After attending a formal dinner at the ICAEW last night, I posted a tweet:

Enjoyed a fab dinner at ICAEW with other current and former Council members. Many accountants with interesting hobbies and backgrounds.

And one of my followers on twitter posted the perhaps inevitable response:

Interesting accountants? Are you sure?!

The simple fact is ‘yes’. Absolutely. During the evening I spoke with a number of middle-aged accountants who are evidently not boring. Including:

• One who originally trained as a fighter pilot in the air force in the 1970s;
• One who took up flying twenty years ago and has recently sold 3 light aircraft he has been flying over the years;
• One who runs 2 marathons a year;
• One who is a solicitor, New York attorney, licensed insolvency practitioner, arbitrator and a professor in business law.
• Then there’s me – a member of the magic circle who spent 25 years as a childrens party entertainer and later a roving close-up magician at dinners and celebrations.

It occurs to me that it is time to nail the lie that accountants are boring. Please add your stories and recollections of accountants with interesting hobbies and backgrounds as comments on this thread. And pass the word.

I attended a business focused Question Time networking function earlier this week. One of the questions posed was whether all SMEs should embrace social media.  I expected the marketing guru on the panel to be an ardent supporter of the idea.

In the event I was pleasantly surprised that he gave the same answer as I would have done. And it echoes the views I have shared on this blog before.

If you think your target clients and prospects are active on social media then by all means look to join up and engage with them. But it’s not right or necessary for everyone.

For example, if you are targetting start up businesses you will find plenty of them are active on twitter. Many of those accountants pointing to the success of their twitter activity are themselves relatively new into practice and can relate well to start-up businesses.  I also suspect that accountants and lawyers who offer tax or advisory services to consumers will have more success faster than those who who want to be engaged by established businesses.

The starting point, if you are considering getting involved with social media, is to be clear about your objectives. And over what time scale will you judge your success or otherwise in achieving those objectives?  Oh, and is the investment of time (and money if you employ or engage someone else to do it for you) worth while? Remember you should also compare this investment with the alternative uses of your time and money.

There are SOME good arguments for getting engaged in social media. But it’s not for everyone. The main misconception is that it’s a low cost way to market and promote your practice. Plenty of professional advisers make this mistake and try to use social media to broadcast their marketing messages. However, those that try this quickly give up – disillusioned with the medium, when it’s actually their messages that were failing.

To make social media work for you you have to be ‘social’ rather than anti-social. It’s not a broadcast medium. If all you plan to do is active marketing then don’t waste your time.

(I’m running a half day masterclass on 21 July to debunk social media and to help professional advisers get it right. Full details here)

 

Feel free to check out any of the links below. These are taken from my twitter feed over the last week. Each item is something I found of use, interest or value and am happy to share:

From #accountingwebuk Why we won’t be seeing the rise of ‘Accounticitors’: http://bit.ly/mbMIiL // ie: Accountant/Solicitor firms

An article I wrote explaining why, despite the Legal Services Act permitting the formation of Multi-disciplinary firms, accountants are unlikely to rush into bed with solicitors.

Social Media for accountants, Tax-Buzz plus tips/advice and … http://conta.cc/jnJ97C via #constantcontact The supplementary weekly newsletter from Tax Advice Network Feel my views are being misrepresented: Note to Mark Lee: Twitter works for professionals http://dld.bz/aead4 I agree it can do @dahowlett Referencing a blog post by Dennis Howlett and a rude video that misrepresent my views on twitter – as will be apparent from my articles and posts on this site! Come and see the founders of #tonic choirs in: Life, love and laughter – in Harrow 8pm on Sat 2 July http://bit.ly/m6XvZ8 I’m a great fan of Philip Barnett who founded Tonic and recommend this event unreservedly. Financial advisers. Do you want a better relationship with #HMRC ? Read ‘Why tax agent enrolment matters’ on #citywire http://dld.bz/adTRF Article of mine in New Model Adviser magazine (and online) – addresses issues for IFAs drawn from HMRC’s con doc: Establishing the future relationship between the tax agent community and HMRC RT @TheTaxBuzz: Ed Balls does an Alan Johnson…. http://bit.ly/jsyHjv // Of course – it was a Balls-up! Highlighting the way that Ed Balls revealed he doesn’t understand how VAT works for businesses Appreciate the invitations I get to industry seminars and dinners. Wondering if it ever has to do with my inclination to tweet about them? Just musing RT @AGreenTax: …..not all companies are into tax avoidance; http://bit.ly/lLOGr0 // Sage words Andrew – and thanks for the quote Referencing an interesting blog post from an ex-big firm tax partner Love this idea from @DuaneJackson – Business Owners: Give some advice to accountants: http://bit.ly/lFvywg via @AddThis Referencing a blog post where business owners say what they want from their accountants Heard a fab idea for getting referrals from bad debts. If they really can’t pay then tell them the least they can do is to refer you on... Passing on a tip picked up recently from David Oliver of Insight marketing RT @philipcalvert: On Days You Don’t Feel Like Marketing http://6sen.se/jjAvz3 // Great advice. Thanks for sharing that Phil Another good blog post I was happy to share RT means I have ReTweeted someone else’s tweet (the person whose twitter name follows the @ sign after the RT). Where there is room I have added // followed by my comment at the end. Remember tweets are limited to 140 characters.

