Tweet

Detroit or the Bahamas - The Devil Is In The Details!

Written by: Steve McIntyre-Smith

Article Overview: Why do most people spend hours planning their next vacation, but little time, if any, planning the next year for their business - which PAYS for the vacation??! It doesn't make sense. Here, Steve offers some options...

Detroit or the Bahamas - The Devil Is In The Details!

I want to cover something this issue that is timely, with it being the start of spring, many readers might be looking to book a summer vacation.

The work that goes into planning a trip can be enormous. I was lucky. Fiona (my late wife) was a travel nut, and so she would take great joy in meticulously planning every trip we took, researching locations, hotels, getting the best deals, looking up what vaccinations we need, getting travel insurance, ordering the currency and so on.

Yes, planning a vacation can be hard work!

The irony is, that many of us who spend so much time planning this trip, do not spend any time planning our own businesses. Yes, even if you’re a accountant in public practice, you are still running a business, and as such, your accounting firm needs the benefit of planning in order to be the best business of its kind that it can.

Tell me, honestly, do you write a business plan for your firm? I thought not.

Do you prepare a detailed cash-flow forecast and projections for the business? Again, I thought not.

The sad truth is, that many CPAs, CAs, CGAs and CMAs, will spend several hours planning, researching and booking their annual vacation, but spend next to no time at all on planning for their business – which produces the income to pay for the vacation!

See the irony here?

So, what should we do about it?

Well, I believe that preparation is nine tenths of a good job.

Being prepared for times of short cash flow means that you can plan for it and make the necessary arrangements well in advance. On the other side of the coin, letting thousands of dollars mount up in the business checking account hardly makes any sense either if you haven’t planned for this to have happened and do not have a business savings account to earn a little interest on the funds you’ve worked hard to accumulate.

Some ideas for planning your practice:

1. Sit down and think about what you want to achieve in the coming year
2. Describe the perfect client – and only market to prospects who meet that criteria!
3. Discuss with your partners your strengths and weaknesses and play to your individual strengths
4. Plan out the year ahead in terms of cash flow – put your clients into one of twelve months across an Excel spreadsheet, three to four months after the work is competed – to get an idea of when cash might be expected to come in from these clients, and spot any periods where there might be a problem before it happens!
5. Look at tax season (and other really busy periods in the year) and see if you have enough people to be able to complete the amount of work you’ll have to do, if you don’t, maybe you should look at hiring before you have a problem!
6. Is your I.T. up to speed or should you be investing in new software or hardware?

I could go on, but I guess you get the picture by now.

We need to plan ahead each year to make sure everyone has enough work to do, that we recover chargeable hours, that we can all get a break and take a vacation or two during the year, and that we move closer to our ultimate goals each year, whatever they may be.

I find that one of the best ways to do this is to take a Thursday and Friday during the summer and hold a partner retreat.

This should be an event away from the office, maybe in a hotel or resort, where there will be fewer interruptions (cell phones & blackberries turned off, please) and we can focus on building a better practice for you.

This should be a relaxed forum, where there is no such thing as a bad idea or a stupid question. The point of the exercise is to get away from the day to day distractions that keep us from setting goals, and to create an environment where we all want to work.

Having done that, then it is time to implement these ideas. Otherwise, what’s the point?!

By spending some quality time away with your partners may firms also get that stronger ‘bonding’ between them and only good things can come from that.

So, next time you’re sitting down with your significant other to plan the next vacation, please, spare a thought for how your practice is going to produce the cash to pay for it, and ask yourself if you really have done all you can this year to earn what you’re truly worth.

It could make all the difference between a 3 star hovel in Detroit, and a 5 star stay in, say, Barbados or The Bahamas.

Related Articles
  Be Not Discouraged
  Who Says There Are No Jobs?
  Become a Problem Solver for Your Customers
  ACT! - Tips and Techniques
  FOR THE WANT OF A NAIL

Article Tags: accounting firm, annual vacation, business checking account, business savings, cash flow forecast, cgas, cpas, good job, great joy, irony, necessary arrangements, nine tenths, planning a trip, running a business, sad truth, summer vacation, thousands of dollars, travel insurance, travel nut, vaccinations



Related Forum Posts
Would you buy a house for a dollar? - There are apparently places in Detroit where people can buy a HUD house for a dollar...or at any rate for some ridiculously low sum... I don't want to get into the real estate game, even if I had the money to do so, but I'm wondering if any entrepreneurs are thinking of getting into this? I know it's somewhat like Vultures Gathering, but if you've got the money, you can pick up some bargains right now, and, if things go well (ie. the right politicians get into office - not Obama!) the housing market might pick up in a few more years and you would finally be able to sell it at a profit...
Re: Is A Business Plan A Waste Of Time? - I think the most important part of a business plan is not to simply present to potential investors - but I think it is to use as a guiding reference for your business schematic. Its' like the criminal code and constitution of society. There needs to be something to fall back on and reference for decision making, expansion, etc. Many entrepreneurs fail to understand this and rely too heavily on their 'thoughts'. Everything is in their mind, as opposed to on paper. Details tend to slip with time - so writing things down is essential to long term success.
Re: Autoresponder v Blog Feed Subscriptions... - They get updates by email only. Your question prompted me to check out the Feedburner email subscription page and I noticed down the bottom that you CAN view the email addresses of your subscribers. Feedburner.google.com => Publicize ==> email Subscriptions: scroll down to the bottom and click "View Subscriber Details". You can also modify the first email notification that goes out, include a link to a logo for branding purposes and set the time of day you want the updates to go out. Pretty neat! DH
Keeping Employees Happy - Here are three interesting ways from career coach Marty Nemko on how to keep employees happy: 1. Instead of hiring consultants to train employees, cater lunch once a month and rotate employees teaching co-workers what they know best. 2. Do the employees hate tough customers? Shunt them all to one volunteer employee who gets special recognition or combat pay. Matt Weinstein, CEO of PlayFair, tells of a bank manager who awards a magnum of wine to the teller who, that week, served the most difficult customer. As a result, instead of trying to avoid difficult customers, most tellers actually look forward to them. 3. Give employees a frequent chance to earn small rewards combined with public recognition: sports tickets, free meals, or on-the-spot cash. But Lynn Halpin, CEO of Detroit Edison, warns that this better be part of a comprehensive plan. "If you work for Attila the Hun, someone handing you $50 is like rubbing salt in a wound."
Demo demo demo - New inventions are often difficult to explain and are better when they are demoed. When Sharon and I went on the Shopping Channel one of the key messages they always repeated was demo demo demo. A YouTube demo is a great start. You can do a dramatization to begin with. Hopefully you'll be able to get actual footage of the system in use from the video cameras of the places where it is installed. The more potential customers can experience the product, the better. Have them "break into" a demo store and let them see how powerful the product is. An actual demo will answer most of the prospective customer's questions and will give them an emotional buy-in to the product. When Henry Ford believed he had perfected his first vehicle, he took it to William H. Murphy, a lumber tycoon in Detroit, who took it for a test drive. Murphy agreed with Ford that gasoline-powered vehicles would be fueling the future and the two instantly formed a partnership that would forever change the face of the 20th century. Without that first hand experience it would have been difficult for Ford to convince Murphy about the potential of gasoline-power - it seems obvious now but at the time it was a revolutionary idea. Demo demo demo the product to get the customers experiencing the benefits first hand!


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Angel Investors Where Are You?

E Mail Marketing Campaigns

Are You An Accidental Consultant?

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.