Confessions of a CPA

Home from War

2012-02-04T14:30:00.003-05:00

I just had to write a quick post to say my soldier husband has returned from Afghanistan safely. We are thrilled to have him home.

On to busy season!

A Victory Medal

2012-01-11T23:36:00.002-05:00

So I haven't posted in ages, and am not sure how often I'll get the chance during tax season. I'm happy to report that my husband returns from Afghanistan soon, just in time for busy season. We all can't wait to get him home.

In the meantime, I've been busy managing our two small children, which has included potty training the youngest. Once he was successful, his preschool gave him a medal - and gave me one too, because I had to work so darn hard myself.

It seems a silly thing, and yet I showed it to my friends at work, my family, emailed about it, and so on. Somehow this small act of recognition from his school really made me smile and talk about it. "I did it! He's trained! I have the medal to prove it!"

A token of appreciation doesn't have to be much to matter. I'll try to keep that in mind when working with others, that a little thing, even as simple as a compliment, can go a long way. That just may be the thing they end up telling their family about.

What's Trust Got to Do With It

2011-08-10T19:58:00.003-04:00

Today, industry guru Rita Keller discusses the need for trust in a successful CPA organization.

She mentions a book that I have yet to finish, but have actually started, by Stephen M.R. Covey titled The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything.

The key concept I've taken away from the book so far is the idea that trust is made up of two pieces. Trust in character and trust in competence.

For example, I trust my husband's character completely. His competence in preparing a tax return, not so much. (He's a psychiatrist.) So if he were to prepare our return and ask: "Don't you trust me?" I could honestly say: "Yes, I trust your character. Now let me do our return."

In a successful CPA firm, the people have trust in their leaders' character and competence. That requires the leaders to work at being competent, at having a clear direction and executing a plan to get there.

What hard work!

Behind the magic

2011-08-08T23:24:00.006-04:00

Today I reviewed one of those returns that is dry, detailed, and less than exciting. I still gave it my full attention, of course, but it took discipline. It was one of those days when work felt hard.

I've talked about this seemingly endless times before - how the work of building an accounting firm, including the client work itself, is hard.

Lest we feel alone in this, even those who were part of the magic of Harry Potter (forgive another reference) felt at times it was just plain hard. From Entertainment Weekly:

Watson seemed to hit her lowest point on The Deathly Hallows. At 19, she had been accepted to Brown University, but first had to slog through a long shoot for which she had to be cold and wet for months. (In the film, Hermione and Ron destroy a Horcrux in water; that scene and the ones that immediately follow required extensive filming.) ''I hate to sound whiny, but it's horrible,'' she said, sopping wet, sitting by a space heater near the Room of Requirement set. ''This has definitely been the most intense, grueling period of filmmaking I've ever done.''

I wonder what will be the most "intense, grueling period" of building up a firm or providing client work will be in my career. Fortunately, I know the hard pays off.

Or in the words of Tom Hanks: "The hard is was makes it great."

Of course, Harry

2011-08-06T21:38:00.003-04:00

Today I saw the final installment of the Harry Potter movies.

One line struck me in particular, as it relates to recent posts and thoughts. At one point, Harry asks whether what is happening to him is real, or all in his head. The response:

Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that
mean that it is not real?

Why indeed? Isn't our reality what we experience with our minds? And don't we have some control over that?

In the words of behavioral author Winifred Gallagher:

When you zero in on a sight or sound, thought or feeling, your brain spotlights and depicts that "target," which then becomes part of the subjective mental construct that you nonetheless confidently call "reality" or "the world." In contrast, things that you ignore don't, at least with anything like the same clarity. As William James succinctly puts it, "My experience is what I agree to attend to."

So I know this is a bit deep and existential for an accounting blog, but oh well. I pose the question: what will you decide to pay attention to today, and therefore make "real"?

Bean Counters

2011-08-04T08:00:00.004-04:00

While recently watching an episode of Covert Affairs on USA, I was of course amused by the reference to "bean counters."

After the main character spends a small fortune on a handbag to further her spy mission, the IT guy replies: "Wait till the bean counters get their hands on you. Don't expect those excuses to hold water with accounting."

I noticed an interesting website - the Online Slang Dictionary - and here's what it has to say about bean counters:

bean counter
noun - a person involved in the finances of an organization - e.g. an accountant. Mildly derogatory, this term implies that the person is concerned only with financial figures and not the larger concerns of the organization.

There remains a stereotype about accountants that we have our heads buried in our general ledgers and do not see the big picture. I confess to being especially guilty of this early in my career. I remember an evaluation note that I didn't always see the forest for the trees.

It's taken me awhile, but I like to think I've come a long way from being a "bean counter" to being a true tax adviser. Whether anyone in Hollywood will stop calling us bean counters, that is yet to be seen!

You are what you think

2011-08-03T21:34:00.003-04:00

Bill Sheridan over at CPA Success brings us a timely post titled Stress? It's a state of mind.

His comments remind me of a book I mentioned before, RAPT: Attention and the Focused Life. We each choose where to spend our limited time, and we choose our attitude. Sounds like an after school special, but funny enough it is true.

Right now, I'm learning a lot about a couple of things Bill mentions for handling stress:

Keep things in perspective. Are you dead? No? Then things aren't so bad.
Don't try to control what can't be controlled.

My husband is in Afghanistan, and I have no control over that. All any of us can really control is our own thoughts.

Victor Frankl, Holocaust survivor and author, shared an important lesson in his book Man's Search for Meaning:

"If a prisoner felt that he could no longer endure the realities of camp life, he found a way out in his mental life– an invaluable opportunity to dwell in the spiritual domain, the one that the SS were unable to destroy. Spiritual life strengthened the prisoner, helped him adapt, and thereby improved his chances of survival."

I am certainly not living anything like he did, but I can take his lesson to heart and remember that my own mind is something no one else can control.

Hopefully I will put it to good use.

Poetry is easy

2011-06-24T20:56:00.005-04:00

As I prepare for my husband to head off to Afghanistan, I think a lot about the time he'll be gone. I'll be managing the kids on my own (with some help from fantastic family), and it's going to be hard.

The hard part will be doing the day to day, day after day. It's showing up.

I can relate to some words from the main character on The Good Wife, who says in response to the comment "Not everything needs a plan" the following:

"Everything that matters does... Show me a plan. Poetry is easy, it's the parent/teacher conferences that are hard."

Ignoring the fact this is about an extramarital affair (which I do not condone), these are wise words.

When it comes to an accounting firm, poetry is easy. What's hard is showing up each day and getting the job done right.

I'm lucky enough in my personal life to have a husband with whom I share both the poetry and the parent/teacher conferences, the day-to-day.

Professionally, a firm that has both the poetry (the vision), and the ability to deliver is something special.

Remembering

2011-06-01T22:59:00.001-04:00

Thank you to The Summa for a wonderful post urging us to "spend some time in remembrance of those who have fallen in military service to the country, and to reflect on the significance of their sacrifice."

Amen to that.

How hard can it be?

2011-05-20T12:24:00.002-04:00

"How hard can it be?"

"Seriously - really hard."

That's one of my favorite lines from an episode of The Backyardigans, a kids show I've seen hundreds of times with two small kids.

I think the approach many people take to things is "Hey, how hard can it be?", not knowing what they are getting themselves into.

As accountants, many of us like to think the accounting is the hard part and everything else - management, strategy, processes, mentoring, marketing, etc. - is the "fluff" stuff. But once you actually get involved with it, you realize just how hard it is.

It's worth investing the time and energy to become a great firm. How hard can it be? Seriously, really, exhaustively hard. But worth it!

Stuck in a Moment

2011-04-08T09:28:00.004-04:00

Right now, my family and I are in limbo, preparing for my husband to depart for training and subsequent deployment with the Air Force this summer.

What a dreadful place is this "Land of Limbo"! I'm more of a "rip the band-aid off" kind of person, so the anticipation of a big event can sometimes be as bad as the event itself. In this case, I doubt the "anticipation" is worse than the "actual", but it's lousy nonetheless.

I wonder if somethings the tendency of CPAs is to put off change, to avoid ripping off the band-aid. And maybe that anticipation and delay is worse than the actual change will be. CPA guru Rita Keller has said that CPA firm leaders often go: "Ready, Aim... Aim... " and just can't seem to pull the trigger.

Today I was listening to U2's "Stuck in a Moment" and thought it aptly described my current situation. Unfortunately, I don't think there's much I can do to get out of this moment of limbo (time just needs to pass).

But what about all the CPAs and tax preparers out there who are stuck in a moment? Maybe, just maybe, it's time to "get out of it."

(But as always, what do I know?)

Tax Deduction

2011-03-03T22:42:00.003-05:00

A picture of my son from a couple years ago.

Be sure to claim all your tax deductions (and exemptions)!

I'm a big fan of the musical Wicked. About this time of year, I feel rather popular with family, friends, and clients, and so I often find the song "Popular" running through my head.

"... think of celebrated heads of state or 'specially great communicators... Did they have brains or knowledge? Don't make me laugh! They were popular -- Please! It's all about popular! It's not about aptitude, it's the way you're viewed, so it's very shrewd to be very, very popular like me!"

Hopefully, one's success as a CPA has at least something to do with aptitude, not just the way we're viewed.

Even so, there's a lot more to it than just our technical aptitude, and this is the time of year to be thinking about the "other stuff." What is our bedside manner?

In The Firm of the Future: A Guide for Accountants, Lawyers, and Other Professional Services, by Ronald Baker and Paul Dunn, we learn that the top 7 reasons clients leave their CPAs are as follows:

My accountant (CPA) doesn't treat me right (two-thirds of the responses).
CPAs ignore their clients.
CPAs fail to cooperate.
CPAs let partner contact lapse.
CPAs do not keep clients informed.
CPAs assume clients are technicians.
CPAs use clients as training ground for new staff.

(List found via the ever-excellent blog CPA Success.)

My key take away is that I need to treat my clients right, pay attention, cooperate, and communicate in real-person terms rather than try to flaunt my technical knowledge.

Hopefully, I can be a "popular" CPA by bringing my technical aptitude and a whole lot more to my firm. And if not, at least I have fun humming the tune to the song when my email and phone are buzzing now through April 15.

A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

2011-02-04T00:01:00.004-05:00

I was pleasantly surprised to find myself included in a list of
20 social media savvy accounting and tax professionals. Thank you for the mention! That was a good day.

Last Monday, I took my daughter and a couple classmates on their 2nd grade class field trip to see a musical production of "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." The field trip was a success, and I came home exhausted from the mass of elementary school children, but relieved.

Later that afternoon, the day turned terrible, horrible, no good, and very, very bad. I learned that my husband, who is a Captain in the Air Force, is going to be deployed to Afghanistan later this year. I can't post much more detail than that, national security and all.

Needless to say, this is tough news. This summer, our oldest turns 8 and our youngest turns 3. Thank goodness for webcams and internet access, so we'll get to see each other even when we're across the world.

So, I don't know how well I'll keep up the blog. I love writing, and have missed writing more frequently. My hope was to jump back into the blogosphere with a vengeance after tax season. But as we all know, life is what happens when you're making plans!

During this busy season, I hope your terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days are few and far between. Good luck!

Confidence

2011-01-12T21:33:00.006-05:00

The release of the 45th anniversary edition of The Sound of Music has of course reminded me of this musical that is a favorite of mine.

Those who knew me as a kid and teenager know I'm a musician at heart. I took piano lessons for nine years, sang and danced in a couple of musical productions, and dream of one day hitting the musical stage again. For now, I must be content to play the piano at home (usually songs from Wicked), and sing to my children. Each night I lie down with my two-year-old and he immediately requests that I sing Jingle Bells. I don't have the heart to tell him no, even if it does mean I'll be carolling all year long.

Songs often come to my mind throughout the day, narrating my life. One that comes to mind when embarking on a new adventure, or even just a new year, comes from The Sound of Music.

"I Have Confidence!"

Good luck in 2011.

Lost, Harry Potter, and Accounting

2010-11-30T10:58:00.010-05:00

Lately, I've replaced my previous blogging/Twitter time with exercise. I miss the social media stuff, and hope to figure out how to get more of it. Haven't tried Tweeting while exercising yet.

One way I get myself on the old elliptical is by treating myself to watching the last season of Lost when exercising. I know I'm way behind by just watching it now, and I already know most of the ending, but it's still fun.