I’ve copied below a couple of slides I used in my recent presentations on Social Media for accountants. They reveal some of the differences between just 4 of the dozens of online networking sites.

I would stress that all of my observations here are focused on the issues as they apply to accountants in practice. Different considerations will often be more relevant for other businesses, consultants, professionals and employees.

Although qualified accountants are aware that anyone can call themselves an ‘accountant’ I find that very few ‘real’ people appreciate this fact. They tend to assume accountants are like dentists, doctors and solicitors. If only that were the case!

It is precisely because of this confusion that various groups of accountants campaign to secure protection of the description ‘accountant’.  The arguments in favour of this are made strongly, vociferously and repeatedly.  And, I suggest, short-sightedly. The proponents seem unaware of the wider consequences that a successful campaign would bring.

My alternative view is borne of many discussions with members of the public in connection with the Tax Advice Network. I quickly realised that that most non-accountants assume that all accountants are tax advisers as the words are thought to be synonymous.

Leaving aside company directors, why does anyone typically appoint an accountant? Is their main concern to have a decent set of accounts? Or are most people more interested in obtaining help and advice as regards their tax returns and tax planning? Private investors, the retired and many other clients do not even have accounts in the conventional sense. Yet still the majority of such taxpayers turn to accountants for help. With apologies to the Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT), the concept of a ‘Chartered Tax Adviser’(CTA) as distinct from an ‘Accountant’ has yet to enter the public consciousness.

I cannot imagine that members of the CIOT would want or ever agree to describe themselves as ‘accountants’.  Equally there would be an uproar if CTAs were precluded from completing tax returns and advising on tax matters.  There’s also the Association of Tax Technicians (ATT) which has just celebrated its 21st birthday. They would be equally disenfranchised. No one is arguing that they should call themselves accountants. But equally no one is arguing to restrict use of the term ‘tax adviser’.

So what would happen if only qualified members of approved accountancy bodies could call themselves ‘accountants’?

Quite simply, unqualified accountants would promote their services (more accurately) as ‘Tax Advisers’. The public would then quickly become much more familiar with the distinction between an Accountant and a Tax Adviser. And given the choice between going to a specialist in preparing accounts or one specialised in advising on tax, which will they choose to appoint?

I am convinced therefore that if the campaign to ‘protect’ use of the title ‘Accountant’ were ever to be successful, it would be largely counter-productive. Unless, at the same time, the term ‘Tax Adviser’ was restricted such that it could only be adopted by those who are members of an approved accountancy, tax or legal body. And that’s even less likely to happen than restricting who can claim to be an Accountant.

Simply stopping unqualified accountants preparing accounts etc would not prevent them working on tax returns and giving tax advice.  Limiting use of the term of ‘Accountant’ would lead to an inevitable increase in understanding as to the differences between accountants and tax advisers  And if that happens I fear that qualified accountants would lose more than they gain.

What do you think?

This is an updated version of a piece I posted on this blog in July 2008.

Accountants are often seen as the ideal people to to ask for referrals. After all, accountants in practice will often act for dozens of clients, many of whom are targets for other complementary suppliers.

This means that accountants are routinely approached by financial advisers, will writers, software developers, marketing consultants and many other service providers. The only problem is that many such people mess up. They don’t know the first thing about how accountants work, what motivates them or how to get them to refer their clients on to other service providers.

