Change Your Mindset

My guest today is Kevin McCarthy, author of the bestselling book, Blind Spots: Why Good People Make Bad Choices. Kevin works globally with industry leaders to reveal blind spots to unleash the potential in organizations and teams.

Kevin spent 33 months in a federal prison for a crime he didn't knowingly commit. His boss at the time was committing stock fraud, and when Kevin discovered this, he realized he had these severe blind spots. How did he wind up working for this boss, and how could he have possibly believed he was a good man doing good things? He became passionate about discovering that for himself.

To learn more, and for the complete show notes, visit: petermargaritis.com

Resources:Learn more at https://www.blindspots.comOrder an autographed copy of Blind Spots: https://ww3.blindspots.com/offers/cuGr2LVH/checkoutFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/kevinmccarthycspLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinmccarthycspTwitter: https://twitter.com/kevinmccarthy01

Change Your Mindset is a production of Crate Media

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My guest today is Dave Caperton. Dave is an author, speaker and thought leader on ways that joy drives success.

Dave uses humor to teach corporations, associations, individuals, and groups how living and working with intentional joy is an act of leadership and a disciplined will. He has 20 years of real-world experience speaking, coaching, and writing about the benefits of a joyful mindset in a business context, including how to unleash creativity, improve health, increase engagement, supercharge learning, and provide legendary service and care while reducing stress and conflict. As a veteran educator, performance consultant, comedian, and comedy writer, Dave fuses entertaining stories, in-depth research, and proven learning strategies to provide conversations about joy to celebrate success, solve people's problems, and build a bridge between where you are now and where you want to be.

Dave came out of education. He was a teacher, and grew up with a family of teachers, teaching high school English. He did that for 11 years, and then he got into stand-up comedy. That led me to an opportunity to be a weekly radio guest in Columbus on a local FM station. And from there, he met a motivational speaker, Phil Sorrentino, who got him started down the path of combining humor and development.

To learn more, and for the complete show notes, visit: petermargaritis.com

Resources:Learn more at: davecaperton.comRead: Happiness is a Funny Thing by Dave CapertonFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/dave.capertonTwitter: http://twitter.com/speakofjoyLinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/davecaperton

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My guests today are Bill and Don Tomoff, who are both CPAs who like to say they aren’t your typical accountants.

Bill Tomoff is currently a CFO for InstallNET International and a consultant with Invenio Advisors, focusing on training and professional development. Bill volunteers with and is on the board of directors of Special Love, an organization serving children and families fighting childhood cancer.

Don is the founder of Invenio Advisors LLC, a consulting firm specializing in information management, process improvement, reporting, and data analysis, as well as education and training. Since 2010, Don is focused on the identification of process improvement opportunities and leveraging readily available technology tools to drive that change. In addition to consulting, Don is an active instructor for the Maryland Association of CPA's Business Learning Institute.

To learn more, and for the complete show notes, visit: petermargaritis.com

Resources:Bill’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/billtomoffBill’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/btomoffcpaBill’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/btomoffcpaDon’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dontomoffDon’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dtomoffcpaDon’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/DTomoffCPA

Change Your Mindset is a production of Crate Media

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Jay Sukow believes that the world will be a better place if everyone takes just one improv class - and I agree! Jay is trying to make that world a reality as the founder of Today Improv, where he teaches improv to actors, businesses, and everyone else around the world. He is currently on faculty at The Second City Hollywood and former faculty member at The Second City Chicago. Some of those he has trained with include Stephen Colbert, Stephen Carell, Dave Razowsky, Keith Johnstone, and Del Close.

To learn more, and for the complete show notes, visit: petermargaritis.com

Resources:Learn more about Today ImprovListen: ImprovCast with Jay and LandonInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/todayimprov/Twitter: https://twitter.com/todayimprovFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/todayimprov

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Dr. Gleb Tsipursky is a disaster avoidance expert with over 20 years of experience dramatically empowering leaders and organizations to avoid business disasters by addressing potential threats, maximizing unexpected opportunities, and resolving persistent personnel problems.