It's amazing to me how many people, including myself, are drawn into this fictional, magical world of Lost. And now that the latest Harry Potter movie is out, I think again about how involved so many of us get into these intricate stories of fictional characters. The other day, when my mom asked me what the seven horcruxes were, I pulled up "horcrux" on Wikipedia on my phone and we reviewed in detail what each horcrux was, how each was created, and how it was destroyed.

In short, these stories are anything but simple.

And therein lies the incredible feat of these creators. They did not dumb down their creation in an effort to grab us with simple flash, cheap tricks. Instead, they spun a web that made us want to understand all the complexities and relationships. Few of us are paid to read or watch these things. (Life as a TV critic would have its perks, would it not?) We invest our free time and energy, arguably our most scarce resources, to participate in the experience of these stories.

A key piece of their success lies in the puzzle. This reminds me of another recent success - Inception - which was full of puzzles. In Lost, Harry Potter, and Inception we want to solve the puzzle along with the characters, and are left unsatisfied if we do not see it to resolution.

As professionals, how amazing would it be if we could tap into that part of our co-workers and employees that wants to be part of an experience, to solve a great puzzle? If we could paint for them a picture of what a firm could be, of the experience we could have, the difference we could make? If we could communicate that we are not just about numbers, but about helping people with businesses and lives and families and trials and triumphs, like us?

That could be really, really cool.

(Okay, so this was a bit cheesy. But hey, Lost and Harry Potter have their cheesy moments too, so I'll forgive myself mine on occasion.)

Do you ever feel this way?

2010-11-17T15:13:00.003-05:00

I've been MIA online for quite awhile now, much to my chagrin. (Is it strange that I get a kick out of using funny words like "chagrin"?)

For several weeks, we've been playing "pass the head cold" in our little family. I know that's how it is for every family with small kids, but that doesn't seem to make it any easier! It becomes a rare day that all four of us are healthy. Thank goodness for DVRs - I have no idea how I'd manage my sick kids without 'em.

Dealing with the seemingly mundane, everyday details of life can certainly grow tiring. I just keep reminding myself that all the individual days are what add up to the great things in life. Life right now is all about the basics, and as cute as my toddler is, I do look forward to a time when he can dress himself! In the meantime, I'll enjoy the highlights, and just keep plugging along.

Or, in the words of Pablo and Tyrone, I better "trudge, trudge, trudge."

Back to the Basics

2010-10-22T11:33:00.012-04:00

These days, we often hear that we need to "get back to basics." The message comes from CPA Success, CPA Trendlines, and Rita Keller, to name a few.

They are right, of course. And yet I expect many people will not listen to this common sense advice to focus on the basics. This may be in part because it goes against the grain of our American culture, where for years it's been about more, bigger, better, faster. We try to fit 48 hours worth of activity into a 24 hour period, in the thought that busier is better.

It's hard to slow down enough to really focus on the basics, but definitely worth it. I like a post from Seth Godin (referenced by Rita Keller):

Compared to everything else we could be investing (don't say 'spending') our time on, is this the scariest, most likely to pay off, most important or the best long-term endeavor?
Or are we just doing it because no one had the guts along the way to say STOP.

In other words, are we doing what's good, better, or best?

It's best to make sure we get the basics right, or we don't have a solid foundation on which to build.

The Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy (War and Peace) believed that greatness lies in the prosaic, everyday activities of life. I've come to agree with Tolstoy, and think we can all benefit from looking at our everyday activities, evaluating whether they are achieving our goals, and constantly re-focusing on what's most important.

I'm off to a day of focusing on the basics! (In my case that's laundry, diapers, and lunchtime mac 'n' cheese for the kiddos. Very exciting stuff.)

Good, Better, Best

2010-10-04T17:01:00.021-04:00

While wandering around Twitter for the first time in a long time, I saw a quote I liked. (I usually prefer Tweeters who share their own thoughts rather than those of others, but then again some things are worth repeating.)

According to Twitter, which I realize is in no way verified, John D. Rockefeller said: "Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great."

This reminded me of a speech I heard a couple of years ago that really stuck with me. The speaker, an older gentleman, told about shopping from the Sears catalog as a kid. The catalog listed three options for a household good (anything from shoes to tools): good, better, and best.

When making a purchase, we decide whether the better or best quality is worth the price. It seems most people are pretty careful about how they choose to spend their cash.

The speaker went on to discuss how time is an even more important resource than money, and we should think about where we're spending it. When faced with options for where to spend my time, and that of my family, I usually think to myself: "Good, better, best."

It's hard to say "no" to all the good things out there, especially when it comes to kids. The possibilities for extracurricular activities are endless! Soccer, baseball, karate, dance, painting, pottery, drama, scouts... it really never ends. Professionally, we all know there is enough to do to fill a dozen lifetimes. So unless we want to spend our life bounced around like a pinball, we have to learn to say "no" and say it often.

Unlike the Sears catalog, ways to spend our time don't come pre-labeled as good, better, or best. I won't pretend to always get it right, but I'll keep trying. And when something comes up, I'll ask myself again: "Is this good, better, or best?"

(I'm not sure where your time spent reading this blog post fits. Hopefully you're not thinking it's a fourth category, like "disappointing.")

First Days

2010-09-25T14:36:00.021-04:00

I realize that in blog years, a few weeks without posting is like an eternity. It's been quite a summer for my little family!

After moving back to the S.F. Bay Area to stay, a few somewhat chance encounters led to a career opportunity that was too perfect to pass up. So I'm now a part-time tax manager at Gallina, LLP in Walnut Creek, specializing in construction taxation (which is what I've been doing for the past eight years, and I love).

So not long after my daughter's first day of second grade at her new school (quite different from the one in Ohio), I had my first day of work.

Since we both started our new adventures withing a couple of weeks of each other, we were able to really talk about it. After my first day of work, my daughter asked: "Were you nervous, Mom? Were you scared?"

And I said with complete honesty: "Yes!"

I think it's easy to forget what it's like to be the new kid on the block if you haven't been there for awhile. Whether a group realizes it or not, they have a culture, a "way of doing things" that takes time for a new person to learn. My daughter's peers already know how things work, having attended first grade together. For us, it's all new.

At my job, I'm working hard to learn the ropes. And fortunately, everyone is very nice and helpful about it. A lot of firm information is documented and available on our intranet, which is really handy for a new person. I know the time spent documenting and streamlining processes doesn't bring in revenue, but I also know it's worth it when it saves so much time in the long term.

I like to think that by the time tax season comes around, both my daughter and I will be experts at how things work. Then I get to have fun with the good stuff of tax. (No sarcasm there. I really do find it fun. Perhaps it's a genetic disorder or something.)

Judging a book by its cover, or lack thereof

2010-08-16T11:08:00.018-04:00

While checking out a couple of shows for the first time this summer, (including White Collar and Covert Affairs), I was disappointed though not surprised by a common theme: professional women wearing not-so-professional clothing.

I know this is the norm for television and movies, but I keep hoping someone will portray a powerful woman who doesn't show so much skin.

When watching the pilot of Covert Affairs, I sighed in disappointment when the character playing a female director at the CIA appeared in a top that I'm almost certain a real-life CIA director would never wear to work. (The dress in this photo is much more professional than the one in the pilot.)

As business experts tell us, what you wear says a lot about who you are. As much as we want to believe you can't judge a book by its cover, the truth is that we form a lot of opinions based on appearances. As Malcolm Gladwell tells us in Blink: "When you meet someone for the first time, or walk into a house you are thinking of buying, or read the first few sentences of a book, your mind takes about two seconds to jump to a series of conclusions."

If a woman wants to be successful in business, she should not dress like she's trying to draw attention to what she is - or isn't - wearing. Let your brains and charisma capture attention, not your clothes.

Okay, I'll get off my soap box for now... especially since I confess I still watch TV.

Why you have to manage one-on-one

2010-08-03T15:05:00.010-04:00

A recent post by Debra Helwig (on her blog Service Minded) touched on one of my favorite subjects: perfectionism.

She writes in "Beat Perfection Paralysis - Take it to the Happy Line":

For the longest time, when things at work didn’t go exactly the way I thought they should (never mind what anyone else thought), I would feel like a huge loser, because I knew I could do better. I had a vision of the perfect result I should have achieved, and my evil inner perfectionist would whisper, “What makes you think you know anything?” or, “If you keep this up you’re gonna get fired.”

This I can relate to, as I've said before.

Debra shares some wise words from a former boss:

As I was leaving, he called after me, 'Quit trying to make everything so perfect. Get to 80% of perfect and 99% of people will be happy with it. And you’ll get a heck of a lot more done. Take it to the Happy Line.'

His advice rocked my world. And I still live by it today. Because he’s right.

Sure, there are some professions (tax accounting is one of them) where 100% accuracy is required. But in marketing and customer service, the truth is that 80% of perfect is always, always better than 100% of unfinished.

The boss told Debra what she needed to hear. Conversely, if he's said it to a slacker employee, the slacker would has used the advice as an excuse to do shoddy work. This highlights something I mentioned before, that there are two parallel, opposite dangers in life: perfectionism and complacency. Perfectionism can lead to burnout, and it can hinder our progress because we fear making a mistake. On the other end, complacency can lead to mediocrity.

This is why managers must manage people one-on-one. If they call everyone in to a room and give them the same speech about working hard and going the extra mile, they are telling the perfectionists to burn themselves out. In any organization, there are people all along the spectrum, from total perfectionist to complete slacker. A one-size-fits-all approach to managing is not effective. A manager must tailor the message to the audience receiving it. It takes longer in the short term to manage one-on-one, but it pays off big time in the long run.

White Collar dig at accountants

2010-07-29T15:54:00.008-04:00

I do so find accountant stereotypes amusing. This week's episode of White Collar takes us back to the days when accountants wore visors.

When one character mentions how he studied accounting, the suave main character replies: "I still can't imagine you hunched over a desk with a little visor doing my taxes. You're lucky the FBI hires mathletes."

(The accountant quip starts at around 7:35)

Taking the leap

2010-07-26T22:38:00.022-04:00

Two months between posts -- now that's just sad! I like to think that moving across the country makes for a decent excuse for the drought...

I felt really bad for the poor performance when I saw that my blog had been listed as one of the Top 100 Accounting Advice Blogs! Thanks for the mention, and I'll try to do better. I don't plan to move again any time soon, so hopefully my computer and I will become good friends once more.

For a change-averse accountant, I've managed to change a lot in a short time. In addition to moving cross country, I've moved into the world of entrepreneurship. It was time to act on all those metaphors I drone on and on about: taking the first step, getting on the horse, and all that.

I'm now officially a sole proprietor providing tax compliance and advisory services. (Wow, that sounds dry. I add a bit more life to it in person.)

I also hope to get involved in teaching, whether at a community college, with the CalCPA Education Foundation, or another avenue. I can't keep all this passion for accounting to myself!

Now this blog is no longer a tax manager in public accounting, but just CPA sharing her thoughts. Since it's all free anyway, I like to think I won't get any complaints.

The necessity of failure

2010-05-25T12:00:00.014-04:00

A recent post by Bill Sheridan (of the Maryland Association of CPAs), titled Failure: The first step toward success, hit home for me. He writes:

My daughter ran her first competitive track race last weekend. It was a prelim heat for the 100-yard dash, and she finished dead last...
Look, trying new things is scary. It's fraught with uncertainty and risk. Given the rate at which our lives are changing these days, it's also absolutely necessary. The key is to identify opportunities, take a few chances, learn from your mistakes and move on -- and to do all of that sooner rather than later.

This has been a theme for me lately, as my daughter tries new things, and sometimes I do, too. If we expect to always succeed, we are soon disappointed. We're better off seeing failure as an opportunity to learn.

In Switch, the Heath brothers write about the work of Stanford University professor Carol Dweck. Part of her work includes studying the "growth mindset." The Heaths write:

That's the paradox of the growth mindset. Although it seems to draw attention to failure, and in fact encourages us to seek out failure, it is unflaggingly optimistic. We will struggle, we will fail, we will be knocked down - but throughout, we'll get better, and we'll succeed in the end.
The growth mindset, then is a buffer against defeatism. It reframes failure as a natural part of the change process. And that's critical because people will persevere only if they perceive falling down as learning rather than as failing."

Knowing this doesn't make failing fun, but it does make it feel a lot more useful. Here's to failing and learning.

Getting on the horse

2010-05-11T20:43:00.012-04:00

Today, I took my 6-year-old daughter on her class field trip to a horse farm. The only other time she's been around horses was when she rode a small pony around in a circle at a park. Here the horses were much bigger and mobile!

