here’s what you’re looking for: frank stitely

busy season management

you don’t have time for every client question

businessman with eyes closed, head on hands

not this time of year.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

a well-known practice management expert, whom i greatly respect, advises cpas to never tell clients that you don’t have time for them. i disagree with the never part. you know how it starts. on march 25th, the call comes in.

“i know you’re busy but …”

more by frank stitely
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a request follows that could most certainly wait until after tax season. you are hip deep reviewing all the personal tax returns that got stuck in process while you climbed out of the march 15th corporate tax ditch.

“i need to know if i’m paying unemployment taxes to the right states. i think i should be paying taxes to the people’s republic of california, but i’m not. i’ve been paying unemployment taxes to uzbekistan instead.”
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busy season management

cut down your tax work in progress

bonus: it’s cheaper than adding capacity.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

want to increase profitability and client retention? manage projects effectively.

if you don’t have these measures, get them, or turn in your ceo title. if, as a value pricer, you’ve sworn off practice metrics based on productivity, you’ll learn nothing from this article. you just don’t have the numbers. mark cuban is on hold waiting to yell at you.

more by frank stitely
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there are only three ways to increase client happiness and thus increase retention:

  1. lower your prices
  2. decrease the turnaround time for client work
  3. increase quality

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busy season management

advanced tax preparers need managing, too

four best practices.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

managing advanced-level preparers sounds easier than it is. these preparers will all have blind spots that appear at inconvenient times. some won’t be able to adapt to your internal procedures, because they worked at firms without well-defined procedures.

we had one person who insisted on printing out the prior year tax returns and workpapers before beginning a return. she said she just needed the paper in her hands. that didn’t work for us.

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she asked to be paid on a salaried basis. when we agreed, she then demanded to be paid on an hourly basis. we agreed to that as well. then she wanted to go back to a salary. she believed that whatever we agreed to would be bad for her.
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busy season management

four challenges of managing new tax preparers

… and three tips to make it easier.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

how do you train up newly hired tax preparers?

hint: don’t start with taxes.

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having standardized processes is key. teaching processes is much easier than teaching tax return preparation. learning your processes teaches tax return preparation if your processes are well defined. much of tax preparation is data entry-oriented. then you teach the variations.
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busy season management

ask tax clients the right questions

hourglass on paper charts

don’t let them dictate your workflow.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

who makes the errors in your firm? staff obviously, but that’s half of the answer. clients are a major source of tax return errors. clients cause errors in three ways:

  1. errors of omission
  2. errors of commission
  3. errors in attitude

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every tax season, we finalize and deliver returns only to hear from the client, “i think i might have forgotten to tell you that we had a baby last year.” does this happen to you? this is a client error of omission. unintentionally, clients withhold important information.
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advisory & consulting

the shift to advisory from a firm perspective

man and woman high-fiving each other in office

it might take longer than you expect, but it’s so worthwhile.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

articles about shifting to advisory are mostly written by consultants. they are smart, well-meaning people. they have lots of advice, some good, some bad, but it’s like hiring a vegan chef to grill your steak. they aren’t living with the consequences.

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my firm made the shift and learned a lot of lessons from grilling our own steak. we mostly survived with just a mild case of food poisoning.

let’s kindly ask our vegan chefs to leave the room and just speak firm to firm. let’s wait a second longer to make certain they’re off grilling tofu.

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busy season management

make ‘done but’ tax returns a thing of the past

six people around work table

eliminate bottlenecks by asking better questions.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

a project hung up in process is one where there is a disagreement between people involved in a project as to the status. for example, a client thinks he has answered your tax return questions, while you believe he has not. another example is when a tax return preparer believes a return is ready for review while the reviewer does not believe it’s ready.

more: use humor to get tax documents in early
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the result of a hung-up project is a dead project – one that’s not moving to completion.

if a tax return gets hung up, eventually your client calls you, and you get to waste time determining why the project stopped moving. this increases work in progress (wip), which increases turnaround time.
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busy season management

use humor to get tax documents in early

my secret? humor, sarcasm and a bit of shame.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

there are easy ways to get clients to do what we need them to do. in our office, we call the process “training” clients. one of our biggest headaches is the late delivery of tax materials. so, we train our clients to bring their tax documents in early.

more: end tax season meetings with clients … seriously | get clients to understand firm processes … or say goodbye | train now before it costs you down the road | keep clients from “balance due” shock | stop clients from performing “favors” | who needs fall tax planning? clients … and you | it’s ok to say no to clients (even the large ones) | control your time: avoid ambush meetings and calls | you train your clients, whether you mean to or not | don’t let clients dictate tax workflow | make fewer mistakes, increase revenue and capacity | easy ways to avoid ‘done but’ tax returns
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we accomplish this through a series of e-blasts explaining our deadlines. the e-blasts start in december, and we call them “countdown to tax season.” they cover much more than our deadlines for clients to provide business and personal income tax returns documents.

we use the blasts to train clients in other areas – such as minimizing the use of staples when they give us their documents. we also discourage people from putting their documents in three-ring binders. as i’m certain you already know, staples and binders drive your admin staff crazy when they’re trying to scan documents.
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busy season management

three ways to thrive with limited capacity

smiling man working at laptop in office with glass walls

turn the staffing shortage into a new opportunity.