Gleb serves as the CEO of a boutique consulting and training firm, Disaster Avoidance Experts, whose clients range from Fortune 500 companies to mid-sized businesses and nonprofits. He's also the author of a national bestseller on avoiding disasters in business, The Truth-Seeker's Handbook: A Science-Based Guide, and an upcoming book, Never Go With Your Gut: How Pioneering Leaders Make the Best Decisions and Avoid Business Disasters, which is coming out November 2019.

What’s Wrong With Going With Your Gut?

Our emotions are short-term oriented because they evolved from the ancestral Savannah. And it really helped us survive in the wild because we didn't really have an opportunity to invest into the long term. We couldn't build a bank account. We couldn't build a house. We needed to get away from predators as quickly as possible while hunting our food as effectively as possible.

But as a result, “these gut reactions, they really misfire very often in the modern world and bring down high-flying careers and big companies.”

So, how can we avoid succumbing to human nature? Well, it’s right in the title of Dr. Tsipursky’s book: don’t go with your gut.

Our gut tends to make really bad choices in our modern business environment (and in modern life in general, really). So, it's important to see what your gut is telling you, but then always check that with your head. And in the book, you will find specific, structured decision-making processes that you can use to check with your head.

Resources:Learn more at disasteravoidanceexperts.comPreorder: Never Go With Your Gut: How Pioneering Leaders Make the Best Decisions and Avoid Business Disasters (November 1, 2019)LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dr-gleb-tsipursky-89ab4b23Facebook: facebook.com/DrGlebTsipurskyTwitter: twitter.com/gleb_tsipurskyInstagram: instagram.com/dr_gleb_tsipursky  

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My guest today is Brian Wagner, Founder and CEO of A Radical Vision, an organization with a powerful mission statement:

"It took a crippling disease for us to understand that we have no vision. Losing our sight allowed us to gain vision. That was the greatest gift that's ever been given. We can't hide from our adversity. Our goal is to help others recognize their adversity, go blind, and gain vision. This happened to us. And now, we want to help others have that same focus.”

A Radical Vision

When Brian was 10, he started to develop some health problems due to a cavernous malformation, which is a malformed blood vessel that can form anywhere in your body. Brian’s just happened to have formed in his brain stem.

So, as a result, Brian dealt with a variety of different issues throughout his life. Then, at the age of 43, it started to bleed, and bleed, and bleed. And when it bled, it put pressure on the nerves that control his vision, and he started to go blind. So Brian had to undergo a brain surgery in order to remove the cavernous malformation from his brain stem.

Brian still can’t see out of both eyes, but in other ways, he has more perspective and vision than ever before in his life.

Resources:Learn more at https://www.aradicalvision.comFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/aradicalvision/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aradicalvision/Twitter: https://twitter.com/aradicalvisionRead: INSIGHT by Dr. Tasha Eurich

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My guest today is Robin Thieme, the Founder of KBS CFO, which is an outsourced CFO and accounting department solution for growing sustainable and profitable businesses. She has over 30 years of financial and accounting experience, a passion for the efficiencies that new technologies enable, and a dedication to small businesses.

One of the things that really impresses me about Robin and KBS is that she was creating a virtual organization long before cloud computing was a mainstream term – and she takes the same innovative and thoughtful approach to establishing efficiencies and solutions that fit the current business environment for her clients.

The old mindset – although many still use it – is that having a CFO is too much money for a small- to medium-sized business. As it turns out, Robin says, small businesses have some pretty big problems or big decisions, too! And they may not need a full-time CFO, but they do still need someone to help guide them financially. “We're really meeting a need of businesses that are struggling to run their businesses; they love what they do, and are really good at it, but just need some help on the back end.”

An Anticipatory CPA & OrganizationYou know Robin is a member of the Maryland Association of CPAs because she describes herself as an “anticipatory CPA” – something we’ve talked about in past episodes with Bill Sheridan, as well as other guests.