She was understandably nervous about getting on. A friend of hers who had the wisdom of having ridden a horse once before (it's amazing how quickly they consider themselves experts), said reassuringly: "I was scared the first time, too. And then when I got up it wasn't so scary anymore. I felt like I was doing something I'd never done before, and I liked that feeling."

I thought this girl could teach me a thing or two.

Once my daughter was up on the horse, she felt comfortable in no time. She hasn't stopped talking about wanting to go back.

Her friend had been down this road before, and so she took a moment to describe her experience and provide encouragement. I wonder why so many adults, including professionals, struggle to do this. I remember my first time going out to a client on a financial statement engagement. I was so nervous that when I left our firm office to go to the client's, I locked my keys in my trunk.

It would have been great for someone more senior to have said to me the things my daughter's friend said: "I was nervous on my first audit, too. And then when I got there, it wasn't so bad. It was a new experience, and I found I liked it."

Getting on the horse for the first time can be scary. Let's try to make it a little less scary for those just starting out.

Doing what you're good at

2010-05-04T08:10:00.012-04:00

Last fall, I had a blast at the Next Leaders Summit in Cincinnati. One of the many ideas that stuck with me was that of focusing on developing team members' strengths rather than focusing on overcoming weaknesses.

Rebecca Ryan, founder of Next Generation Consulting, reminded me about this in her most recent newsletter. She writes:

At work, you don’t want the Sam-with-the-stick-up-his-butt leading the sales team. And you don’t want the rules-are-meant-to-be-broken dude leading your IRS audit. Great managers assess each person’s strengths and configure teams in the most optimal way to get work done on time and ahead of schedule.

From surveys with over 10 million workers, Gallup confirms what great managers already know: “...employees who have the opportunity to focus on their strengths every day are six times as likely to be engaged in their jobs and more than three times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life.”

Gallup explains that the research indicates people not operating from strengths at work probably dread going to work, have more negative than positive interactions with coworker, treat customers poorly, tell friends they work for a miserable organization, achieve less on a daily basis, and have fewer positive and creative moments.

I finally got around to doing the assessment myself, and really like the information it provides. I'm making efforts to implement some of the suggestions, and find they help me to perform better and derive more satisfaction from what I do.

I'm all for people figuring out what they're really good at, and then doing it. For some people it's the detail of accounting, for others it's the management side. People have different skills, you know, like nunchuck skills, bowhunting skills, computer hacking skills...

The First Step

2010-04-30T11:25:00.021-04:00

A few months ago, I took my 6-year-old daughter Samantha on an ice skating field trip with her school class. She'd never been skating before, and was understandably nervous. I reassured her: "Everything is hard when we first try it, and it takes practice to get good add it. The key is to give it a try. Remember when you first started reading? You didn't know how to do it, and you practiced, and now you are a terrific reader!"

In spite of her fears, she stepped out on the ice, and had a great time.

The things I said to Samantha came back to haunt me a short time later. When I first tried dancing to a new Zumba DVD, I felt like one of those laughable auditions on a reality TV show. Coordinated I was not. My instinct was to stop, feeling as absurd as I did. And then I remembered what I'd told my daughter: "Everything is hard when we first try it, and it takes practice to get good at it. The key is to give it a try."

I figure if I'm going to talk the talk, I better walk the walk. Walking the walk is not always easy.

I recently read something that sounded a lot like my experience in Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard. (I'll probably write about this book for awhile, as I thought it was excellent. It seems to me the perfect road map for CPA firms trying to bring about real change in their organizations.)

"At different times in our lives, both of us (Chip and Dan) were urged by our significant others to take salsa-dancing lessons. This was not our first choice of weekend activities, but we agreed to give it a shot. The fantasy was an attractive one - we could picture ourselves with our partners, full of passion and artistic flair, drawing envious glances from passersby. No question: This "dancer identity" had appeal.

"It did not take us long to realize how deeply misguided our fantasies were. All too quickly, we discovered that salsa is a sadistic style of dancing created for the purpose of making middle-aged men feel ridiculous. Salsa requires an array of sensual hip movements that we found structurally implausible. We managed to perform this beautiful dance with all the seductive force of Al Gore giving a lap dance...

"Here's the thing: When you fight to make your switch, especially one that involves a new identity, you and your audience are going to have Salsa Moments. Any new quest, even one that is ultimately successful, is going to involve failure. You can't learn to salsa-dance without failing. You can't learn to be an inventor, or a nurse, or a scientist, without failing."

I take comfort in knowing I'm not the only one who runs into trouble when attempting to salsa dance, or when attempting anything else for that matter. I'll just keep taking the advice I give my daughter, and give it a shot.

Not my table? Then whose is it?

2010-04-15T11:17:00.018-04:00

It's a beautiful day here in Dayton, Ohio as I wrap up another exhausting busy season. We had a great season, reaping the benefits of our tax department's hard work all year to become better. I had a blast talking with CPA guru and friend Rita Keller about our improved processes in action. She was so kind as to then write about it!

One area we worked on is something I've thought about for years - staff assignments. Each firm has their own way of assigning tax returns, and I won't profess to know what the majority do. I have heard of firms having a shelf or a drawer from which staff pull client data to start a new return. The process is that, when they have completed their current work, staff pull a return off the shelf or out of the drawer.

I'm not a fan of that process. Recently, I wrote about the need to identify when something is "not my table," meaning it's not my responsibility. That said, it's essential that important things are clearly somebody's table. For example, I think everyone would agree that it's essential that clients are billed for our services. It's hard to keep the door open without cash. Thankfully, client billing is not my table -- BUT, it is somebody's table. That somebody knows it, and takes care of it.

I believe the better way to handle staffing assignments is for the project to go to somebody's table right when it comes in the door. If necessary, that person can ask to have it reassigned, and it can go to someone else's table. The key is that it is always on somebody's table.

The problem with the shelf or drawer system is not that people are lazy. I'm currently listening to Malcom Gladwell's The Tipping Point, and recently finished Chip & Dan Heath's Switch, and these best-selling authors referenced the same interesting study in their books. (When smart people talk about the same thing, I try to listen.)

From Switch...

Columbia University students, having volunteered for a research study, were asked to sit in a room and fill out a survey. Some were left alone; others were put in rooms with two other students. As they filled out their surveys, a "crisis" emerged. Smoke began to poor into the room through a wall vent. The smoke continued to flow, in irregular puffs, until eventually the room was filled with haze. Of the students sitting in a room by themselves, 75 percent got up and found someone to alert about the smoke. But when three students were placed in the room at the same time, only 38 percent of the groups of three ever reported the smoke...

In a similar study, individuals or pairs who were completing a survey heard what sounded like a woman falling down loudly on the other side of a room divider. 70 percent of the lone bystanders went to help her, but only 40 percent of the pairs helped. Even when the pairs helped, they acted more slowly than the individuals.

When multiple people are involved in just about anything, the responsibility for acting gets very ambiguous very quickly. Ambiguity is the enemy to action. And that's what a shelf or a drawer is - ambiguous.

Staff assignments can change based on workload and timing of projects. Just because something goes to your table doesn't mean it will stay there. It does mean, however, that it must either be clearly on your table or someone else's. There's no bottomless drawer to leave stuff in and hope it goes away.

So even as you contemplate what in life is your table and what isn't, I think it's worthwhile to ask those around you: "Is this important enough to be somebody's table? If so, we better figure that out."

Party time

2010-04-11T14:13:00.003-04:00

We're almost there! Just 4 more days of tax season, and it's time for the April 15th parties. I'm guessing a lot of CPA firm parties look like the one here.

I know something you don't know

2010-03-24T22:22:00.011-04:00

This morning, my kids and I flew from Cincinnati to San Francisco. After checking our bags and getting through airport security (a three-ring circus for the three of us), we headed for the military lounge to relax.

The lounge door was closed. When I asked a nearby attendant if there was a code for the keypad to get into the lounge, she gave me a look that clearly said: "That's a really stupid question."

She answered me with no hint of a smile in a voice dripping in condescension: "No, we don't have a code. And it's only 7:30. They don't open until 8 or 8:30."

Why was she so perturbed by my question? Because the answer was obvious to her. People do that a lot, expect what is obvious to them to be obvious to others.

I think a lot of CPAs are guilty of this. They are great at the technical stuff, but not great at relating to non-accountants on technical issues. People like CPAs who are easy to talk to, not ones that act annoyed if they have to explain issues like passive losses or basis limitations.

I did not know what time the lounge opened or whether there was a code, and I'm guessing that gate attendant didn't know the criteria for capital lease treatment under GAAP. Let's not treat each other like idiots for our differing banks of knowledge.

Death by...

2010-03-16T17:59:00.012-04:00

I was thrilled to see superstar Rebecca Ryan (who I raved about not long ago) left a great comment on my last post. And, as usual, it got me thinking...

Rebecca writes: "The lack of discipline to EXECUTE strategy (not just MAKE strategy) is the reason so many of our firms are suffering 'death by initiative.' "

So true. The phrase "death by initiative" reminds me of the book Death by Meeting. CPA guru Rita Keller has written some great posts on the topic, including a reference to an article by Michelle Golden.

Most organizations today, including CPA firms, need a little less talk and a lot more action.

Keeping that in mind, however, the action does need to be directed somewhere. Like just about everything else in life and business, it's about finding the right place on the spectrum between death by initiative/meeting and complete chaos.

I like to compare a good meeting to the huddle before the play. It doesn't have to be long or fancy; it just needs to get everyone on the same page.

Without any common direction, you're likely to find yourself in a situation much like the classic guard scene from Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail (it starts at 1:00 in this clip). If this is how it feels when communicating within your organization, you might have some work to do.

Hold the reservation

2010-03-14T16:45:00.011-04:00

Technology is a beautiful thing. I recently bought an iPod shuffle, and use it to listen to audiobooks while in the car, doing dishes, etc. (I always love getting suggestions for good books to read!) I've listened to Malcolm Gladwell's Blink and Outliers, Jim Collins' Good to Great, and Chris Anderson's Free; and thoroughly enjoyed all of them.

The book currently on my iPod is Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done, by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan. The book's premise is that execution is "the missing link between aspirations and results."

It's probably clear by now that I watch and remember a lot from TVs and movies. (Whether or not that's a good thing is a discussion for another day.) The scene that comes to mind when I think about this concept of execution is from Seinfeld, where the rental car company did not hold a car to actually fulfill a reservation.

Jerry says: "See, you know how to take the reservation, you just don't know how to hold the reservation. And that's really the most important part of the reservation, the holding. Anybody can just take them."

I'd say the same is true of strategy, goals, etc. Anybody can just make them. The most important part is actually getting them done.

What's your answer?

2010-03-08T09:06:00.005-05:00

In How Do Business Owners Define Success?, Rick Telberg of CPATrendlines discusses the question I asked awhile back: "What is success?"

Accountants often define success in terms of revenue, net income, or maybe client service. But the Enterprise Council on Small Business surprisingly found that “satisfaction” was the primary way that they defined success, followed by “growth.” They asked business owners to define what satisfaction means to them. Business owners said maintaining a healthy work/life balance was the single biggest factor in their definition of success.

CPATrendlines is conducting a survey asking how we accountants define success. Of course I joined in. Here are the options the survey includes:

Making employees happy
Satisfying clients
Making a positive difference
Doing what I love
Maintaining a healthy work/life balance
A great place to work
Advancing in my career
Spiritual fulfillment
Building a growing business
Only doing things I want to do
Healthy and happy family

It's hard to narrow that down! And since the survey doesn't indicate how many to pick, I'm selecting quite a few: making employees happy, satisfying clients, making a positive difference, doing what I love, maintaining a healthy work/life balance, a great place to work, and healthy and happy family.

I look forward to reading the results of the survey. How do you answer the question?

Just keep swimming

2010-03-02T09:59:00.005-05:00

March is upon us. It's hard to remember a time when reference to the month of March didn't immediately make me think: "crazy busy."

Each year, I think about more ways to keep perspective during the stress of tax season. Ways to remember that the seemingly endless piles of work really do end, eventually. We just have to keep plowing through, one return (or audit) at a time, to get there.

Just like it's hard for me to remember life before busy season, it's hard to remember life before kids. These days, I seem to find most of my life lessons watching shows with my kids. My busy season philosophy this year comes from Finding Nemo: "Just keep swimming!"

Not my table!

2010-02-18T12:04:00.017-05:00

Last summer, one of my many delightful nephews went through a phase of repeatedly watching "Muppets Take Manhattan." He loved the part where Rizzo the Rat delivers a heartbreaking monologue about his woes. When Fozzie replies with "We understand. We don't have any money either," Rizzo jumps up and says: "Sorry, not my table," and runs off.