by frank stiteley
the relentless cpa

charles dickens had to be writing about the accounting profession when he wrote, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

clients are plentiful. i met a new client coming out of the restroom at our office complex. we get four to five inquiries a day – out of tax season. during tax season, we turned down four out of five prospective clients.

more on staffing: tax and accounting jobs and salaries show strength | olympics of outsourcing and offshoring for accountants | new study: strong and steady growth for accountant jobs and salaries | can’t recruit? retain! | is tech causing both cpa shortage and low salaries? | staffing tops list of woes at cpa firms | to replenish the talent pipeline, go back to the classroom | whole person retention: when it’s not just the money | more big firms shut their doors to new college grads | seven enticements to keep talent on board | employee retention is easier than attraction | let interns fix the staffing shortage? | disruptors: talent crisis? what talent crisis? | firms culling clients as staffing woes persist
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staff are not plentiful – at least not good ones. i’m getting two or three resumes a day, but they’re the warm body sort most of us learned the hard way not to hire during the pandemic. you’ve seen these resumes too. they are people with six employers in eight years. you are certain to be number seven in nine years. they claim eight years of experience, but you can see from their job history that it’s really two years of experience repeated four times. and – they want $100k for those two years of real experience.

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humor

how a case of beer saved the u.s. financial system

great businesses are formed by trusting others … even if they need a 24-pack to get there.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

you’ve probably heard of the 1929 stock market crash, black monday, the dotcom bubble and the great recession. all of these combined pale in comparison to what almost happened back in 1986. save for a case of miller lite, our financial world, as we know it, would not exist.

more: even with value pricing, time tracking matters and here’s why | end tax season meetings with clients…seriously | get clients to understand firm processes … or say goodbye | train now before it costs you down the road | keep clients from “balance due” shock | it’s ok to say no to clients (even the large ones) | you train your clients, whether you mean to or not | business owners face one of three exits
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

 

i landed this job not because of my fabulous accounting qualifications. i was a double major in economics/finance in college. i would have taken a job sniffing used toilet paper out of college with those academic credentials. i got the job solely from my relationship with paul karstetter, the second name in what eventually became stitely & karstetter, cpas.

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pricing, fees & billing rates

even with value pricing, time tracking matters and here’s why

higher productivity equals higher capacity, which drives faster turnaround times. faster turnaround times create happier clients. 

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

employee productivity plays a huge factor in managing wip (work in progress). because capacity is the denominator in the lean six sigma equation, and employee productivity is a big factor in capacity, employee productivity becomes a big factor in determining turnaround time.

more: end tax season meetings with clients…seriously | get clients to understand firm processes … or say goodbye | train now before it costs you down the road | keep clients from “balance due” shock | it’s ok to say no to clients (even the large ones) | you train your clients, whether you mean to or not | business owners face one of three exits | how small firms can win the talent wars | do you know your turnaround time?
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

first, let’s dismiss all the consultants from the room who tell us that time tracking and productivity metrics don’t matter. mostly, these consultants have never managed or owned cpa firms. rarely have they worked in firms for any length of time. they have never known the struggles of meeting payroll during the first pay period in february when employee hours are up, but the tax season money is not rolling in yet. goodbye. don’t let the door hit you in the butt on the way out, or do let it hit you. that’s up to you. i hope it’s a heavy door.

here’s an example that shows why time tracking and productivity metrics matter:

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pro member exclusive

end tax season meetings with clients … seriously

clients who want to meet should be more than willing to pay for that meeting.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

what did dorothy and her friends fear in the wizard of oz? “lions and tigers and bears, oh my!” dorothy feared the wrong things if she was a partner in a cpa firm. we don’t see much wildlife in our offices during tax season unless you count fast-food delivery people and the occasional crazy client.

more: get clients to understand firm processes … or say goodbye | train now before it costs you down the road | keep clients from “balance due” shock | it’s ok to say no to clients (even the large ones) | you train your clients, whether you mean to or not | business owners face one of three exits | how small firms can win the talent wars | do you know your turnaround time?
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

we should fear the events that destroy our priorities and drain hours from productive work. meetings and phone calls and emails, oh my! from a practice management standpoint, let’s look at why these communication methods are so destructive.

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pro member exclusive

get clients to understand firm processes … or say goodbye

woman in a business suit waving a red flag

with just a little advanced marketing, you can get paid year-round and have more satisfied clients.

by frank stitely
the relentless cpa

when i’m frustrated, here’s how i explain the importance to clients of letting us work our process:

“when you get your car repaired, you don’t look over the mechanic’s shoulder and tell him which wrench to use. the same principle applies to us. if you knew the best ways to prepare tax returns, you should become our competitor.”

more: train now before it costs you down the road | keep clients from “balance due” shock | it’s ok to say no to clients (even the large ones) | you train your clients, whether you mean to or not | business owners face one of three exits | how small firms can win the talent wars | do you know your turnaround time?
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

let’s be perfectly honest with each other.

there’s a reason you aren’t actively training clients to allow you to work efficiently. you’re afraid that you’ll lose clients.

i guarantee that you will.
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