I started this as an entry in my written journal (yes, it\u2019s true \u2013 I still write a journal by hand), but this topic is near and dear to my heart and I felt it was important enough to write it out on my blog. I read\u00a0this thread on Reddit<\/a>\u00a0and it made me think (again) about the nature of the profession and WHY being a CPA is so hard.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been an auditor for nine and a half years and being a CPA isn\u2019t easy. It\u2019s hard work, the hours are long, clients are difficult, and the rules seem to be constantly changing these days. (I\u2019ve been hearing that US GAAP and IFRS are converging for almost 20 years and they\u2019re actually finally getting close to it.) I\u2019ve had good busy seasons and bad busy seasons. I\u2019ve had busy seasons where there wasn\u2019t enough work to go around and I\u2019ve had busy seasons where there was too much work and too few people. The job cycles with the economy \u2013 when times are good, there\u2019s plenty of work; when times are bad, there\u2019s not much to do.<\/p>\n

What I don\u2019t understand is why we still expect our staff to work themselves to the point of exhaustion week after week during busy season. I don\u2019t understand why we\u2019re still expecting staff to \u201cfigure it out as they go along,\u201d to \u201clearn on the job.\u201d I don\u2019t understand why we still have the mentality that because busy season was shitty for us that it should be shitty for everyone who comes after us (and if we\u2019re stressed out then everyone else has to be stressed out). It\u2019s like the professional version of hazing \u2013 in the old days, I had to chisel my workpapers out in stone and send them to a partner in another state for review and if he hated them he\u2019d call me up to yell at me personally and I took it and liked it! Y\u2019all, I can\u2019t believe that in the year of our Lord 2019 I\u2019m still listening to people act like using Excel is \u201cthe easy way out,\u201d and that leaning on technology makes you lazy.<\/p>\n

The majority of the people who enter this profession are intelligent, well-educated people who can pick up new ideas quickly. A few become \u201csuper stars\u201d and do so well that they\u2019re able to take on harder work sooner than their peers. And a few of them are the kind that don\u2019t do well for one reason or another and either linger until they\u2019re fired or realize the job isn\u2019t for them and they quit.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019ve noticed in almost ten years, based on my own experiences and in listening to friends\u2019 experiences, is that a lot of the \u201cpain\u201d of busy season is self-inflicted. Partners and managers recall their own awful experiences and think that\u2019s how it should be. Staff and seniors come to expect it based on the horror stories from their peers and their managers and partners. Firms are disincentivized to change because staff want the experience and the name on their resume. They\u2019re willing to be put through the grinder for two or three years to get a big name firm on their resume and then move on to a better job.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s missing from the equation is stopping to ask yourself, why? Why does it need to be this way? For many firms, the most important thing is name recognition and a big bottom line. Investing in staff training and technology to make the work more efficient is hard and can be expensive in the short-run, so firms that are focused on today\u2019s bottom line are not interested in doing so. They\u2019re also more likely to expect (and demand) more out of lower levels to get higher realization rates \u2013 if a senior is expected to do manager-level work, the firm can get the same work at a lower rate than they would if the manager did the work.<\/p>\n

While it\u2019s true that expectations should be set high to provide an incentive to excel, the long-term impact of demanding that your staff do senior-level work, seniors do manager-level work, and managers do partner-level work, from day one is that your teams get burned out. They get to the point where they don\u2019t care \u2013 the firm becomes a revolving door of kids who come in as interns and then leave as seniors because it\u2019s too much to handle for too little payout. Then partners and managers will excuse it with the phrase, \u201cNot everyone is cut out to be a CPA.\u201d Well, sure, that\u2019s true \u2013 not everyone WANTS to be a CPA either. The skill set and intellectual demand is a barrier to entry for people who hate numbers and don\u2019t want to wade through thousands of pages of rules and regulations to do their jobs.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019ve seen over the years is that firms don\u2019t want to change. End of busy season parties and summer golf events are seen as an easy morale booster for people who make it through busy season. Morning donuts are supposed to make you feel better for working 20 hour days the week of filing. Yet people keep leaving because the expectations are too high, because when they don\u2019t meet expectations they\u2019re yelled at, because if they\u2019re less than perfect they get shuffled around, because yelling and verbally abusing people lower on the totem pole is normalized. Then I have to sit through lectures or read articles about how millennials are lazy, disloyal, and don\u2019t want to do \u201creal work\u201d blah blah blah\u2026.<\/p>\n