During this phase, my 3-year-old nephew would walk around saying: "Not my table!"

For some odd reason, this phrase really stuck with me, and I find myself saying it all the time. Living in a busy world and an even busier profession, we have to be careful about what we take responsibility for. We each have only 24 hours in a day, and to make the most of those hours, we must be able to look at situations and say: "Not my table!"

At the library recently, I came across a small book titled That's Outside My Boat, which reminded me of my Muppet catch phrase. Inspired by an experience at the Olympics, I thought it fitting to mention now...

When veteran television announcer Charlie Jones got assigned to the hinterlands of Olympic broadcasting to cover rowing, canoeing, and kayaking, he serendipitously discovered a powerful philosophy for focused living: That's Outside My Boat. He learned that Olympic rowers never let anything outside their boat prevent them from achieving their goals. Jones, with coauthor Kim Doren, realized that the world of business - and all aspects of life - could greatly benefit when this same perspective is applied. The book uses the power of the personal example to show how focusing on what one decides is important fosters success.

Rita Keller recently shared a similar message, encouraging us to think about what we need to stop doing, so we can focus on what we should be doing.

What's outside your boat that you are wasting time thinking about?

Once you realize something is outside your boat, or that it's simply not your table, you'll probably find it much easier to focus on what is.

Another look at the glass

2010-02-11T11:00:00.013-05:00

I've decided there was a problem with my previous post about "the glass." Here's what I wrote a few months back...

Conventional wisdom divides the world into two types of people: optimists and pessimists. This theory supposes that a person sees a glass as either half-full or half-empty

I find this theory to be completely flawed, and choose Door Number Three. A person in this third category says: "There's water in the glass, and whether it's half-full or half-empty doesn't matter. What matters is that the current level is just a starting point, and I'm going to work towards filling it up to the top, and perhaps even get it overflowing."

I remain convinced that the world needs, and thankfully has, improvers. The problem with my post is that I brushed past the evaluation of the current situation, the level in the glass, and skipped right to task of filling it up higher.

Before jumping to the task of filling up the glass, the improver should take a moment to celebrate what is there. It doesn't need to be a big celebration. It can be just a moment's reflection to acknowledge the progress.

Why bother celebrating success? So you can get more of it. This can seem paradoxical, like many things in life. If celebrating something that is less than perfect, aren't we accepting mediocrity? Fortunately, no.

The fact is, there are two parallel, opposite dangers at work here: perfectionism and complacency. And both are dangerous. Perfectionism can lead to burnout, and it can hinder our progress because we fear making a mistake. On the other end, complacency can lead to mediocrity.

I'm guessing most CPAs are more likely to err on the side of perfectionism. And I believe that's the end of the spectrum most successful people are closer too. The key is to see the distance between where you are and where you could be as an opportunity, rather than a condemnation.

Take a minute to celebrate a success. Then, start working on filling up that glass some more.

"P" is for...

2010-02-02T16:10:00.021-05:00

I remember a week in high school when several of my peers walked around wearing a letter around their necks (made out of white paper and yarn, very fancy).

They were in the same English class, reading Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlett Letter. The assignment was to spend a week wearing a letter for their own personal vice. (To my knowledge, no one had a scarlett "A.")

The most common letter was "P" for procrastination. I'm not sure if the students lacked creativity and simply used the first example the teacher gave, if they chatted amongst themselves, or if they really did all individually identify the same vice. Regardless of how it came to be, there were many folks roaming the halls sporting a P on their chests.

I think many of us CPAs do not suffer from the woes of procrastination so much as another dreaded "P" word: perfectionism. We grow up in a world of multiple choice exams and standardized tests. We spend our educations seeking "the right answer." It's no surprise, then, that we struggle with the desire to do things perfectly. After all, how else can we earn an "A"?

We like it when amounts tie out to the penny, when debits equal credits. We like things to be black and white, and can struggle with accepting the reality of the gray.

At some point, we come to realize that there isn't always a right answer, work product is never going to be perfect, and that imperfection is actually okay. We realize that the rule makers, whether Congress writing the tax code or FASB drafting GAAP, are imperfect people and organizations. (At times, we may feel overwhelmed by just how imperfect.)

If you happen to be a fellow perfectionist reading this, I dare you to go mess something up on purpose. You just might find it liberating.

All Things at Once

2010-01-28T16:36:00.014-05:00

The other day, I enjoyed watching Stephen Colbert's interview with Mika Brzezinski, MSNBC correspondent and author of "All Things at Once."

She discussed the issue many of us deal with, which I've posted about before: the ever-exhausting juggle of motherhood and career.

Some of the comments included...

"I was trying to be a perfect wife, a perfect mother, and a perfect correspondent reporter journalist."

"Every choice has a consequence...I don't think there's a right answer, but I think every choice has a consequence.

"I wasn't doing anything right because I was trying to do everything too much."

"I think you can have successful parenting being at home or working. But if you want to work, you need to go to work and you need to focus, and that needs to be okay too."

What a great message. I've often said: There's no one right way. That sounds like common sense, but in reality, we are often told from other people or institutions that there is only one right way. The extremist messages are more dramatic, I guess.

Here's the interview!

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Mika Brzezinski

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Economy

The Seven Deadly Myths of Accounting

2010-01-25T09:46:00.015-05:00

I just read an interesting post from AccountingElf Kel about the "The Seven Deadly Myths of Accounting," written by accounting professor Dr. Pava.

The myths are...

1. “Learning accounting is like learning the rules of a game.”
2. “I’m good at math, so I’ll be good at accounting.”
3. “There is such a thing as the bottom line.”
4. “Accounting is a ‘thing apart.’ Understanding other disciplines is a waste of precious time.”
5. “All decisions are based on the cost-benefit criterion. If not, they should be!”
6. “God gave GAAP.”
7. “I’ll learn what I really need to know when I get my first job.”

My thoughts on two of the myths...

2. "I'm good at math, so I'll be good at accounting."

A classic misconception! My younger brother held this myth, and planned to be an accounting major. When he took Accounting 200, however, he learned that accounting has very little to do with math. Fortunately, I was a tutor in the accounting lab that semester, so I was able to help him study. He survived the class, never to return to accounting again!

4. “Accounting is a ‘thing apart.’ Understanding other disciplines is a waste of precious time.”

Guilty. Until recently, I honestly did not want to be bothered with information that was not accounting or business related. Numbers ruled. It was all about the puzzle, figuring out where the different pieces fit into the financial statements or the tax return.

About a year ago, I realized I needed to be good at more than just accounting to be successful. This was a somewhat terrifying discovery, since accounting is what I'm best at. Slowly but surely, I'm learning about other essential subjects, like management and marketing.

In the end, it does all come down to people: the people you work with and the people who pay you to provide service. Unfortunately, we don't learn much about people in our accounting education. Sure, they make us work in a group claiming that's how it will be in the real world, but that's not exactly an education in management.

I'm glad I've finally recognized the need to learn the "other stuff," even though it would have been nice to know sooner. My advice to accounting students and staff -- make an effort to learn the management/people side at the same time that you are learning the accounting. If you do, you'll be light years ahead of your peers, and maybe even your managers.

The tough choices

2010-01-15T08:12:00.009-05:00

As I often observe, time is the most scarce of a person's resources. (Rita Keller shared an interesting post on this topic last month.)

Over the past few weeks, I have fallen behind in even skimming the headlines of the 1000+ contents from my of my 168 subscriptions in Google Reader. With tax season barreling down on me, I've finally admitted to myself that I won't be able to keep up. So much interesting content, so little time!

Today, I created a separate folder in Reader for "Daily Reads," which also shows up as its own list on the right of this blog. It was very hard to come up with such a short list.

Some blogs not on the list are fantastic reads that require a lot of my mental horsepower to follow, and I hope to make more time this summer to summon the brainpower to read them daily. These include the tax and legal experts at such blogs as ataxingmatter, Mauled Again, and TaxProf.

Other blogs not on the list are great reads about the world of finance and accounting, which I hope to revisit with a vengeance after April 15 when I am not required to only live and breathe tax. Some of these include BookMarkLee, The Exuberant Accountant, Jr Deputy Accountant, and many, many others.

So my "Daily Reads" are not a review (though of course I recommend them all), but simply the list of what I think a tax manager like me will religiously follow when time is short.

What are your "can't miss" blogs?

Are you sure?

2010-01-05T12:29:00.012-05:00

As I started catching up on the past couple weeks in the blogosphere, I was pleasantly surprised -- well, shocked -- to see my blog was honored with a spot on Biz-Learner's list of Top 50 Blogs for Accountants. I'm honored!

Considering the caliber of others on the list, my immediate thought was: are you sure I should make the list? Some of my favorite blogs on the list include:

I'd also throw in Stacie's Tax Tip s, Bed Buffaloes in Your Tax Code, Tick Marks, Bruce the Missouri Tax Guy, and The Tax Lawyer. (Oh dear, now that I've listed a few, I'm sure I've missed one and will be black-listed. Doh!)

Thanks Biz-learner for the mention. Hopefully I can come up with some quality content now.

Back in Action

2010-01-03T15:21:00.007-05:00

After a fun and desperately-needed vacation, I'm back in action. Well, as much as a CPA can be considered "in action."

While on vacation, I watched a few episodes of the new TV show Glee. (How we survived before DVRs, I cannot imagine.) The show is entertaining, even if it does reinforce my dread of my daughter's pending high school years.

Like most shows, Glee reinforces some common Hollywood myths about life. One of these: the myth that minimal preparation can yield amazing results.

I admit there have been and are some great, unplanned moments in life. Many of science's great discoveries were unexpected. Nonetheless, I believe most successes are the result of time and effort.

The scene I'm thinking of in Glee is a football team's dance performance in the middle of the field. If my memory serves right (a debatable assumption), they practiced for a week before this performance. (The clip is below.)

I'm no dance expert, but I'm pretty sure it would be impossible for a bunch of football dance novices to manage that routine in a week. It makes for fun television. Unfortunately, the downside to kids growing up watching the fake world of TV is that many then balk at the idea of real work and responsibility. (What, I can't work at a coffee shop and have a swank New York apartment? But Rachel did it!)

I'm glad it's not my job to teach reality to anyone but my own kids. Hmmm...if only there were a quick and easy answer for accomplishing that...

I quit!

2009-12-08T10:17:00.008-05:00

Sometimes I quit. And that's okay.

I first figured out that truth several years ago, in high school. My freshman year, I was elated when I made the varsity soccer team. Soon, however, soccer stopped being fun. Not because it was hard work, not because it was competitive, but because the coach was jerk. He was downright abusive. If he were a coach today, I'm betting he'd get sued.

I played on the team my freshman and sophomore years. Near the end of my sophomore year, I wondered why I was sticking around. I determined the costs of the team far outweighed the benefits, and made the decision not to go back my junior year. I never regretted that decision. I'll never forget talking with a former teammate our senior year, who said: "Yeah, I figure I just have to do this year, since I've gone this far. It isn't at all fun, though."

How often do we allow ourselves to get stuck? Last week I posted about having passion, or lack of, for one's work. Rita Keller shared a great comment:

I am a firm believer in the power of passion for what you do. Joseph Campbell called it "following your bliss." Too bad we all can't identify our bliss (or passion) and then be able to follow it. I think too many people simply feel trapped in a job or career. My hope is they will one day break free.

Indeed, life is too short to spend most (or all) of it feeling trapped.

One of the many books on my to-read list include Seth Godin's The Dip. In summarizing the book, he says:

The old saying is wrong-winners do quit, and quitters do win.

Every new project (or job, or hobby, or company) starts out exciting and fun. Then it gets harder and less fun, until it hits a low point-really hard, and not much fun at all.

And then you find yourself asking if the goal is even worth the hassle. Maybe you're in a Dip-a temporary setback that will get better if you keep pushing. But maybe it's really a Cul-de-Sac, which will never get better, no matter how hard you try.

What really sets superstars apart from everyone else is the ability to escape dead ends quickly, while staying focused and motivated when it really counts.

Winners quit fast, quit often, and quit without guilt-until they commit to beating the right Dip for the right reasons. In fact, winners seek out the Dip. They realize that the bigger the barrier, the bigger the reward for getting past it. If you can become number one in your niche, you'll get more than your fair share of profits, glory, and long-term security.

