Consulting Has Finally Reached a Tipping Point in Accounting

In the late 1990's, I left my role in a public accounting firm after having just been told I would make partner (specializing in tax) because I was frustrated by my lack of impact and by my inability to do more for my clients. And I had a nagging voice inside telling me that I didn't belong there.

I went to work for a tech company and started teaching project management software. That lead me eventually to an accounting software company where I helped build their CPA influencer program, discovered speaking, and eventually took to the accounting speakers’ circuit. (Thanks to a lot of wonderful teachers, guides, and people who believed in me.) I was driven by a burning desire for our profession to provide more value and to be more valued.

Rosetta Stone

In the early 2000's, during my speaking travels, I discovered a piece of software that I could only describe as my own personal rosetta stone. It was the missing link. The combination to the value safe. (It was called ACCPAC CFO back in the day, later ProfitDriver and even later $copeIt!) It was exactly what our profession needed. In my mind, this tool held the key to unlocking the mysteries of accounting for people. What's more, it would give accountants a new ability to be proactive, a way to strengthen their relationships with clients.

With this software, we could finally change lives, make a difference, help our clients chart a course to financial success. We could communicate clearly and regularly and show them how changes in certain metrics could bring about the financial improvements they sought.

It was an interactive dashboard that included scenario modeling, what-ifs, and goal seeks. It brought financial information to life. I saw it as a goldmine.

I left the speakers’ circuit and signed on with ACCPAC to work with this product and help bring it to the world of accounting – absolutely positive that accountants would sign up for this magic opportunity in droves. 

But it was only a tool.

Fool’s Gold?

And then I started talking to accountants.

I spoke at conferences, presented seminars, talked about the magic of sitting down with clients and talking through their numbers, showing them why profit did not equal cash and what they needed to change. I talked about how the tool could enlighten owners, teams, even bankers about a company’s results and how they could be improved. I tried to get them to envision working together with their clients to create a picture of the future.

But they weren’t ready. The accountants wanted to know if they could just print a report and send it to their clients.

A few brave souls tried to actually use the tool but adoption dragged. 

At the time, few accountants wanted (or knew how) to deliver proactive services to their clients; rather they FEARED a conversation where they didn’t have all of the answers.

As I considered what to do, I decided I had to provide training. I had to teach accountants how to overcome their own fear and understand the information that was being presented. But I worked for a software company. They needed revenues and fast. Selling to accountants (instead of businesses) was a departure for them. I had a short window of opportunity.

A Toehold

So in early 2000 I took to the AICPA website to try and find people who already thought like I thought. I wanted accountants who were trying to provide services that made a difference for their clients. I found a group focused around a program called Performance Measurement Plus (PMP) which was created by Edi Osborne at Mentor Plus for the AICPA. Edi focused on 3-dimensional education – providing accountants the mindset, skill set and tool set to deliver true advisory services. I contacted these PMP accountants and they bought the software. They used it. They changed lives.

You see, they already had the right mindset to provide proactive consulting services for their clients.

But the proactive accountants were in the minority.

Note: The AICPA and many accountants backed away from a consulting focus during the Sarbanes-Oxley independence chaos.

I began working with Edi in various formal and informal ways as we both pursued a shared vision for the profession. In 2008, I went to work for a Napa Valley CPA firm that uses MentorPlus tools in consulting with wineries. That is where I still am today. I have the honor of working with an incredible firm that helps some truly incredible wineries make sense of their numbers, create measures and metrics, engage teams, drive change, and achieve their goals.

Edi continued to provide live training that delivered all of the tools and techniques a firm can use to create a consulting practice for firms of all sizes. My firm invested in certification training for all 20 members of our team.

Edi and I and countless others in the accounting profession have been speaking, writing https://www.amazon.com/Forward-Journey-Compliance-World-Reliance/dp/149373833X , training, and working to drive accountants to embrace consulting ever since. 

For many years, for many of us in the accounting profession, it has felt like pushing a rock up a hill. Until now.

The Tipping Point

Firms and accountants have new technologies that enable them to better serve the needs of their clients. Their clients are starting to demand more value from the work we do. They are asking new questions. Young people who enter our profession are no longer content to deliver dusty historical tomes in the form of financial statements to their clients. The need is clear. The time has come.

Training is Everywhere

There is no excuse. Find the training that works for you and get going. I don't care if it is tax season. Do you really want to spend the rest of your life working all hours to meet a deadline?

·  Sandi Smith Leyva, Author of https://startwithaprofit.com/lp/start-profit/ and President of Accountant’s Accelerator is offering a great new course.

·  LIVEPLAN, the creators of wonderful planning solutions, offers implementation help https://www.liveplan.com/strategic-advisors/implementation .

·      Karbon, ReceiptBank and other solution providers are trying to provide the education layer (as I did back in the day) that is missing for accountants afraid or unwilling to embrace their tools https://karbonhq.com/karbon-academy/ .

And we have come full circle. The AICPA (through their for profit arm CPA.com) is offering another consulting program, this time called Client Accounting Advisory Services Certificate (CAAS) taught by some incredible thought leaders like Greg LaFollette and Dustin Hostetler. This is a great place to start.

And finally, I have teamed up with my mentor and friend, Edi Osborne, CEO of MentorPlus.com, who has taken her comprehensive Level 5 Certified Advisor curriculum online. This is the training, honed from more than 20 years of live teaching with firms of all sizes, that I myself have received and use every day with wineries. Launching May 1, the online training and certification includes more than 15 hours of videos and tutorials, 49 downloadable tools ready for licensed use by you or your firm, plus links to resources, references, books, and new ideas. It has everything you need to change your practice and to really serve your clients. 

Your clients need you to step up.

Tip or be Tipped. The choice is yours. 

About the Author

Geni Whitehouse, CPA.CITP, CSPM is the author of "How to Make a Boring Subject Interesting: 52 ways even a nerd can be heard." She is a keynote presenter, Top 100 influencer, Top 25 Thought Leader, and one of the "Most Powerful Women in Accounting" according to CPAPracticeAdvisor. (She would be at the bottom of numerous lists of every sort, if anyone bothered to create them.)

She writes and speaks through www.evenanerd.com and does fun work with incredible accountants and winery clients at www.bdcocpa.com .

She is currently scheduled to speak at Accountex and at the AICPA Women's Summit in 2018, where one can certainly expect there will be basset hounds.

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The views expressed here are my own and are not intended to represent anyone else. If I have erred, the mistakes are mine and if you offer consulting training for accountants, please let me know, so I may add you to the list.