Change Your Mindset

I always enjoy speaking with Karl Ahlrichs, a human capitalist consultant and a far-thinking and future planning individual. He comes on the podcast today to discuss some of the storms he sees coming on the horizon, particularly where HR and the next generations of employees meet.

Even though our current economy is far greater now than it’s been in a while, Karl sees quite a few potential problems on the horizon that we need to be prepared for:

• Baby Boomers – due to the recession of 2008, many of these people delayed retirement to rebuild their nest egg. Many of them are now ready to leave and hit the beach.
• High Performers – they’ve driven the country’s productivity to unprecedented levels, but now they’re looking for the next challenge. They’ll be ready to migrate jobs soon, so we need to figure out our management style and plans so we can attract new ones and keep the old ones in place.
• Social Media – sites like LinkedIn will attract high performers away from you by enticing them with great challenging opportunities as well as being a source of candidates for recruiting companies.
• Digital Natives vs Digital Immigrants – this is a great way to divide the world when looking to hiring in the future. Digital immigrants need jobs without lots of tech involved, and we need to hire people who line up with their jobs. You can’t put somebody tech savvy into a job with minimal tech interaction and vice versa.

Karl knows that business practices also need to reflect the current majority group within the workplace: millennials. Studies have shown that 2/3 of millennials don’t plan on staying with their current employee for more than 5 years. We have to change our business and management practices to keep these high performers more engaged. “We have to adapt the very work we do to fit a more project thinking pattern.”

There are a few things that we can start to do now to keep those high performing millennials in place:

• Better hiring practices and higher standards. High performers love to work with other high performers and are pleased and impressed when their bosses hire the best.
• Management sincerely listens. High performers tend to stay in their jobs 20-30% longer if they perceive their manager listens to them and values their input.

Millennials are only one employment group we must contend with, but the new Gen WiFi will be a handful as well. These future employees became aware at the age of 3, the same time as Google came online. This generation doesn’t need or want to know anything; they rely on Google over memory. One other key distinction about this group is their lack of ethics. The ends justify the means for them. This will create ethics issues in the workplace and it’ll be up to us as management to parent them along ethical lines.

Underscoring all of these issues is the fact that people nowadays are overwhelmed with the glut of information they’re presented on a daily basis. The average person is subjected to 32GB of data per day. Talk about overwhelm! This has created the need for simplicity in answering questions or solving complex problems. The ability to simplify the complex and communicate it will be invaluable in the near future. “That’s the most important human skill going forward; to take complex things and make them understandable.

So the most important thing people can do, to sum everything up, is to focus on hiring standards because if we bring in ethically challenged poor performers, we’ll destroy the cultures and businesses we’ve worked so hard to develop. We need to screen for, teach and practice for ourselves a higher ethical standard because, “Ethics are learned by modeling, not by reading.”

Karl was very gracious with his time and wisdom today as he dropped value bomb after value bomb on us. I took a great deal away from our discussion, as I’m sure you did as well. We all now have lots to take away and apply to our own lives and business to make our lives easier.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

• How you can tell if you’re a millennial
• Why it’s to respectfully leave any job that’s not a cultural fit
• The three basic stages in the development of our own personal ethical standards
• Why story telling skills can help you communicate with the world today
• Plus much more…

DON’T STOP HERE…

• Learn more about Karl: Website | LinkedIn

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

• Book ‘Everydata’ by John H. Johnson and Mike Gluck: Website

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Ed Mendlowitz is a long-time CPA and a partner of prestigious Withum Smith+Brown. He’s also a member of many CPA societies and has taught financial and accounting courses for 11 years. He’s a firm believer in CPE and uses his CPE training opportunities to network with other CPA’s from around the world. He’s full of wisdom and insights and he shares many great nuggets with us today.

Ed considers himself the last of the “expert generalists.” He started his firm a long time ago and the only way he could grow was to never say “no” and to do anything that came his way. He grew his first practice from two people to fifty before finally merging with WSB years ago.

WSB does something that many other accounting firms don’t do; they create unique, fun and fresh videos that they use to promote their brand on the Withum1 YouTube page. The videos started as a way to chronicle their yearly ‘state of the firm’ meetings and to excite the staff. This has also had an added benefit of being a recruiting tool for new talent just emerging from their accounting education.

WSB does a lot to wine and dine great prospective employees, just like how many companies wine and dine prospective clients. Where many companies fall short though, is they start by doing anything they can to land the client, then once they’re on board, they eventually forget about these existing clients.

“If they paid attention to existing clients with the same effort and interest that they do to get a new client, they’d get a lot more business from existing clients and the firm would grow and their clients would do all their recommending and referrals for them.”

Through his love of CPE, Ed attains over 100 credits per year. Most of this is through going to LIVE CPE events. He prefers these over online CPE because of the human interactions that come from these events. He meets about 40-50 new people at each event, often times inviting the lone person to join him for lunch or dinner. His networking skills have earned him referrals from all over the world.

