If you’ve been reading these tips for any length of time you’ll know that I am a great fan of celebrating our successes so that these positive memories remain with us to get us through some of our tougher days.
Well, this year, ICB (The Institute of Certified Bookkeepers) have been celebrating their 25th birthday.
They kicked off the celebrations at their annual dinner where they made me, and a number of other more famous people, Companions of the ICB to recognise our support of the bookkeeping profession (I’m almost as fond of good bookkeepers as I am of a decent cup of tea).
Bookkeepers are the Cinderellas of the accounting world. They do all the hard work that makes us accountants look good. With good bookkeeping acting as a strong foundation we get to do the fancy bits like fairy godmothers producing useful information to help businesses to grow and their owners to achieve their dreams. So it seems only right that they should go to the ball or, in this case, a reception at the palace.
Last week Garry and June Carter, the Founders of ICB invited me to join them at a special reception held at St James’s Palace by kind permission of Her Majesty The Queen, and in the presence of ICB Royal Patron His Royal Highness Price Michael of Kent.
What a splendid way to celebrate their anniversary and here’s to many more.
Social media
This week I have been up in Scotland speaking about social media and how small businesses can use it to punch above their weight. It’s also a great way for introverts to network.
Here are some of the actions that I suggested:
- Update your headshots so that you are recognisable
- Review your introductory information. I like to add a little personal thing to get conversation started eg I’m a triathlete and a tea addict.
- Arrange to meet one of your online connections in real life to deepen the relationship
- Next time you attend a face to face networking event connect with everybody you spoke to online so that you can sustain those initial relationships
- Ignore ‘the algorithm’ which is just trying to promote good content and genuine relationships. Instead focus on creating good content and genuine relationships
How to increase your prices
Last week I talked about WHY you need to increase your prices but, less talked about is HOW you go about doing it.
It’s a lot easier to talk about in theory than it is to do in practice.
- Work out what your prices should be. If you need to provide quotes then work out what your method of calculations will be.
- Recalculate up to date prices for all your clients.
- Consider using pricing software which provides confidence to both buyer and seller that this is the right price.
- Start by increasing prices for new clients
- Email/write to all clients with the new price. If you have not done regular price increases before then you may need to explain that this is due to catching up an several years and reassure them that you will not leave it so long in future. Keep your explanations brief.
- Telephone any clients who need extra TLC or if a change in scope means that the increase needs further explanation
- Resist discounting. You worked out your prices in (1) above.
- Practice telling client your new prices. If you’re an introvert who hates role play then just rehearse in front of a mirror:
“Our new prices are …”
“We do not offer discounts”
Also prepare responses to any other potential objections so that you don’t need to think on your feet quite so much.
Have you got the right priorities?
I’m the first person to remind you that you need to work ON your business as well as IN it and I will only take on coaching clients who agree to commit half a day per week to working on their business, but I’m a business owner too and I know how hard that can be to make the time.
We’re always torn between things that earn money now and things that will earn money later such as marketing and business improvements. Not to mention that we’d like to spend some time on the things we enjoy.
I’ve written before about my default diary which includes time for marketing and my own business and personal development. I then allocate particular tasks to those slots. But if you truly want to improve your business then you need to learn to delegate and think systematically.
I love lazy marketing when I use one piece of content in different ways. I also know that my strength is in writing/recording the content and then my wonderful VA tidies it up and distributes it across multiple channels. Whether you’re reading this in our Top Tips e-news or a blog or on social media then she is the one who has put it there (with the help of some software).
My job is to prioritise getting the content out each and every week. When I tried to do the whole job myself it took four times as long so I only got around to it about once a month, maybe less.
Look at everything you do, maybe keep a rough timesheet for a week or month, then go through the list with a highlighter to see what could be delegated to the right person. Then find that right person.
Your priority should be the things that only YOU can do.
If you’re an accountant, you can find somebody else to do the accounts themselves and some of the marketing (I write a monthly content pack for accountants who don’t want to do it themselves) so that you can focus on being the face of your business. If you’d rather be the one doing the accounts, then find somebody else to manage your business. Don’t think that you have to be the MD just because you’re the majority shareholder.
To create the business you want you need to be clear on your priorities.
Do you set boundaries?
I work with a lot of people who are overwhelmed in their business as they have bitten off more than they can chew. When we start working together it soon becomes clear that they need to improve how they set boundaries.
Here are a few ideas I often use:
• Practise saying “no” in front of a mirror. It makes it easier to say to a real person.
• Practise saying “no” without feeling the need to offer an explanation.
• Practise saying “no” with a polite smile
• Be clear on what you are willing to do for your clients. Your engagement letter should act as a reminder to you as well as to them of what you are contracted to do.
• When a client asks for something extra tell them “yes we’d love to help you with that and it will cost £X” (fixed fee or per hour)
• Do not discount your fees. You are not a charity. If people are struggling then reduce the scope so they do more for themselves eg we provide basic bookkeeping training videos if the owner is capable of doing this themselves
• Do not provide extended credit. You are not a bank.
• Set appointments in your diary to make time to do something for yourself
• Ring up an old friend and arrange to meet for lunch or an enjoyable activity. It will get you out of the office. If you’d prefer to be alone then book a facial or a massage or plan a bike ride with a nice cake stop.
• Set an alarm for when you intend to finish your working day and then leave your laptop on your desk when you close your office door
• Stop reading this and practise saying “no”
Are timesheets useful?
