high billing rates, maintaining strong realization, high leverage of staff to partners and keeping expenses down. It’s the rare firm that does well in all of these categories.

More practice management strategy: Compensation Issues for the New Managing Partner | 20 Decisions for Your Firm’s New Partner Compensation Committee | Three Ways to Break Partner Gridlock in an Accounting Firm | What Partners Are Entitled To, and What They’re NOT Entitled To | How to Make Partner? | Why Accounting Firm Partners Are “Popping Prozac like M&M’s” | More…

The path to profitability is different for every firm. But the truly profitable firms are successful at achieving one or more of the following: READ MORE →

The Essence of CPA Firm Profitability

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What Mickey Mouse can teach accountants about accounting.

by Marc Rosenberg, CPA
Author of The Rosenberg MAP Survey

It has been said that organizations should never have profitability as a goal. Why? Because profitability should be the result of an organization’s efforts, not its goal. Profitability is a measure of success in accomplishing core business goals. The Disney Corporation probably says it best in their mission statement, which is short and sweet, but very powerful: “Our mission is to make millions happy.”

Related: Compensation Issues for the New Managing Partner | 20 Decisions for Your Firm’s New Partner Compensation Committee | Three Ways to Break Partner Gridlock in an Accounting Firm | What Partners Are Entitled To, and What They’re NOT Entitled To | How to Make Partner? | Why Accounting Firm Partners Are “Popping Prozac like M&M’s” | More…

Disney super-pleases parents by creating hundreds of quality movies and lovable characters children grow up with and adore, and by creating theme parks that tap into our fantasies and imagination.

READ MORE →

Seven Pearls of Wisdom for the New Managing Partner

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A thankless job: Divide, conquer and delegate.

Most CPAs are thrust into the managing partner role with little or no training or coaching. Who teaches you to be an effective managing partner? How do you know if you’re performing well?

Your partners won’t tell you. If you’re new to the job, do you just do it the same way as your predecessor? Is that the best approach for the firm? Who will mentor you?

Gary Adamason, longtime managing partner of Dayton, Ohio-based, BradyWare, has been there, done that, and come back with a few wise words:

More at CPA Trendlines: What a Coach Can Do for You  |  How to Balance the Six Jobs of Managing Partner  |  The Partner Compensation Checklist  |  How CPA Firms Make Money in Turbulent Times

There are not too many places to turn for help. Whether you are new or a veteran, here is an approach to organizing the job with a focus on dividing and conquering and delegating when necessary. READ MORE →