Robin defines an anticipatory CPA as “one who is looking out towards the future, anticipating trends, and is really focused on what's going to happen next, instead of being a historian for our clients... And, ultimately, when you think about it, from its most basic elements, a successful business should always be thinking about where they're going and not where they've been. So, I live in that world,” and we should all be living in this world.

Everywhere in the accounting and finance profession, and really almost any profession, people are having conversations about change; changing demographics, changing technologies, changing societal expectations, etc. And, especially when it comes to technology, our profession tends to see this change as a threat – but that’s just our fear of the unknown talking. 

Robin compares this to autonomous vehicles, something that still feels futuristic and foreign to many of us, although there are already autonomous vehicles driving on our roads. Robin envisions a future where not only do autonomous vehicles become popular, but it might even become illegal for humans to drive because it will be a safety risk. 

And you know what? That change doesn’t hurt our ability to commute or get places – it gives us more time! The same thing is true for the technologies that are going to transform the way we do work in our profession, although the transition might be difficult to wrap our heads around.

So, what will you do to become more future-ready? What steps will you take to change your mindset and get out of your comfort zone? What risks are you willing to accept in order to be prepared for tomorrow – all the while knowing that, in order to enact change, it takes baby steps? 

Resources:Learn more at https://www.kbscfo.com/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kensingtonbusinesssolutionsTwitter: https://twitter.com/kbscfoLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kbscfo/

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My guest today is Phillip Lovegrove, who's a partner in the personal financial planning firm of Vorisek Financial Corporation.

Now, many of the financial planners that I've interacted with in the past could not or would not adapt their conversation to meet the needs of their clients. Instead, many only seem to be serving their own needs and, at times, come across condescending. Phil is just the opposite.

Phil believes in taking a needs-based approach and providing hands-on personal service for his clients – and I believe this is something that all professional service providers need to start doing, and soon. It helps your clients in the long term, and it’ll help your business, too.

I've been a client of his for just over a year and, during this time, I've had more conversations about my financial position and pending retirement than ever before. Albeit, I'm a lot closer to retirement than I was five years ago, but this is the kind of service that really adds value and increases trust. He is doing a great job, and it's something we all can learn from.

So, do you provide a needs-based approach in your work life? If so, how can you help others become better in this approach? If not, will you develop the skills necessary to become a needs-based and hands-on personal service to your clients, customers, and employees?

Either way, sit down, devise a strategy, and work on it every single day.

Resources:Learn more at https://www.vorisekfinancialcorp.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phil-lovegrove/Twitter: https://twitter.com/phillovegroveFinancial Advisor Success Podcast: https://www.kitces.com/blog/category/21-financial-advisor-success-podcast/Between Now and Success: https://stevesanduski.com/podcast-blog/Planet Money: https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510289/planet-moneyWall Street Journal podcasts: https://www.wsj.com/podcasts

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Change Your Mindset is produced by Podcast Masters

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My guest today is Amy Franko, who is a strategic sales expert, author, and keynote speaker. Amy had a successful business-to-business sales career with global technology companies like IBM and Lenovo before, in 2007, she pivoted into entrepreneurship and launched the training firm Impact Instruction Group. Now, Amy works with professional service firms, helping them grow business development results and build firm leaders.

Amy also recently released a book, The Modern Seller, which is not a book about prospecting or negotiating skills. It's a book that explores the five skill sets that individuals and organizations need in order to become successful. In this episode, Amy explains each one of these skill sets in great detail, focusing on how they apply to the financial service industry. However, no matter what industry you're in, the ability for you to develop these five skill sets is crucial in the disruptive business environment that we are operating in today.

So, let’s dig into the five skill sets of The Modern Seller....

A modern seller is agile.

Until the last decade or so, “agility” was something that you heard about in sports and athletic training, not a business concept.