Personal connections have always been a part of Ed’s business, but many other accounting firms just don’t do a good job with it. They often think that doing the client’s taxes and meeting commitments is developing a relationship. It’s not. It’s when you reach out with a personal touch that really matters. When you’re in the neighborhood, stop by and say “hi.” This creates availability and clients love when their CPA is available.

Ed recommends returning phone calls promptly, and if there’s a problem you need to let them know ASAP. You should precipitate phone calls with questions and suggestions for the client. These build your client relationship and will often lead to referrals. “The referrals you get from existing clients are the way you can tell if you’re doing a good job or not.”

Creating a comfortable environment for your employees is another relational aspect to accounting that every company needs to work on. Within committees or groups, create an atmosphere where people can spitball ideas that can turn into something great. “Bad ideas lead to good ideas, no ideas lead to nothing.” Innovation and crazy ideas have led to many successes in every aspect of life, so don’t miss out on this opportunity within your own company.

Ed truly delivered with some great nuggets of knowledge and insights into networking within the CPA community. You’ll hear from Ed again in the near future on the podcast, so stay tuned.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

• A few ways that WSB excites their employees and keeps them interested in their job
• Where most of WSB’s referrals come from
• Why ex-WSB employees remain in the accounting field more often than ones who leave the “Big 4”
• How important it is to elicit ideas (even crazy ones) from your team.
• Plus much more…

YES, AND…

• Learn more about Ed: Website
• Withum Smith+Brown: Website

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

• Ed’s review of ‘Improv is No Joke’: Website
• Withum Smith+Brown ‘I Gotta Feeling’: Video

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Tom Hood was a wonderful guest on today’s show. He’s a great forward-thinking leader in the CPA world and delivered great value to the audience with his insights into technologies and trends for the future.

Tom just returned from a spring council meeting for members of the American Institute of CPAs. A big takeaway from the meeting is the sense that people are beginning to understand the impact of the exponential pace of technology. Big changes like continuous auditing of 100% of transactions are right around the corner, as well as automation within the financial world. Big ticket items will still remain with professionals, but the entry level tasks will be moved to machines soon. “We’re going to need new skills and need them faster probably than we think and we’re going to need to focus on things that computers can’t do.” The trust and relationship side of accounting are aspects that we need to leverage: we need to get better at doing what computers can’t do.

Tom has been able to predict many of the things that others are just now starting to see. It’s not any type of clairvoyance on his part, though. He attributes his future seeing abilities to something that Isaac Newton had said, “The reason I can see farther is because I stand on the shoulder of giants.” Tom’s business relationships and training has helped him see upcoming trends.

With this vision, Tom knows that it won’t be enough to just know the nuts and bolts of accounting. CPA’s will need to begin developing strategic thinking within the companies they work for. This is understanding data and having the ability to analyze it within the context of the company and the world surrounding it. “Wisdom is looking at patterns and connecting dots.”

The number one reason why people leave their CPA’s is because they tend to be reactionary and not proactive. Accountants are logical and we look for facts to understand and tell us about the business. This can lead to a focus on the rear view mirror, without ever looking out through the windshield. CPA’s need to make time for the future and must be taught to look forward.

A change in curriculum like this isn’t something that higher education is capable of just yet. That’s a huge ship to turn around, and we all know they don’t turn quickly. Because of this, it’s up to us as employers to teach our people the skills necessary to be more adaptable and to make a greater impact. Don’t worry about the costs, do this so your people are better prepared to help the organization. The old idea of “if we train them they’ll leave” needs to take a back seat to the more critical message of “what if we don’t train them and they stay?”

Tom gave some incredible food for thought in today’s episode. We all need to make a concerted effort to be more forward thinking in our approach to our chosen profession. I’m really glad he had the time to speak with us today.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

Why forward-thinking is so valuable to the CPA professionHow collaboration between CPA’s and other professions surrounding them will be more important as time moves onThe hard trends that we can all be trained to seeWhy we can’t rely on higher education to fully prepare accountants for the new financial world we’re facingPlus much more… 

YES, AND…

Learn more and connect with Tom: LinkedIn | Twitter 

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

Maryland Association of CPAs: WebsiteAmerican Institute of CPAs: Website‘Humans are Underrated’ by Geoff Colvin: Book

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I’ve been looking forward to this conversation with Michael Sciortino for a very long time. He has over 30 years of experience in the area of marketing, is a keynote speaker and trainer and is the author of ‘Gratitude Marketing.’ He comes to us with a wealth of marketing information and he shares some incredible techniques with us today.

He didn’t get into writing his book like many authors do. Instead of writing a book then developing a seminar and teachings/trainings around it, he started with the seminar first. He put all the tools he’s used for years and what he’s learned from others around the country and tested everything out on live seminar attendees. The feedback and experience he received from this was massaged into a user-friendly format within the book.

‘Gratitude Marketing’ is about recognizing and developing meaningful, memorable relationships with the people that you want to work with for the long-term. “I’m about building long-term relationships and you do that by being concerned more with what the customer or client wants than what your agenda might be.”