David H. Maister writes in his book\u00a0True Professionalism<\/a><\/u>\u00a0that \u201c[t]he point of any business is to find ways to make money without working harder.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasing your utilization means you made more money because you (or your people) worked harder. This is certainly an accomplishment, but it still is primarily a short-term achievement.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Maister\u2019s point is that a firm has to earn respect, to get the market to place a higher value on the firm\u2019s work, which will make clients want to pay more for the service. Firms earn respect by expecting professionalism from their people, from training their people to be professionals, and from leading by example. They earn respect by caring about both their clients and their people.<\/p>\n

Instead, I see CPA firms trying to do more with less \u2013 giving clients a \u201cbargain\u201d so they feel good about a \u201cnecessary evil\u201d (whether it\u2019s an audit to maintain compliance with the SEC, or a tax return) and then demanding their teams do more with a smaller budget. That mentality will make clients see the firm as a vendor, to challenge the firm\u2019s billings, and to continue to demand more for less. Maister goes on to say, \u201cWorking hard and cutting overhead costs are easier to do than achieving increases in your rate or leverage.\u201d Which is true. A smaller bottom line is scary for people who care about today\u2019s profits but not tomorrow\u2019s.<\/p>\n

In order to demand professionalism from your staff, however, you have to invest time, energy, and money into training \u2013 both technical skills and soft skills. You also have to invest in technology, look for better ways to do things. If your staff come in to work every day because they tolerate what feels like abuse so they can get a name on their resume so they can work somewhere else, you\u2019re not building a healthy firm. You\u2019re cruising on name recognition. And if your staff don\u2019t like what they do, they\u2019re not going to care about your clients, and your clients aren\u2019t going to care about you. And if your clients don\u2019t feel valued, if they don\u2019t feel like you care about them, then why would they want to stay?<\/p>\n

The main reason I hear companies say that they want to take their business away from Big 4 or other large firms is that they felt like those firms didn\u2019t care about them, that they were being ignored or undervalued because they weren\u2019t important to the firm. That\u2019s exactly the reason I hear from people who leave those firms to go into industry or to a smaller firm \u2013 they were just a number, just a cog in the machine, they were expected to do more work with fewer incentives to stay.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve heard people say that staff feelings don\u2019t matter, that staff just want an easy job with a big paycheck, so why should we cater to lazy people who don\u2019t want to work hard? But I don\u2019t think that\u2019s true. There\u2019s a big difference between staff who legitimately don\u2019t want to work hard, and staff who work hard and want to excel but don\u2019t want to be treated like crap just for a paycheck. If you develop your staff, if you give them resources and coach them and train them, they\u2019ll want to stay. They\u2019ll want to do well. If you read down the thread you\u2019ll see a number of horror stories from staff who worked for people who didn\u2019t care, didn\u2019t want to care, and just wanted to squeeze as much work from them as possible.<\/p>\n

But staff feelings SHOULD matter. Staff who are well-trained and care about the quality of their work and their clients turn into seniors and managers who care about their clients, and then into partners who have a good reputation and bring in clients who want to work with them, and who bring in staff who want to work for the firm. If your staff are failing and your realization rate sucks and your clients are shitty, then it\u2019s probably a failing on your part \u2013 either from failing to train staff or from bringing in any old client just to make a buck or from treating your clients like they\u2019re just a revenue source.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been a mentor or a coach for most of my career. I still care about my former staff who have moved on and I definitely offer to coach them through tough situations at work (or at home, if they want someone to give an outside point of view). Today\u2019s bottom line doesn\u2019t bother me as much as tomorrow\u2019s or next year\u2019s. If I want to have long-term productivity and profit, my staff\u2019s feelings absolutely matter, and they\u2019re going to continue to matter even after they\u2019ve moved on. Treat your clients and teams like they\u2019re actually people (because they are) and you\u2019ll do well in the long-term.<\/p>\n

By the way, if you haven\u2019t yet read David H. Maister\u2019s book, I highly recommend it. It has important advice for both the professional service firm and for professionals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why should staff feelings matter?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":368,"featured_media":310901,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"","_twitter_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type":"","_pinterest_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"","_medium_share_type":"","_threads_share_type":"","_selected_social_profile":[]},"categories":[30052,11195,30226,11158],"tags":[30227,5825,30230,30228,30229,508],"class_list":["post-310899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature","category-first-person","category-office","category-philosophy","tag-job","tag-leadership","tag-management","tag-misery","tag-staff","tag-work"],"yoast_head":"\n