According to the Center for Creative Leadership, which does research on the top skills that organizations are looking to hire for and build, agility really popped onto the radar about 10 years ago. And they think that, by 2022, things like adaptability and versatility are going to be in the top five skills that organizations are looking to hire for.

Amy says that they are also skills that we need to be thinking about when it comes to business development and growth – because our clients are expecting that of us! They're expecting us to show agility as professional organizations, and in order to do that, we have to be developing agility in ourselves.

A modern seller is entrepreneurial.

Whether you're a manager, a senior manager, or someone at the highest level in your organization, look at yourself and look at the people in your firm. Do they see themselves as employees, or do they see themselves as the founder and the CEO, maybe the chief bootstrapper, in their own book of business?

Because there’s a big difference there. When an employee thinks of their book of business or their team's book of business as a business itself, they make different decisions. They look at the top line and the bottom line, and they look for the best opportunities.

So, we want to have people in our organization that are thinking entrepreneurially because that's what's going to help us grow.

Now that you know what a modern seller is, are you ready to become one?

Then you’re going to need to take some action.

So, what’s the next step in the pursuit of becoming a modern seller for you? Which of these five skill sets have you best developed? Which of the five skill sets is your weakest? Will you build on a strategy of strengthening your weakest and leveraging your strongest?

Devise a strategy and work on it every single day, even if it’s just for 30 to 60 minutes. It takes baby steps in order to change a habit.

“You can go to a training, you can read a book, but the switch has to be in the application; applying things, trying them, failing at them, and moving forward. That's the only way that we learn.”

Resources:Learn more at amyfranko.comRead: The Modern Seller: Sell More And Increase Your Impact In The New Sales EconomyLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amyfranko/Twitter: https://twitter.com/AmyFranko

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My guest today is Samantha Bowling, who's an Audit Partner at the accounting firm of Garbelman Winslow in Maryland and the current Chair of the Executive Board of the Maryland Association of CPAs.

This episode is focused on public accounting, but it also has great implications to business and industry accounting professionals. So, I encourage anyone in accounting – or just interested in how AI is going to change the nature of work – to listen to the interview and decide how these technologies might affect your organization.

Now, in March of 2016, artificial intelligence was introduced to the accounting profession when IBM and KPMG signed an agreement to bring Watson into KPMG's audit practice. At the time (and still, really), many of the small- to middle-sized firms speculated that this technology was too expensive for their practices.

Samantha, however, saw an opportunity. She felt that if the larger firms had this advantage, how long would it be until they started taking clients? She turned that question into action, and 18 months after IBM and KPMG's announcement, Samantha was able to bring artificial intelligence into her audit practice at an affordable price.

In fact, Samantha was awarded the Innovative Practitioner Award 2018 from CPA.com for her efforts – and it was well deserved!

Now, if you're still a little skeptical or just curious, then start listening or keep reading and you'll learn how she did it.

Small Firm, Big Technology

For context, Samantha’s firm only has about 15 employees, depending on the time of year. They do mostly everything that small firms do, except for government contracting, and she happens to be the audit partner at this firm.

So when Samantha heard about KPMG introducing AI into their audit practice three years ago, she thought she was probably going to lose a lot of revenue if the large firms have Watson and her firm doesn’t have anything.

“I'm not going to be able to do auditing anymore,” Samantha though. “[But] I really don't like tax. So, I have to find a solution."

Samantha started by talking to her software providers, asking how they were implementing AI into her platform... and they said they weren't. They were only going to look into AI for the large firm platforms. She was a little discouraged, but she didn’t stop searching. Instead, she did what most of us do when we have a question: she Googled it.

She just happened to come across a company called MindBridge, a Canadian startup company that was willing to work with her and let her try it out. Still, she was skeptical. She thought she can't afford the software, it’s probably not going to do what it says it's going to do; was she setting herself up for disappointment?

Resources:Learn more at gwcpas.comCheck out MindBridge.aiTwitter: https://twitter.com/sbowlingcpaLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samantha-bowling-cpa-cgma-25531420

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