Most leaders of accountancy firms know what great workflow looks like but find it difficult taking the steps to fix it.
Efficient workflow is the key to sustained profitability in your firm. It's also really important for team engagement, by reducing stress and peaks like January tax season. And of course, it offers clients higher value by getting their information to them when you said you would.
So how come most firms don't have efficient workflow?
In the blogs below you will discover what great workflow looks like and some of the important factors when it comes to managing workflow in your firm including:
Efficient workflow and process management are essential for your firm to grow and be successful. And when your firm runs well it makes it a happier, nicer place to work too, no-one likes an environment full of stress and chaos. But with meetings, client and team issues, calls, and emails, staying organised can be challenging. One of the
Read MoreIt’s tempting to throw your hands up in despair when unexpected problems occur in your firm. It’s tempting to panic, stutter and stall when things happen out of your control that cause chaos. Running your firm is stressful – you have commitments – deadlines to meet, suppliers to pay, clients to satisfy, staff who rely on you
Read MoreIt’s so easy to let the many varied day-to-day jobs of running your firm dominate your working life. This is especially the case now, when we are all dealing with so much uncertainty… Only when you take positive daily action on the jobs that will guarantee the future of your firm will you gain the success you
Read MoreManaging the complexities that come with running an accountancy firm isn’t easy and made even harder if you are constantly lurching from good times to bad times. Some people would describe this way of working as being on a rollercoaster and would give anything to be able to get off! We all want to sail a steady
Read MoreHow much better would your accountancy firm be if you could create the best environment and structure to get the best results from all your people? I’m sure within your team you have highly motivated, enthusiastic people… however it may be that even they need help finding the discipline and the structure to get things done. Let’s
Read MoreWe all manage change in our personal lives – leaving home, getting married, buying a house, moving jobs… these are all completely normal changes, although some of them are large and can be unpredictable. Our job is to manage these changes and the transition from something old to something new as smoothly and as positively as
Read MoreWhen was the last time you reviewed your client list? The full list… When you look closely at it, you’ll see an imbalance The chances are that 20% of your profits will be generated by 80% of your clients… It might be slightly less, it might be slightly more – but the imbalance will be there… Look at how
Read MoreAre your firm’s internal meetings as productive as you’d like them to be? Internal meetings within your firm should be designed to help you make or implement decisions. Productive internal meetings should help you move your firm forward and grow into a firm you’d be proud to own and run.But remember the meeting is not
Read MoreMulti-tasking… If you ask most members of your team, they will say they multi-task regularly – they want to sound productive, efficient and effective in their role. And it’s one word that appears on every CV you have ever received! But the reality is, if you want a job in your accountancy firm done well, accurately and completed
Read MoreThere is a general belief in the business world that most internal meetings are pointless and result in little or no action or accountability… So, is this the fault of the meeting or is the person running the meeting to blame? In his book ‘Read This Before Our Next Meeting’ Al Pittampalli states: “One mediocre meeting after another
Read MoreReal-life business success shows the power of small daily steps, the power of consistent daily action to create momentum towards your ultimate goal. In his book Good to Great, Jim Collins’ research study showed how 11 great businesses exceeded market growth by more than 3 times the norm (and one attained 18 x market growth). All 11 businesses
Read MoreHow does change happen within your firm? It is through several targeted initiatives or part of your everyday work? Your firm’s success depends on your ability to constantly improve what you do and how you do it. The Japanese call this ‘Kaizen’ – constant improvement. The word translates to mean change (kai) for the good (zen). Businesses that follow that
Read MoreWhich daily business habits do you have? Driving to work the same way? Parking in the same spot? Having a cup of coffee as soon as you get to work? Checking your emails as soon as they arrive? Having the same meeting at the same time every day? These are probably, until now, actions that you
Read MoreYou, me, everybody would prefer not to follow a checklist, yet they keep us alive in many walks of life. Checklists can keep your accountancy firm alive too and help it thrive. The importance of using a checklist was proved in the slums of Karachi, Pakistan in the 1990s. All the local water sources were contaminated with sewage.
Read MoreDelegation – something that nearly every partner or manager talks about doing, but rarely does well. How many times have you said to yourself or to one of your team ‘I need to delegate this task’ or ‘I shouldn’t be doing this really, someone else should’? Yet, you end up doing it – every single time. Why? Because there
Read MoreHow do the internal meetings that happen within your firm make you feel? Are you concerned that they seem to be ineffectual, unnecessary and only happen by habit? According to a 3M Meeting Network survey of managers, 25-50 percent of the time people spend in meetings is deemed as time wasted. Effective internal meetings should result in collaboration,
Read MoreThe 80/20 rule (as a rule of thumb) states that 80% of outcomes can be attributed to 20% of all causes for any given event. It’s is also known as the Pareto principle, as it was first used by the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto to describe the distribution of wealth in Italy in the 19th Century.
Read MoreBE WARNED – old habits don’t die hard! They are waiting in the shadows of new habits to trip you up unless you stay vigilant, stay conscious and stay aware… For you to grow, for your firm to grow, for your people to grow and for your profits to grow you MUST embrace the science of habit
Read MoreTo truly hook your firm’s clients, you must manage their ability to act and motivate them into action. Your aim is to make their action easier than thinking. For example, anyone would be put off by a lengthy registration page, especially if you have to scroll down, leave the page or fill in lots of information. Compare this
Read MoreInternal meetings are the lifeblood of every business. Many people view them as the way people within the business communicate, a place where all the decisions are made, and the most important issues of the moment are decided… However, in reality this is not always the case… How many internal meetings have you attended this week that have
Read MoreAlmost every accountant I know complains about the sheer number of demands on their time. How many times do you get to the end of the working day still having not achieved everything you wanted to? If you look closely at your use of time, you’ll almost certainly find an 80/20 ratio, where 80% is low-value work,
Read MoreWhether your firm is large or small, there are jobs that need doing every single day, and the list is almost endless. The flow of these jobs is like a river – it never stops. But if all you ever do is the day-to-day work, every day, all you’ll ever get is more of the same
Read MoreSuccess is all about hard work. As a partner or manager in an accountancy practice, you know this. You have worked hard to build a successful accountancy firm. But what if you worked hard in a different way? Could your firm be more successful? Dan Coyle, in his inspiring book The Talent Code, visited hotbeds of talent production
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