Losers, on the other hand, fall into two basic traps. Either they fail to stick out the Dip-they get to the moment of truth and then give up-or they never even find the right Dip to conquer.
Whether you're a graphic designer, a sales rep, an athlete, or an aspiring CEO, this fun little book will help you figure out if you're in a Dip that's worthy of your time, effort, and talents. If you are, The Dip will inspire you to hang tough. If not, it will help you find the courage to quit-so you can be number one at something else.

I haven't done a lot of quitting in my life, but am glad that I know it's okay to quit if I'm at a dead end. Sometimes it's the best thing I can do.

Sad to watch

2009-12-04T12:53:00.007-05:00

While at Wal-mart this morning, I stumbled upon the staff's morning meeting back in the auto section. Being obsessed with the concepts of management as I am, I could not help but eavesdrop while picking up my items. (Okay, maybe I could have helped myself, and just opted not to.)

After the manager said it was time to get started, the group said the following in unison:

"Go Kim." (clap, clap) "Yay teamwork, woo-hoo."

It was the most lackluster, monotone "cheer" I've ever heard. It was honestly painful to watch. I couldn't stay another minute.

I pondered the obvious lack of enthusiasm, and thought about the challenge managers face of helping people feel excited about their work. It's not easy to inspire people, but I believe it can be done, whether at Wal-mart or in public accounting. I think the most important factor is that the leaders have the passion themselves, or they aren't going to get anywhere.

Fortunately, even though I may be lacking a lot of things, passion is not one of them!

I love technology

2009-11-24T09:21:00.015-05:00

Much like Kip in Napoleon Dynamite, I love technology.

I went to the BMV yesterday (Ohio's version of the DMV) to renew my license. Upon arrival I discovered I needed proof of my address, and none on the documents I had with me would suffice. What to do, what to do? I walked a couple buildings down to the library, got online, and printed up a bank statement. The entire detour took me less than ten minutes, and I am happy to report I remain a licensed driver.

It's hard to remember what was life like before the Internet, e-mail, and cell phones. I love living in the 21st century. A few of the many things I love about technology include...

Ability to work remotely
Tax preparation software!
Immediate access to information (Google)
Breakdown of the geographical barriers to connecting with people (Blogger, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn)
Increased (even if just barely) transparency in government and business
Mapquest - this is huge for a military family

It will be interesting to see how my beloved profession adapts to the new world. Where do you think we're headed?

Tick tock

2009-11-15T17:47:00.021-05:00

Five months after starting it, I finally finished RAPT: Attention and the Focused Life. And yes, I recognize the irony in taking five months to finish a book about focus.

I enjoyed the book, especially its very logical, scientific approach to the concept of attention. The book's premise is entirely accurate, which is basically this:

Where the qualify of your life is concerned, focus is not everything, but it is a great deal. The question is: If all the world's a stage, as Shakespeare puts it, where do you shine the spotlight of your attention?

As I've observed previously, we make choices every day as to how we spend our limited resources of time and attention. Are we proactive in making these choices, or do we merely react, and then curse the consequences? Who calls the shots?

When I discover people who are wildly successful in their chosen endeavors, whether professional or personal, I often marvel at how much they accomplish in 24 hours a day. I wonder if I have missed a trick that somehow lengthens the day. The fact remains that each of us has the same amount of time each day. What matters is how we use it.

Hopefully, the time you just spent reading my blog didn't feel like a complete waste!

How do they find out?

2009-11-03T13:56:00.002-05:00

My six-year-old daughter is on track to surpass me in knowledge before long. She has an uncanny ability to ask deep, probing questions, which I often struggle to answer. Sometimes I get lucky and she asks one I can manage.

Today, she explored the areas of marketing and networking. She has recently joined a Girl Scout troop, the "Daisies." This morning, she asked me: "Mom, how do other people find out about Daisies?"

I responded: "People can learn about Girl Scouts in many different ways. We learned about your troop from the other moms and dads of the girls on your soccer team. Some people learn about it from friends at school, or church, or other places like that."

She replied: "Oh, I see. So, a girl might go to school and tell her friends about Daisies, and the idea spreads from there."

"That's exactly right."

My little marketer in the making. I wonder what ideas will be spreading when she's my age.

Where's the value?

2009-10-31T16:18:00.014-04:00

Information is free. It didn't used to be. People and organizations used to derive their power from owning information.

A leading thinker on the new world of free information is Seth Godin, of whom I'm a big fan. One of the questions he explores is that of identifying what people actually pay for.

A few months ago he wrote the following:

In a world of free, everyone can play.
...Of course, it's ironic that sometimes people pay money for my books (I view them as souvenirs of content you could get less conveniently and less organized for free online if you chose to).

Since reading this post, I've thought about it quite a bit. I asked myself some hard questions, including: "If people can access accounting and tax information for free, why do they pay me? Once they realize it's all available online, will they stop paying me? Where is my real value?"

I've come to a few conclusions on the matter, one of which I posted about on my blog for the tax geek in me. I believe my professional value lies in my ability to do the following with information:

Filter for content
Translate for clarity
Apply for benefit

Filter - As Mr. Godin wrote, all of the information in his books is available for free online. But they are still valuable, in part because they filter and organize the infinite mass of free information out there. In all areas of life, we need knowledgeable people to filter information for us, whether they are doctors, lawyers, accountants, or salespeople at Wal-mart. Our most valuable resource is our time, so a good filter is priceless. That's one of the reasons people flock to a great blog -- they trust the blogger to filter information into valuable content.

Translate - The wisest people in the world know that the most effective way to communicate is to talk like a normal person. No one wants to listen to somebody that's just trying to show off how smart they are by using big fancy words that sound like a foreign tongue to the average listener.

Apply - Like Kevin Costner did at the end of Field of Dreams, people are always going to ask the question: "What's in it for me?" And if they are paying for your services, you better be able to provide a good answer.

So that's where my mind has gone lately. Now that information is free and easy to access, there's really no telling where it will go next!

"No, I won't"

2009-10-24T21:00:00.032-04:00

Last week, I celebrated a milestone birthday - the "big 30". At the risk of sounding "touchy-feely", I admit I've spent time reflecting on the past, pondering the present, and thinking about the future.

For the most part, I'm happy with what I've done with my first 30 years. There are bits and pieces I'd love to go back and erase, but I figure everybody has those. Fortunately, I wouldn't change any of the big things -- marriage, kids, education, career. Those are all keepers.

That being said, life is very stressful right now, with things like trying to sell a house (it's not a great market, had you heard?), waiting to learn where the Air Force will send us next summer, and a cute little toddler who keeps waking up screaming in the middle of the night.

People often comment on how tired I look. When I mention the baby waking up in the night, 9 times out of 10 the person says:

"Enjoy him while he's this age. You're going to miss this!"

My response is always the same (whether I verbalize it or not): "No, I won't."

I'll wager at least one parent out there is thinking: "Oh, but you will miss this! Just wait and see!"

In college, people would say the same thing: "Enjoy it now, because you're going to miss this!"

Here's the thing: To me, there's a big difference between remembering a time with fondness and missing it. The fact is, there is no "perfect" time in life. Each phase has it's pros and cons, and the key is to enjoy the pros as much as you possibly can. That doesn't mean you pretend the cons aren't there, or that they aren't hard.

This is the improver in me, and I realize it's hard for some people to understand. I can love my kids more than anything in the world while admitting I look forward to getting past the preschool years. I don't wish their lives away. I enjoy the smiles and laughs in the present, and at the same time look forward to the next phase.

I enjoyed college, and at the same time looked forward to life after graduation, including no more finals and a paycheck.

You really can appreciate where you are and think about where you're going. At no point in my life have I looked back and longed to return to a previous time. I hope I never will. I hope I'll always be able to look back with fondness, but never miss it.

I'm not worried about whether my glass is half full or half empty. I value what's already in it, and I look forward to filling it more. Life is good. Even so, no matter how many times I hear: "You're going to miss this!", my answer will not change.

No, I won't.

Black, white, and gray

2009-10-12T15:36:00.025-04:00

Stacie Clifford Kitts over at Stacie's More Tax Tips provides a thoughtful post related to my discussion of juggling work and family. I was immediately intrigued by her title: "I'm Afraid My Opinion Won't Be Popular."

I definitely agree with what I believe is Stacie's fundamental message: Children deserve parents who are fully committed to being attentive, available parents.

Each day, we are bombarded with different people and things vying for our attention. We choose where we devote our limited resources, whether consciously or not. The choices we make are evidence of what we truly value, where we are truly committed. (As you may have noticed, the concept of "commitment" is a favorite of mine.)

As Stacie writes: "Motherhood really is a full time job, and let's face it; few people can successfully pull off two full time jobs."

Before having my first child, I decided I was not one of those people who could pull off two full time jobs. I've always worked flexible, part-time hours during my mommy years, and plan to do so for several years to come.

For a long time, I felt guilty for not wanting to be home with my kids full time. I remember a mom with three kids telling me: "I was a teacher before I had my kids, and now I home school. I always loved teaching and wanted to be home with my kids, and now I get to do both!"

I immediately thought: "Wow, that sounds like my worst nightmare."

Sounds terrible, right? But the fact is that days full of diaper changes, Dora the Explorer, and temper tantrums don't always thrill me. By working part time, I get the break I need, along with the intellectual stimulation I crave, and I'm infinitely happier during the many hours I am with my kids.

My ever-wise mom told me years ago: "Monica, your kids want a happy mother."

The best moms know they must find some time for themselves. Water cannot be drawn from an empty well, and if you are not setting aside a little time for what replenishes you, you will have less and less to give to others, even to your children.

There is no one perfect way to be a good mother. Each situation is unique. Each mother has different challenges, different skills and abilities, and certainly different children. The choice is different and unique for each mother and each family.

I say, figure out what works for you and your family, and do that.

Hmm, I wonder if I can make some money sharing my "revolutionary" idea?

It's supposed to be hard

2009-10-09T21:15:00.036-04:00

As always, I appreciate comments left on this here blog. My post that discussed the question: What is success? received a few great comments (including one from my mom, though I guess she's required to like me).

An anonymous reader made some great points:

Wonderfully open and accepting view! Not only is it important to define your own personal measure of success, but I think it is just as important, if not more, to recognize that your own personal definition does not apply to everyone else. I have often found myself trying to share with friends and acquaintances that a person's value is not based on their career or their income. A doctor is not more successful than a janitor. The millionaire is not better than someone living in poverty. Someone with a PhD is not more successful than a high school dropout. It saddens me when I hear people who do not believe this to be true, and refreshing when I read a blog from somebody who understands!

It's very nice to have my views considered open and accepting, because I honestly do try to see the world from different perspectives. Alas, I am subject to the occasional tunnel-vision, particularly around April 10 each year.

It's easy to get caught up in the rat race, and to focus exclusively on money and status. I'm fortunate to have a life full of people who help me keep perspective. Perhaps the greatest perspective comes from my 6-year-old daughter. She's very much like me, so having her as a daughter accomplishes a couple of good (though hard) things: (1) She keeps me humble, and (2) She helps me empathize with people who have to interact with me. And believe me, she accomplishes both things very, very effectively.

Brittney asked how I'm balancing work and home, and the first answer that comes to mind is "barely"! Parenthood is quite an adventure, one that no amount of education could have prepared me for. I'm sure right now a parent of a teenager is saying: "Just you wait!" Rest assured, I know I've got a long road ahead of me.

Long ago, I began deciding on my own definition of success, or the way I would find fulfillment in life. In addition to a career, my definition includes marriage and children, and I am grateful every day to have them.

That being said, the task of balancing home and work is hard. Very, very hard. It's not for the faint of heart. When things get really rough - like when my baby just would not sleep at night - I thought it might just be too hard. So I'd ask myself if the juggle was worth it. The answer was always "yes."

As a movie buff, I often relate life experiences to movie quotes. One that comes to mind often is from A League of Their Own:

Geena Davis: "It just got too hard."

Tom Hanks: "It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. The hard is what makes it great."

When life gets tough, I try to remind myself: "The hard is what makes it great."

Here's the clip from Youtube. This quote starts at around 2:10.

I'm a fool, no doubt

2009-10-05T15:38:00.010-04:00

Thank you to my kind readers who leave me nice comments! (To those mean readers who leave nasty comments, I have other things in mind...)

The Wandering Tax Pro Robert Flach cites the old adage: "It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak up and remove all doubt." To his credit, he also adds: "Of course, I have never taken this advice." The world is better off for Robert avoiding silence!

When it comes to speaking up, I see two options: Play it safe, and avoid being called a fool; or roll the dice and say it anyway.