Mike is a masterful client-relationship builder and he tries to establish new working relationships by asking the prospective clients about their practice, their clients and their approach to business. This warm caring attitude will lead the prospective client to choose him as the logical choice because of this. Two of his favorite words to get them on his side are “tell me.” “Tell me about your goals… your objectives… what you want for your kids… what you want to do when you retire.”

Gratitude marketing comes naturally to Mike, but some clients or prospective clients don’t see the value in building interpersonal relationships. For these people, Mike asks them what they’ve done in regards to marketing their product. He finds that most traditional marketing speaks at people. Gratitude marketing engages and connects with people. You meet them where they’re at and build a deeper connection through this process.

Expressing gratitude isn’t a one-time thing. It’s a consistent practice that can accomplish The 3 R’s:

• Retention – it increases client retention. It costs 7x more money to find a new client than to retain a client.
• Referrals – by far the best marketing strategy is to cultivate a consistent referral program. Client referrals cost effectively doubles your business.
• Revenues – taking care of retention and referrals takes care of revenues. “Ultimately, people and clients work with people they like, know and trust.”

An incredible expression of gratitude to your current clients that helps to build relationships and which leads to referrals and more business is to personally hand-write three thank you cards every day. There’s always somebody to show gratitude towards, and taking the time to do this is the greatest habit you can build that will be so much more valuable than you could ever imagine.

But, all the gratitude in the world won’t help if you don’t have a business worth sharing with others. Mike’s a big believer in “we don’t get what we don’t ask for,” but clients are only willing to refer if you give a service that’s referable.

Mike dropped some incredible nuggets of information and some actionable steps we could all jump at right now to improve our businesses no matter the industry. I’m thankful for the time that he gave to me and the podcast today.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

• How building long-term relationships nurtures trust within clients and leads to more business
• That moving your focus away from the numbers and to the relationships will lead to more than just financial success
• How writing the book has surprisingly transformed Mike’s own life
• An exclusive asset retention idea not presented in his book
• Plus much more…

YES, AND…

• Learn more and connect with Mike: LinkedIn | ph 985-705-1824
• ‘Gratitude Marketing’ Book: Website : Amazon

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It was great having my longtime friend and mentor, Clarke Price, on the show with me today. He’s retired now, but he led The Ohio Society of CPAs for 40 years and has been a not-for-profit volunteer and leader during much of that time. He’s developed great leadership skills and influence in the not-for-profit world and he shares much of what he’s learned with us today.

In the not-for-profit world, leadership can be quite different than in the corporate world. Great leaders spend a lot of time building a consensus and support among the organization for the direction they want the organization to take. It’s not enough to just have a vision and say, “This is where we’re going.” Great leaders have the ability to explain that their path is the right thing to do.

This takes the power of persuasion and the willingness to tackle hard conversations with your people. You must have the ability discuss the unknowns, but to be able to convince supporters that they have the capacity to succeed in new endeavors.

This of course makes relationship building a critical piece of running a not-for-profit. People have to know, see and trust you. It’s easier if they like you, but that’s not always the case. Leaders can’t be effective if their focus is on “How do I get everybody to like me?” You must have the courage of your convictions and be willing to go full-bore once a decision is made.

As a true leader, you’re going to develop a vision for where you want the organization to go, but within every not-for-profit, your vision may conflict with the views of others within. “Good leaders are not afraid to take on the tough or unpopular issue.” This is where the relationships you develop begin to pay off. The ability to address these issues and to be heard by your people is part and parcel of being an effective leader.

Part of leadership is innovation of ideas and implementing them within the organization. There’s “idea leadership” where the leader decides on the direction of the organization or products it will develop. The corollary to this is where ideas come from within the organization. In order to get this type of idea creation, the leader needs to create a place where he empowers his people to bring forth their own ideas. The great leader supports a culture where people feel free to express ideas about what the organization should do or stop doing. You know this is the case when your people have faith that you will support them or at least listen to what they have to say and know you will give it serious consideration.

One concern that Clarke has with the world today is the trend toward timidity of leadership. This is when an organization avoids controversy at all costs. They allow questions like, “Who will this offend?” and “What’s the media reaction going to be?” drive their leadership decisions. It’s better to ask questions like, “Does this make sense for the organization?” and “Will we be stronger or more profitable as a result?” These questions lead the organization on the right path.

This was an incredibly informative and valuable conversation with a great leader. I’m very appreciative of the time that Clarke granted me for this interview, and I can’t thank him enough.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

• How story-telling and communicating your vision is critical to success
• How some people may just not be cut out for leadership
• The qualities that Clarke respects in his favorite leaders
• Some solutions to getting great people on board your not-for-profit bus
• Plus much more…

YES, AND…

• Learn more and connect with Clarke: LinkedIn
• The Ohio Society of CPAs: Website

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Welcome to the Improv Is No Joke podcast!

Please enjoy this short introduction episode where I explain the purpose of this show, and the value I hope to provide to my listeners throughout a series of interviews with many business leaders & entrepreneurs.

For more information on the show, head to www.petermargaritis.com

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