Anyone who had to do timesheets in an accountancy firm probably remembers how much time they spent/wasted recording their time to the nearest 6 minutes. Then trying to make sure that the hours balanced. What did you do with the extra hour you worked but didn’t get paid for? And what about the 7 hours on the job that was already over budget? And then being beaten with a big stick (not literally) for dumping everything to admin.
Most businesses, with the notable exception of lawyers, now charge fixed fees rather than hourly rates so timesheets are rarely used for billing. So, what purpose do they serve?
They are a mine of management information.
That over budget client was undercharged for years because nobody was honest about how long the job actually took. One staff member took twice as long to do jobs as another because they hadn’t been trained properly. And the amount of time genuinely spent on admin justified investment in some automated systems to speed things up.
So, what is the compromise?
We keep timesheets to the nearest 15 mins with the exceptions of phones calls and ‘quick’ emails which are recorded as a minimum of 10 minutes because of the disruption to other work. If I do some work on the train to a meeting, then I may double record the time as part of the meeting time AND the job I worked on on the journey as otherwise it would have had to be done in the office.
This means that I know roughly how much time (our most expensive resource) is spent on each job so I can ensure that our fixed fees cover this as well as a share of the automation and overheads. What I really need is reporting by exception. What jobs are taking significantly longer than expected so that I can see what the holdup is and how to improve. This doesn’t need 6-minute reporting. And it doesn’t need a timesheet balanced to the official working day.
Before implementing timesheets think about WHY you want them and make sure that they will give you the information that you need. You may find that the recording process doesn’t need to be too onerous. I use the Xero project app on my phone, but Toggl is another free resource.
What is business advisory?
As you know I’ve spent the last year writing ‘Changing the Numbers: how to deliver advisory services for success’ to help accountants to provide real help for their business clients. And I’m the first to agree that, whilst all businesses need this service, not everybody can afford to pay for it. (This is why we have free products such as our Better Business webinars for accountants and our Money Matter ones for general business.)
But for those clients that can afford to invest in growing their business then we can do much better than a bit of tax advice at the year end or help completing a loan application. As accountants we have financial training but we also have exposure to hundreds, if not thousands, of businesses as well as running our own.
Accountants who, like me, have worked as Finance Directors or similar will know that their role at the board room table includes much more than ‘just’ accountancy. The topics that I’ve identified include:
1. Vision and values
2. Cash flow
3. Pricing
4. Staffing
5. Efficiency of operation
6. Funding
7. Tax
8. Mergers and acquisitions
9. Marketing
10. Sales
11. Customer services and quality
12. Cost control
Different accountants may offer advice on some or all of these areas depending on knowledge and experience so we need to be clear on those areas.
Do you invest in yourself?
As I write this I’m halfway through a two day coaching course which is really making me focus. I did my first coaching qualification about 10 years ago but never really used it until I set up Hudson Business Advice four years ago to coach accountants, bookkeepers and other business owners. In that ten year period I’ve forgotten a lot of what I already learned as well as picking up some sloppy habits.
I’m always very diligent about keeping my accountancy and tax knowledge up to date as that is a requirement of remaining a member of ICAEW. I also spend a lot of time perfecting my speaking as that is a newer skill for me and there’s plenty of room for improvement. I also go on business courses and read a lot around the subject so that I can improve my own business and also add expertise to my experience when helping other business owners.
I believe in continuous improvement of myself, my business, and the services that I offer. How much time and money do you invest in yourself?
How do you work smarter?
There are all sorts of ways to work smarter rather than harder. I usually speak and write about systemising, automating and delegating work but you can achieve a whole lot more just by organising your workload better.
I run two businesses, Hudson Business Advice is my coaching/training as well as speaking and writing but I also run Minerva Accountants which is much easier to systemise with predefined processes for preparing accounts etc. I therefore use two different systems to track my workflow and deadlines as my brain can’t hold everything that I need to know.
Accountancy Manager is great for a highly systemised business with known inputs, outputs, and a clear process. It’s good for tracking deadlines and uses templated emails at each stage of the process. There are other good systems available but this one suits Minerva best.
For my main business I have fewer standard processes but more individual interactions so I use Active Campaign to add notes and actions relating to each interaction. This business revolves more around people than processes, although I do have standard procedures for as much as possible.
I also use a third system, Trello, to track ideas and project work as well as my household and family tasks. (I will get around to resealing the bath one day!) I can have either a whole Trello board or a list on my main board to ensure that no idea is lost.
So, three systems to manage the three different parts of my life and also a vague attempt to separate them. I prefer these to paper because I can access them from any of my devices which are all backed up to the cloud.
What systems do you use to manage your to do list and ensure that you don’t forget anything?
How much should I save?
How much cash should you leave in your business and how much should you take out?
The generally accepted wisdom is three month’s worth of costs. I don’t know the source of this figure, but this seems about right. If all your income stopped overnight, you would have three months to make plans.
In reality, unless there is a global pandemic, it’s unlikely that your income would all stop at the same time, so you’d probably have longer to find funding, start a new income source, or to ride out a temporary blip. Most income protection insurances take 3-6 months to kick in.
We should also have a similar amount easily accessible to cover our household bills.
The last eighteen months have been tough, but we need to rebuild our reserves ready for the future.
How long would your reserves last you?