Speaking up is scary. Being a leader is scary. But isn't being bored, unfulfilled, and mediocre much worse?

As Even A Nerd wisely notes: "As accountants, we tend to have this perfection thing going - it keeps us from doing so many great things. Just put yourself out there -people want to work with humans not robots!"

It took me a little while to find my voice, and now that I have, I can't seem to shut-up. Sometimes I'm right, sometimes I'm wrong.

Thank you Even A Nerd for the wise words, and for the encouragement. Maybe I'll earn my superhero cape yet.

When in doubt, say it anyway

2009-09-29T20:24:00.011-04:00

We've all been there: life gets busy, and fun stuff falls through the cracks.

When life gets busy in my little corner of the world, my wanderings around the blogosphere take a backseat. I fall behind, and then feel ill equipped to draft postings of my own. After all, if I haven't read about everything going on, how can I be sure what I write isn't wrong?

But I'm finally realizing that no matter what I say, I run the risk of being wrong, and that's really okay. It's better to speak up and be wrong than to never say anything. Where would we be if no one dared articulate their ideas?

That's all I have to say today. Maybe I'm wrong, but at least I said it.

Some people like me, some people don't

2009-09-23T10:13:00.017-04:00

One of my many cousins said something surprising and profound when she was around 5 years old, which none of us will ever forget. She turned to her mother and said matter-of-factly: "Some people like me, some people don't."

What led to this insight, we don't know. She was (and is) a well-liked, pleasant girl. I guess she was just blessed with this piece of wisdom that it's taken me years to finally understand.

John Maxwell, a best-selling author and recognized leadership expert, recently wrote:

"I grew up in a wonderful, loving, positive family. I don’t ever recall my parents criticizing anyone. It just wasn’t allowed in our family. So you can imagine the transition I had to make when I got out on my own and began to receive the stinging criticisms of those I was leading. In fact, one of the most difficult emotional hurdles I faced was in handling criticism. And finally a wise old friend told me, 'John, if you’re getting kicked in the rear it means you’re out front.' What he was saying was if you’re going to be a leader, you’re going to be criticized. So get used to it."

His words accurately depict my own life experience. He provides his personal 4 Steps to Handling Criticism:

Know yourself—This is a reality issue.
Change yourself—This is a responsibility issue.
Accept yourself—This is a maturity issue.
Forget yourself—This is a security issue.

The article is a good read for anyone who is or plans to be in leadership. Because no matter how nice or great you are, if you are a leader, you will be criticized.

You've got to learn to listen to the criticism, consider what's true and what's not, change what you can and should change, and forget the rest.

After a lot of stress and struggle over the years, I'm finally starting to get this. My young cousin understood this long before I did, and she's right: "Some people like me, some people don't."

Professionals with passion

2009-09-21T19:57:00.031-04:00

It wasn't until I read a couple of the comments on my previous post that I realized I just might be offending some very cool CPAs out there, who also happen to me one of the only three or so people who read my ramblings. Fortunately, both Joe and Bruce both have a good sense of humor!

As these individuals and others show, we're not all stuffy and boring.

I had a great time meeting some fellow non-stuffy CPAs, as well as some cool kids from other professions at the Next Leaders Summit in Cincinnati.

A quick aside: I don't write this blog to try and sell anything, not that anyone would buy even if I did. No hidden agenda here. Just a gal working remotely who has a lot to say.

With that disclaimer, I'm going to sing the praises of people I find interesting and intelligent. And Rebecca Ryan is both, as well as exciting, engaging, and enthusiastic. (Like the alliteration there?)

Rebecca is the founder of Next Generation Consulting and author of Live First, Work Second. She has an incredible understanding of people as they live and work in organizations and communities. She is the embodiment of an improver. And she's really, really nice. I followed her around like a puppy dog for three days, and rather than blow me off, she said smiling: "Hey, everyone needs groupies!"

Though not an accountant herself, she does a lot to breathe life into our little profession. And hopefully in the years to come, I can do just a bit of that myself.

CPAs , Personality Disorders, and Social Media

2009-09-20T14:13:00.002-04:00

Have you ever noticed that every time a TV show has a character play a CPA, that person is white, male, middle-aged, and balding?

As with any profession, we suffer from our share of stereotypes. It seems that most people think of a CPA, they think of someone with schizoid personality disorder. What’s that, you ask? The National Institute for Health explains:

“Schizoid personality disorder is a psychiatric condition in which a person has a lifelong pattern of indifference to others and social isolation. A person with schizoid personality disorder appears aloof and detached, and avoids social activities that involve significant contact with other people.”

Hopefully, we younger folk can make progress in altering the public’s perceptions (and misperceptions) about our species. One way is through the use of social media, which, as Tom Hood of the Maryland Society of CPAs explains, “is not about the technology. It's really about the RELATIONSHIPS.”

Maybe someday in the not so distance future, my kids will be watching a TV show where the CPA has a personality, sans disorder.

Life Lessons from John Stewart

2009-09-18T20:17:00.004-04:00

I'm a fan of The Daily Show with John Stewart, even if I don't necessarily agree with his politics. During an interview this week with LeBron James, he said the following:

"People have this idea about athletes that somehow it is this privileged life. In your life, you were a working man from the time that you were a young boy. Because of this talent, you went to work.... And the story of the discipline that it takes to take that ability that you have and turn it into something -- I don't know that people realize. People are really critical of modern athletes. I don't know that they realize."

It reminded me of my thoughts on How to Be a Super Hero. To be a professional athlete, you can't just have raw talent. You've also got to work hard.

Turns out that's the case no matter your profession. Guess there's no substitute for hard work!

Here's the video of the interview.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

LeBron James

www.thedailyshow.com

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This day

2009-09-11T23:10:00.008-04:00

We accountants like to fix things. Perhaps that is part of why I struggle so much with this day -- I can't fix it.

I want to fix it. I want to go back in time and somehow prevent the horrors of this day eight years ago. I want to heal all those who suffered loss. I want to make it all better.

Of course, I cannot make it all better. All I can do is honor those lost by remembering them. It is a poor substitute for restitution of loss, but it is what I can offer, and so I will.

I will never forget that day, will never forget all the lives lost and tears shed. I'll never forget all the men and women who risked (and even lost) their own lives in efforts to save strangers. I think we all learned more about what it means to be an American that day.

We learn a lot about the idea of freedom upon which our nation was founded. At times, I think we focus almost exclusively on the idea of being free from oppressive government, tyranny, etc. But in this great nation, perhaps what's even more important is that we are free to do. We are free to be part of a national community that comes together in times of crisis. We are free to celebrate and strive for our democratic ideals.

So today, I will also try and honor those lost by celebrating all that we are free to do and be.

What is success?

2009-09-07T20:04:00.019-04:00

Ask a CPA an accounting question, and you'll likely get a quick, straight-forward answer. Ask a CPA an open-ended, abstract question like "What is success?", and you'll likely get a blank, incredulous stare.

But whether we are consciously aware of it or not, we each spend life seeking success. Each person has his/her own definition of a successful life, and people with similar definitions tend to gravitate toward each other, whether via a company, profession, musical group, sports team, wine club, or whatever.

So what is success?

For me, a key measure of success is whether a person feels satisfaction and fulfillment in his/her life.

Accounting Elf Kel asks some great questions in her comments on my previous post.

Do you think the "optimists" have an important place in the system, or do you think if everyone was striving to advance their careers it would really be good for everyone?

There's not enough room at the top for everyone, so what happens to the peoople who strive to improve, but don't pull it off as well as the next guy?

No doubt every company would run much more efficiently if every person had the "winner" mentality, but can they all really succeed?

(I'm really wondering all those points, not disagreeing with you!)

First off, I must assure Kel and any other reader that I do not immediately assume someone is being contrary by asking questions! Quite the opposite, I believe curiosity and inquisitiveness to be wonderful traits. I'm thrilled when I get a comment on my little blog. How can we truly learn about and from other people if we don't ask questions? Finally, I must also say that it is perfectly acceptable to disagree with me, and I welcome differing viewpoints. I find few things as enjoyable as exploring new ideas with intelligent people. As long as people keep it respectful, disagreements can be great things.

So back to the issue at hand. Kel is absolutely right that the world would be a challenging, and likely dysfunctional place if we all had the "winner" mentality about work. I'm glad she raises the point, as it leads me to clarify that I believe this attitude is not just about career, but about life. Many great people do not focus their energy on professional success because that is not where they find fulfillment.

Perhaps the most incredible person I know is my mother, who chose to raise seven children rather than "work." This is a brilliant woman who could have been a CEO, but who found more satisfaction in focusing her efforts at home. She's had her share of challenges -- including a car accident in which she was actually crushed by a van -- but she's an improver/winner in every sense.

Me on the other hand, I find great fulfillment in my career, and so try to balance my efforts between work and family (a challenging task that is a topic to tackle another day). Everyone has their own passions and interests, whether they be professional or personal.

With the perspective that the diversity of people in the world lends itself to diversity in where people focus their efforts, I like to think we'd actually do pretty well if we all had the improver/winner mentality.

However you define success, the path to finding it can be very hard. Like me, Tamela Rich posted Sunday on the topic of success, including a drawing of "The Road to Success." Coincidentally, I looked at this drawing many times growing up. It hung in the office of my father, a small business owner and entrepreneur.

As I've posted before, I think a happy life depends in large part on your ability to identify what interests you, define success for you, focus on those things, and try to let go of the rest.

Enough of my ramblings for one day!

Who calls the shots?

2009-09-06T13:27:00.027-04:00

Confession time: Few things turn me off of a movie, book, idea or anything else more than when it's described as "inspirational."

I'm not a terrible person (I hope). I'm actually a big fan of hope and inspiration. The problem for me is that when I hear something described as inspirational, I think "cheesy, contrived, blatant attempt at emotion." (You've probably guessed that I'm not a fan of Chicken Soup for the Soul books.)

This bias of mine makes me skeptical of people marketing their "Steps to a Better You," "How to Be Successful," or other such products.

The fact remains, however, that some people are successful in life, and others are not. So what makes people successful?

Many people have attempted to answer that question, and many are still trying. One of my favorite books is The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey, which I wish wasn't referred to as a "self-help" book because I don't see it that way. He researched the book by studying the lives of successful people. That's a method I can respect. The best way to figure out how to be successful is to study people who already are.

Over the years, I've developed my own thoughts and ideas about what leads to success, which may or may not be accurate. That's the beauty of a blog - I don't have to be right.

I believe the most important determinant of success lies in the concept of ownership. When it comes to your life, who calls the shots?

Some people take ownership of their lives, and others don't. Continuing in the idea from my previous post that there are three types of people in the world, here's how I see the concept of ownership:

The Workers (Optimists): "Workers" are content to go to work each day and just do the job their told, without career advancement or management responsibilities. They are happy with their lives just the way they are, and see no reason to make changes. They don't really think about whether they have ownership of their lives, since they are just fine with how things are.

The Wishers (Pessimists): "Wishers" are not happy with their lives and careers, but they do not take ownership of their role in making their lives what they are. They see themselves as victims of circumstance, and express resentment of the people and organizations they blame for their unhappiness. Often, wishers have experienced very real challenges in life (whether related to family, health, or other hardship), and are at times real victims of circumstance. The problem is in how they respond. They lash out at the cause (whether real or simply perceived), remain unhappy with their lives, and fail to take the steps necessary to build the life they want.

The Winners (Improvers): "Winners" take ownership of their lives. They recognize that a happy life and fulfilling career require planning and hard work. They experience challenges in life, just as do the Wishers. They respond to challenges by focusing their efforts on making their lives better. They see both the good and the bad in the world. They recognize their own strengths and weaknesses, and always work to improve themselves. When obstacles come their way, they figure out a way. In their lives, they call the shots.

So those are my thoughts on success this week. Whether my ideas have merit, well, I'll just have to wait and see.

Improvement in Action

2009-08-23T13:42:00.025-04:00

In response to my recent post Door Number 3, resident Accounting Elf Kel asked if I could share any real-life examples of the idea of improvement versus optimism and pessimism.

The first example that came to mind took places a long time ago, in a land far away... well, just a few years ago at another accounting firm.

It's a long one, but to be honest, I think any true "improver" story is long...

When I first started at this accounting firm, we used a basic software to handle certain tasks. It was easy to use, and the tax managers liked it. Well, we all know that kind of thing can't last.

The software company stopped updated it and supporting it. It was going away.