I regularly hear about such encounters – both from accountants who are ‘fed up’ with such approaches, and from service providers whose efforts are failing to secure the desired outcome. Indeed this mis-match led me to develop a seminar (now a masterclass) to help such service providers better understand what matters to accountants. I’ve run the seminar a number of times since its first outing in January 2009 and feedback has been very positive. (Next outing is 17 March 2010).

In addition to my own insights and ideas I have been sharing the data I collated in a survey of accountants in 2008. Over 200 told me what was important to them when approached by someone asking for referrals.  This enabled me to extrapolate some specific advice based on empirical evidence.

Is this still an issue I wonder? Are you often approached? What’s your attitude and response when someone asks you for referrals to your clients?

I’d welcome feedback on this new webcast that both introduces me to candidates for my mentoring services and explains how it all works.

A friend of mine, Stephen Harvard Davis is recognised as the UK’s leading authority on job transition and retaining top talent, He is the author of “Why do 40% of Executives Fail?”

The following observations were inspired by an item on Stephen’s blog in which he addressed the retention issues relevant to top executives in the corporate sector. Whilst some of Stephen’s points apply equally to ambitious professionals, I believe that there are also a number of crucial differences.

Replacing ambitious professionals can be costly and can easily involve as much as twice the salary in hard cash terms. Yet recent studies from the USA suggest that the opportunity costs when top talent leaving a company can be as much as twenty-four times the salary (Based on a salary of £62,000).

Most professional firms try to retain ambitious professionals by throwing money at the situation. Every single time I have witnessed this over the years the extra money only buys time; firms looking to poach the best partners and prospective partners will always pay more for potential because they have budgeted for the cost of the recruitment exercise and they are determined it should be successful.

I believe that there are four key steps to retaining your ambitious professionals:

Step one is to recognise that top talent can be found at all levels within a professional firm. It’s not, and never has been, confined to the partner group. Once identified, however, top talent needs to be nurtured, developed and encouraged otherwise it walks. Partners (and managers in the larger firms) therefore, should be rewarded for identifying top talent, developing and nurturing it.

Step two is to understand the reasons for top talent leaving. This means learning what individuals want from their current and prospective role in the firm. Many firms view this as difficult because of the complexity of analysing human relationships. It also makes developing a one size fits all package of benefits difficult.

The result is that many professional firms ignore the real reasons for talent loss and blame attractive salaries and benefits on offer from competitor firms. Yet the fact is that top talent tends to be hungry for knowledge and experience and to seek out the firms that can offer them this.

Certain top talent can be therefore be categorised in three ways “Knowledge nomads” moving from one firm to another seeking information that adds to their abilities. Then there are the “Prospectors”, those that are looking for better career expectations and finally the “Relationship Migrants” who seek out a particular type of more senior experienced partner as a teacher and mentor.

Step three is to evidence the firms’ commitment to the individuals concerned in a way that motivates each of them. Top talent tends to be attracted by retention drivers such as, mentoring, coaching, training programmes and also by being able to contribute to the firm’s vision, direction and future. However paying lip-service to this communication will only create resentment. The engagement must be real and motivate the individuals concerned.

The ambitious professionals tab on this blog explains in more detail the benefits of my mentoring programme and this is certainly one way a firm can evidence it’s commitment to ensuring that ambitious professionals are motivated and able to perform more effectively and profitably.

Step four is to provide constant feedback and stimulation. There is little point in hoping to retain one or more ambitious professionals if the partners merely pay lip service to their development process. Again external mentoring has a role to play here but partners cannot abrogate their own responsibility for finding out what motivates their star people and contributing to the process.

The September issue of Accountancy magazine has been published and I am delighted to see that they have included my letter in response to an article about coaching and mentoring in the July issue. The full text of my letter appeared on this blog on 30 July.

Mentoring seems to be flavour of the month all of a sudden. I was approached today by a journalist who wanted a quote from someone with experience of the traditional internal style of mentoring that some larger firms provide. Here’s what I said:

” As a junior partner many years ago I was allocated a mentor. He was a senior partner in the firm and I recall he took me for a very nice lunch to confirm his commitment to the (undefined) mentoring process. Although we chatted on and off over the subsequent months and years I did not gain any demonstrable benefit from having him identified as my mentor.

My experience all those years ago was part of the inspiration for the external, tailored mentoring service that I now provide for ambitious professionals. I have the time, the talent and the techniques to ensure that the firms which engage me can measure the value that I bring. This process is more motivating for the individuals concerned and enables them to build up their business and personal skills so that they can operate more effectively and profitably for the firm.”