are your clients happy? have you told your staff?
by hitendra patil
accountaneur: the entrepreneurial accountant
unless you become the “cas champion” or make someone accountable to be one, your cas practice will not take off the starting blocks.
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and the single biggest initial challenge for the cas champ is how to communicate the value of cas to the firm’s future fortune to every stakeholder – be it partners, staff, clients or prospects. for this post, i will assume that your cas champ absolutely “gets it.”
your cas success is not just about how you explain the higher value of cas to your clients. cas communication starts from within your firm and only then extends to clients and prospects.
communicating cas within your firm
most likely, you and your partners bring in the highest rate per unit of work. their expertise and insights are more valuable. you may feel cas is more of foundational work and not optimally worth your partners’ time and competencies. your firm’s cas, to be successful, needs buy-in at the partner/leadership level first. one simple thing to understand to get that buy-in is to know that your clients need cas and if you do not offer it to them, someone else will.
- communicating cas with your partners: cas is not just transactional work. cas only begins at the foundational levels where you create the books. we have learned that cas generally constitutes three key service segments – after-the-fact financial statement preparation, i.e., “write-up”; business transactions processing; and outsourced cfo and controller services. tax planning/tax strategy services may also become part of your cas offering if you have interest/expertise in that segment.
your partners will be able to apply their expertise to generate insights and advice that your clients will value more – and will be willing to pay a premium fee for such valuable advice. your partners will find they are delivering advisory services more frequently when your firm offers cas. your firm will be able to identify some key insights that can become your unique selling propositions, and that will help your firm attract better clients. it is a perfect win-win – cas leverages your partners’ experience and expertise, providing them with more opportunities to positively impact the lives of your firm’s clients, which in turn drives up satisfaction and professional fulfillment.
so, when pitching cas to your partners, you’d want to focus less on the “how,” i.e., the nitty-gritty details of how your firm will produce the client’s accounting information. you’d want to focus more on how well you present the information to your partners and what they will do to discover insights that clients will value. in other words, your partners should not feel/perceive that cas will lower them to less valuable work. the fact is, to the contrary.
- communicating cas with your team: “cas will enhance/upgrade your role and responsibilities.” that is the message you want to deliver to your cas team. that is the proof you want to provide to your cas team. when you communicate your cas plan with your staff, there are some key elements that you must share with your team.
- make a “before and after” comparison document about the list of your staff’s erstwhile job/task responsibilities compared to their new cas role, duties and deliverables.
- you will need to identify and communicate how your improved technology stack leverages integration and automation. make your team aware of how it will reduce manual data collection and organization work. explain how that will enable your staff to contribute more meaningfully to clients’ lives as well as to your firm’s growth.
- you will also need to identify the new/additional skill sets that your staff will need in their new cas responsibilities – and share your firm’s plan to reskill/upskill them accordingly.
your cas practice will continuously evolve. it will need more communication as you go along your cas journey. one of the things many firms miss out on communicating with their staff is the testimonials/experiences of your clients. when you regularly share how staff’s cas efforts enhance clients’ success, it is a reinforcement, and confirmation that their work is contributing meaningfully to the clients they serve.