While still using the old software, our firm started using a new software, with the intention to phase out the old software completely. During this time, every discussion about the software turned into a debate between those advocating and embracing the new software, and those refusing to accept it because it did not work exactly the same way as the old software. Those were some uncomfortable staff meetings.

Being brand new, when a heated topic like this one came up, I kept my head down and my mouth shut. (Those who know me have a very hard time believing I ever managed to do that.) But before long, the improver in me had to jump in.

Here's the breakdown of firm members on the issue of the new software:

The optimists believed the new software was better, and that anyone who couldn't see that was just being ridiculous. When the pessimists complained about their problems with the software, the optimists would say how to work around it or fix it. Of course, the optimists were intimately familiar with the new software, so a "quick fix" to them sounded like Greek to the pessimists who'd never so much as opened the program.

The pessimists refused to believe the new software could work effectively in our firm. They refused to try it out, and essentially demanded some form of the old software be made available.

As an improver on the issue, I saw the great potential in the new software and learned it quickly. However, I also saw the problems with it, including the problems that most bothered the pessimists. I came up with some ideas for how to address the problems, which involved deciding on a standard format for certain workpapers.

The main group of pessimists was sitting in the lunchroom one day, so I asked if we could have an impromptu meeting to go over my ideas. I showed them the examples, and when they saw the one they liked, they seemed genuinely surprised at how much it looked like the workpapers from the old software. Suddenly, the new software didn't seem so impossible.

After they agreed on what they liked best, I put together a memo to all the staff with the sample reports and circulated it throughout the office. I put together detailed, step-by-step instructions for staff on exactly how to generate these workpapers.

Lest I mislead, my actions did not fix everything. There was still complaining about the new software. But I think the attitude shifted away from: "This will never work!" and more toward: "Oh, fine, I guess we'll use it, but I still don't like it much!"

The role of improver is a difficult and exhausting one. It takes a lot of time and energy to listen to both sides, explore the issue yourself, engage opposing sides in conversations to brainstorm solutions, seek out a win-win solution, get both sides to agree on a solution, and implement the solution. And all along the way, people may fight you.

Yep, improvement is a lot more work than optimism or pessimism. Fortunately, I like a good challenge.

The Case for Improvement

2009-08-18T10:08:00.007-04:00

The day after my previous post, Bill Sheridan of CPA Success also posted about optimism vs. pessimism, referencing a recent article in Business Week titled "The Case for Optimism" and a sidebar titled "The Case for Pessimism."

(I like to think this is a case of great minds thinking alike, but I'm not sure when, if ever, I'll earn the title of being a great mind!)

Bill discusses the benefits of optimism and pessimism, in his customarily straightforward manner. He concludes his post with the following comment:

All things being equal, I'll take the optimists. When things go wrong, they seem more likely to fight through failure.

Under Chesterton's alternate theory that there is a third type of person, the improver will fight through the failure without pretending it never happened.

Bill is the perfect example of an improver, always celebrating success while at the same time striving to make things better. Let's hope I can follow in his footsteps!

Door Number 3

2009-08-16T20:18:00.015-04:00

Conventional wisdom divides the world into two types of people: optimists and pessimists.

This theory supposes that a person sees a glass as either half-full or half-empty.

I find this theory to be completely flawed, and choose Door Number Three. A person in this third category says: "There's water in the glass, and whether it's half-full or half-empty doesn't matter. What matters is that the current level is just a starting point, and I'm going to work towards filling it up to the top, and perhaps even get it overflowing."

The glass may never get filled to the top, but that doesn't stop this person from adding a drop at a time.

A century ago, author G.K. Chesterton called this third type of person the "improver." He writes that the idea of there being only optimism and pessimism assumes "a man criticises this world as if he were house-hunting, as if he were being shown over a new suite of apartments."

As with Chesterton, my problem with the conventional "half-full"/"half-empty" concept is that it assumes a person is evaluating the glass as though he has no stake in or control over it. This idea supposes we can say: "I can take the glass or leave it." But that couldn't be further from the truth, as we don't get to just take this world or pick another.

A pure optimist refuses to change, insisting things are perfect as they are.

A pure pessimist takes joy in spreading misery, pointing out problems while refusing to embrace solutions.

An improver celebrates the good, recognizes the bad, and works to make things better.

It's not always easy choosing Door Number Three. But I'll still choose it over Doors One and Two every time.

How to be a super hero

2009-08-06T14:57:00.008-04:00

So I don't know how to become a super hero, and am not sure quite if/when I'll earn the title of Wonder Accountant.

What I have learned is that, most often, the habits that make a person most successful can be the least visible. And sometimes, we mistakenly discount these semi-visible or invisible activities as unimportant. That's not a good thing, since we won't be able to follow someone's example to success if we ignore the unseen efforts that led to success.

Here's the kind of stuff I mean:

The fitness buff: People who are incredibly fit don't get that way by spending all day posing for the camera. They get that way through a lot of time and hard work.

The Fortune-500 CEO: CEOs don't spend all their time flying on jets and playing golf. They spend hours reading industry literature, financial reports, meeting with clients, board members, and employees, and a host of other things. They spend a lot of years and a lot of long days learning their profession before rising to the top.

The valedictorian: Very few people can get straight-As without even trying. (My husband is one of those people, and it drives me crazy.) The valedictorian spends long hours reading, studying, and reviewing.

In life, we often see just the results of others' hard work without seeing the work itself. But just because we don't see it, doesn't make it any less important. One of my favorite quotes is from Thomas Edison:

"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work."

So the theme of my blogs seems to be: get up and go to work! Not a very novel idea, but funny enough, it usually works.

Related posts:

Learning from the doctors

2009-07-28T20:47:00.008-04:00

Being married to a doctor, I get to compare and contrast my beloved accounting profession to the medical profession on a regular basis.

The medical system is, of course, imperfect. But I think it's way ahead of us accountants. Hospital policies and procedures are designed to maximize the doctor's time. The system utilizes administrative personnel, technicians, and nurses with so many different licenses I can't begin to keep them straight.

Why can't we accountants make this happen for us? One excuse may be that the work just has to be done by an accountant. This excuse doesn't fly with me. I believe the finished product should be reviewed and key decisions made by an experienced accountant, but that's not the same thing as doing the work. The doctor should be the one to prescribe medication, but doesn't need to be the one taking blood pressure.

I say let's streamline as much as we possibly can, and thereby free ourselves up to do the more complicated stuff.

Here's the hiccup at most small firms (I think): Somebody has to devote the time and energy to the task, and who has free time? To improve a firm's system, somebody first has to document all of the existing processes. Next comes analyzing where inefficiences might exist. Next comes finding ways to eliminate the inefficiencies. Next you try new processes, which may or may not be successful. And all along the way, you've got to convince everybody this is really a good thing, change can be good, and that they really will be better off learning a whole new way of doing things.

Jim Boomer of Boomer Consulting recently wrote about this: "We consistently procrastinate and avoid doing the activities that do not provide instant gratification. This is a major reason that many firms fail to standardize and document their processes."

Rita Keller often talks about this: "Studies have told us that people joining an organization simply want to know, 'how we do it here' relating to policies, procedures and just everyday work life. Seems like a very simple thing to ask. However, in CPA firms I find that it is not always something easy to communicate to our new hires or even to our experienced people."

I like to think we, as a profession, are moving in the right direction. Perhaps someday my doctor husband will comment on just how well my profession maximizes the professonal's time. It's a nice dream, anyway.

Blogs for Aspiring CPAs

2009-07-21T10:05:00.006-04:00

So I realize my blogrolls are massive, and that few people want to take the time to check out every single one to decide which to follow (even though I might recommend all of them).

As difficult as this is, I'm choosing my Top 5 blogs for aspiring (or just new) CPAs:

Rita Keller – http://cpamanagement.blogspot.com/ - With over 30 years of experience in the public accounting industry and a fantastic personality, Rita is my hero! She gives great advice for interns and partners alike.
CPA Trendlines (Rick Telberg) - http://cpatrendlines.com/ - Rick conducts research into CPA firm management and other industry issues, and provides lots of insight into where we are and where we're going.
CPA Success (Bill Sheridan & Tom Hood) - http://www.cpasuccess.com/ - The directors of the Maryland Association of CPAs, who are consistently cutting edge. When I spoke with the head of IT for the Ohio Society of CPAs, he talked about how much these guys invest in technology and work to stay ahead of the curve.
The Power-Up Blog - http://www.powerupblog.com/blog/ - This blog is for professionals 35 and younger, and provides good suggestions for managing your career and getting ahead.
Accounting Tomorrow - http://www.webcpa.com/acto_blog/ - An interesting discussion of generational issues, and what's up in our profession.

Happy reading!

Accountant's Got Talent

2009-07-18T22:59:00.006-04:00

I appreciated the comment on my last post by an anonymous accounting student:

"Sometimes I feel that although I do well in my college courses I may not have the talent or skill required to actually be successful as a working Accountant. Hopefully working hard, and trying my absolute best will keep me afloat!"

My immediate response was: "Oh, no! Did I sound like I don't think some students have the right stuff, and should just give up? Yikes!"

So to clarify, I wasn't trying to scare accounting students into thinking they just might not be good enough, like those illusionists on America's Got Talent. Rather, I was opining on the decisions people make to "follow their dream" when chances of earning a living that way are slim to none.

An accounting college graduate has several options for earning a very good living. Not everyone has the skill or personality to become a partner in a public accounting firm -- but that's just one career path of many. In the private sector, opportunities abound. Every successful business requires successful accounting.

The commentator has exactly the right attitude: "Hopefully working hard, and trying my absolute best will keep me afloat!"

Keep working, but also know that you don't have to know it all at once. When in a public accounting firm, you're surrounded by people who talk circles around you. In my recent post I'm not supposed to just know that?, I wrote:

"If anyone reading this is new to the CPA profession, I hope that perhaps I can at least communicate this message: No, you are not supposed to just know it all. Everyone starts somewhere, and even the most experienced CPAs had to learn it one step at a time. There's a wealth of information out there to help you navigate your professional life. The smartest people in the world know to take advantage of knowledge available from others."

So if your dream is to be an illusionist, I have little faith that you would succeed. But if your dream is to be a professional success, I think a great way to work toward it is:

Find a mentor!
Maximize your strengths
Learn to minimize your weaknesses
Find an area in accounting that interests you
Network (in person or online) with people who share your professional interests
Never stop learning

I hope accounting students reading this will find the career that's right for them, and that it develops into all you'd like it to be. Accounting is a great degree to have!

America Thinks It's Got Talent

2009-07-17T09:41:00.018-04:00

As anyone with young kids can tell you, it's hard to find shows that are both entertaining for adults and kid friendly. I opt not to watch some of my favorite shows with my little one, such as The Closer and Burn Notice, which is probably a wise decision. (I don't always make wise choices, but every now and again I get one right.)

And so, we watch America's Got Talent together.

My little one enjoys the singing and dancing.

My husband, a fourth year psychiatry resident, is fascinated by the depth and breadth of people's delusion, and comments on how very unhealthy is our obsession with fame.

Me, I start analyzing it in terms of career, life choices, etc.

We skip most of the commentary on the show, as most of it is painful to listen to. Judges and contestants alike say the same thing, over and over: "Don't give up on your dream... follow your dream..."

At some point, can we all agree that not everyone can earn a living following their dream?

A recent episode profiled a young father who's art, dream, passion is being an illusionist (apparently that's the term magicians like to be called). He's got at least two kids (I didn't listen that closely), and he went on America's Got Talent in the hopes of "making it" so he could provide for his family.

(As an aside, I have little respect for parents who insist on "following their dream" at the expense of their children.)

So this guy did his magic act, and the judges thought it was a nice presentation, but were not wowed. They had to debate, one judge said yes, one said no, and so it all came down to the third judge who was very hesitant. Of course, the judge finally said yes, since the audience felt so sorry for this poor father and his dying dream. And he was ecstatic.

Doesn't the guy realize that if the judges barely put him through, he's not going very far? That he won't even get close to winning, let alone even make it to the finals? That he is not going to realize his dream this way? That he probably never will, because people just aren't that impressed?

The answer, sadly, is no. People often believe what they want to believe. For a long time, our society has told people they can be anything they want, do anything they want, as long as they believe. Perhaps I sound callous, but not everyone can be or do anything.

Though I haven't yet read it, I've already fallen in love with the title of Bruce Tulgan's new book - Not Everyone Gets a Trophy. As I posted recently, not all dreams come true, especially if you don't have the talent or put in the work.

I guess it's just too bad the contestants on America's Got Talent don't read my blog.

Horton Hatches the Egg

2009-07-10T20:36:00.014-04:00

We can learn a lot from Dr. Seuss.

I'm a big fan of Horton Hatches the Egg. Wikepedia provides the following plot summary:

The book concerns an elephant named Horton, who is convinced by an irresponsible bird named Mayzie to sit on her egg while she takes a short "break", which proves to last for months. Naturally, the absurd sight of an elephant sitting atop a tree makes quite a scene. Horton is laughed at by his jungle friends, exposed to the elements, captured by hunters, forced to endure a terrible sea voyage, and finally placed in a traveling circus.

Horton had a tough time. But every time a challenge came, he said the following:

"I meant what I said
And I said what I meant...
An elephant's faithful
One hundred percent!"

How great would it be if everyone could say this? Unfortunately, the world if full of people who are more like the bird and avoid responsibility.

I think we'd all be better off if we asked ourselves each day: Do I mean what I say, say what I mean, and follow through on commitments?

And hopefully we try a little bit harder to be more like Horton... although I suggest choosing our commitments a bit more carefully than he did.

The Certainty of Ambiguity

2009-07-06T23:04:00.013-04:00

Like me, many accountants are drawn to the profession by the perception that in accounting, the answers are black-and-white, and numbers don't lie. In the age old accounting equation of A=L+E, everything has a place, everything balances, everything ties, and all is right in the world.

Until we leave the ivory tower and learn accounting in the real world. And if we choose the real world of public accounting, ambiguity is a certainty.

Here are the "three stages" of ambiguity I've lived through..

Stage 1: Entry level ambiguity
Your first day may go like this: a senior staff member gives you a project, tells you to:

get it done as best you can,
try to figure things out on your own,
but don't spin your wheels.

Question: At what point are you "spinning your wheels" and need help?

Answer: Ambiguous. It all depends on the complexity of the project, the efforts you've made to figure it out and whether you've utilized all resources at your disposal.

Stage 2: Senior level ambiguity
Seniors start to take on management responsibilities, including training new staff and assigning them work.

Question: What would would be most beneficial for the staff? What work should I simply prepare myself?

Answer: Ambiguous. Seniors need to delegate work to newer staff, but not necessarily all the work, such as the more complicated projects.

Stage 3: Manager level ambiguity
A client considers claiming a tax credit or deduction, the facts of which are unusual and subject to speculation.

Question: Do I advise the client to claim the credit or deduction?

Answer: Ambiguous. Manager must conduct research, reconcile conflicting authorities, determine the strength of the evidence either way, and discuss the researched findings with the client.

I'm sure others could come up with countless more ambiguities we deal with all the time in the trenches of public accounting. Hopefully, this post doesn't depress as much as prepare future accountants for the reality. And to be honest, the ambiguity (especially at the manager level) can actually be a lot of fun. At the very least, ambiguity keeps things interesting!

Cinderella had it wrong

2009-06-26T15:08:00.025-04:00

In the Disney version of her fairytale, Cinderella sings: "No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true."

Cinderella is a sweet girl, a model of patience and virtue, and an ardent lover of animals.

But was she ever wrong.

No amount of wishing and believing is going to make your dreams come true. Am I saying you should not believe, have hope? Of course not. But hope by itself is not a plan.

Most CPA exam candidates (such as the Accounting Elf, Cooking Accountant, and frugal CPA) can tell you that simply hoping to pass the exam and showing up to take it won't work so well.

This applies to CPA firm leaders, too. Industry expert Rick Telberg recently wrote: "Competitive CPA firms are 15 times more likely to follow a written plan. It’s amazing how many firms don’t."

So Cinderella, while I commend your pretty voice and your ability to communicate with mice, I respectfully disagree with your strategy for life.

"It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something." -- Franklin D. Roosevelt

A bad sign: You're miserable

2009-06-22T19:32:00.037-04:00

I've been away on a much-needed vacation, hence the lack of posts (though I'm guessing no one's been missing me too much).

Like most people, time away from work lends itself to thinking about big-picture career stuff, and reflecting on the road so far.

I'll never forget my first accounting professor. As a business major when I started college, I took Accounting 101 my second semester. I remember first reading about debits and credits, struggling with the concept for awhile, and then suddenly understanding it all at once.

What I remember most about my first professor are his funny stories and his passion for accounting. One lecture in particular remains clear in my memory. The point of the lecture was:

Do what interests you.

He spoke of an attorney friend with whom he'd recently had lunch. The friend was making around $500k a year, and was miserable. He hated his job. When asked why he didn't change careers, the attorney answered that he had a big house to pay for, along with some fancy cars, and other financial obligations to meet. And so he toiled in a job he loathed.

My professor said: "As college students, you have learned to live like dogs. You can live on a small income. Don't go into business or accounting if you don't like it, just for the money. Do what you love."

Rita Keller shared a similar message in her post titled DO YOU HAVE THE PASSION?, to which question she answers: "I do. I can recognize it in the CPA partners, firm administrators, HR directors, marketing directors and team members when I first meet them. Can't you?

"I also think I can recognize the lack of it in some of those same people when I meet them. I bet you know people in your life that hate their job. I can't imagine a more horrible situation."

Lucky for me, I love accounting. Sure, there are parts about it that drive me crazy, and I think about quitting the profession almost every time I have to deal with the IRS. But most days, I love my profession. To Rita's question asking if I have the passion, I can answer with a resounding YES.

So to anyone out there considering career options, I encourage you to choose to do what interests you.

You'll be glad you did.

The Bridge Builder

2009-05-29T15:18:00.008-04:00

I recommend reading today's post by Rita Keller, one of my heroes. She discusses the importance of mentoring, and shares a story from Brian Williams, anchor and managing editor of NBC Nightly News. She also shares a quote from Ray Charles.

I believe those who are most successful in life are mentored along the way. Her post reminded me of my favorite poem, which eloquently expresses the philosophy by which I try (albeit imperfectly) to live my life. So I thought I'd share.

“The Bridge Builder”
by Will Allen Dromgoole

An old man, going a lone highway,
Came at the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast and deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.

The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fears for him;
But he turned when safe on the other side
And built a bridge to span the tide.

“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,
“You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again must pass this way;

You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide—
Why build you the bridge at the eventide?”
The builder lifted his old gray head:
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,

“There followeth after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building the bridge for him."

The cool kids

2009-05-21T10:03:00.007-04:00

I spent the past 2 days at my first ever "Dayton Accounting Show," and had a blast. (I like to think my passion for the public accounting profession makes me eccentric, rather than strange, but that may be wishful thinking.)

As I've mentioned before, working remotely brings significant challenges. The hardest part for me is the lack of interpersonal interaction, since I am an outgoing people-person (to put it mildly). So I absolutely relished the chance to talk with other CPAs, Ohio CPA Society personnel, accounting software providers, AICPA representatives, and the list goes on.

It took me a few moments to feel comfortable approaching all these new people. For a few minutes when I first arrived Tuesday morning, I flashed back to high school. The exhibit hall was filled with tables and chairs, and my initial thoughts were: "Oh dear, I don't know anyone. If I sit by myself, everyone will think I'm a loser. If I approach someone I don't know, they'll also think I'm a loser without any friends of her own."

Fortunately, I brought myself back to reality very quickly. This wasn't high school! Thank heavens.

Anyone who spends five minutes with me can guess I was always excited about school, loved (and still love) learning and going the extra mile -- your typical teacher's pet and overachiever. All throughout middle school and high school, I tried to hide my love for learning from my peers. The popular kids were all too-cool-for-school. Even in college, so many students wanted to just skate by, do the minimum to get the grade, and gave me a hard time for my "go get 'em" attitude.

As we all discover, neither high school nor college represents the real world. When small business owners decide which CPA to hire, they don't care who was cool in high school. They don't want the guy who just gets by. They want the guy who is passionate about his job, about learning, and about teaching his clients.

Standing in the exhibit hall of the Dayton Accounting Show, I reminded myself that high school was many (well, not too many) years ago, and I jumped into the mix. I participated in every class I attended, introduced myself to dozens of people, and did not for a moment hide my passion for public accounting.

There may have been some "cool kids" who rolled their eyes at me, and perhaps even muttered "Teacher's Pet" under their breath. And you know what? It doesn't matter. I met smart and interesting people who share my passion for the profession, and learned a ton. And in doing so, I've made myself more valuable to my clients.

So it turns out I’m actually one of "the cool kids." How awesome is that?

Focus, focus... where was I?

2009-05-12T19:00:00.003-04:00

Last week, Number Insights discussed one of my favorite concepts from Stephen Covey, the priority matrix, which suggests we should focus our resources on things that are important but not urgent.

Obviously, we all have to deal with issues that are both important and urgent (such as a crying baby). But in the ideal world, we decrease the amount of important/urgent issues by focusing on important issues before they become urgent.

Like most people, I feel pulled in about 50 different directions at any given moment. After almost 30 years of trying to do absolutely everything, and do it well, I've finally wised up. Turns out the secret of life (in my humble opinion) is not trying to do it all, but trying to do what matters most to you.

And to my great pleasure, some very smart people happen to agree with me!

The Tax Prof posted last week about a new book, titled Rapt, by acclaimed behavioral science writer Winifred Gallagher, which poses the argument that: "No matter what your quotient of wealth, looks, brains, or fame, increasing your satisfaction means focusing more on what really interests you and less on what doesn't."

On a related note, my new favorite quote (from Anna Quindlen) is: “The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.”

Being a realist, I doubt anyone will be coming to me, a tax accountant, for advice on the secret to happiness. But for what it's worth, I think I'm starting to figure it out. Implementing this philosophy of focus is the hard part. We'll see how my next 60 years turn out.

The science of pricing

2009-05-08T07:25:00.004-04:00

I got a good laugh out of this video posted by Ed Kless of the Verasage Institute. He prefaced the video as follows:

"Setting price is more art than science. It is often times messy business, but it is always an incredible exercise in creativity.

"This video is presented tongue in cheek, but as those of you who have set price using pricing on purpose will see, it sure feels like this sometimes."

I'd like to thank all the little people...

2009-05-05T15:40:00.011-04:00

I'm famous! A big thanks to Taxgirl for featuring me in her "Getting to Know You Tuesday" series about tax professionals.

Having discovered Google Reader, blogs, Twitter, and Facebook, I now find it difficult to buckle down and focus on the work that pays. Today I turned off the sound notification of new Tweets, as I realized I would never get any work done if I kept that on.

As we all know, the volume of information available at any moment is overwhelming, daunting, terrifying, humbling, and a million other adjectives. (I'm sure I could get an impressive list in a matter of seconds if I searched for it.)

Fortunately, I've finally realized I'm not just "supposed to know" everything, and have ceased holding myself to an unattainable standard. Unfortunately, I would still really like to know it all.

Hence, the attraction of Twitter, blogs, etc. So much juicy information at my fingertips. Hopefully, I'll find a way to quench my daily thirst for new knowledge without becoming an Internet addict who never leaves her tax lair.

Wish me luck.

Grading the professors

2009-05-04T19:15:00.008-04:00

I read an interested post from Tax Professor Paul Caron today. In Britain, university students have grown frustrated with professors starting classes late or cancelling without notice. Professor Caron writes:

"Britain's faculty union is complaining that students are "snooping" on professors in response to complaints about professors starting classes late or cancelling classes without notice to advance students. A student group is attempting to document the severity of the problem and has asked students to send a text message to a special hotline whenever this happens to them. But a faculty spokesman said: 'The relationship between lecturer and student is key to higher education, and schemes that encourage either to spy on the other, however well intentioned, undermine that bond.' "

To the student group, I say: Good for you! The most effective and meaningful relationships in life allow each person to hold the other accountable. And what is the student group's efforts if not a way to hold professors accountable for their behavior?

Of course, every professor will at some point have a sudden emergency that causes them to be late or absent. But this does not seem to be the focus of the student union's efforts, as reported by Times Higher Education. No one should be held to an impossibly perfect standard, but I believe everyone should be held to a reasonable standard.

Obviously, the level of what is reasonable will vary by the individual. (I require more of my husband than my 5-year-old.) But these are university professors, so I think it's reasonable to expect an announcement if class is cancelled.

Am I expecting too much? What are your thoughts?

Yet another blog?

2009-04-30T12:27:00.007-04:00

I know that less is more. However, since Congress has not managed to implement this strategy as it relates to taxes, we're left to deal with more.

I'm one whose mind races a mile a minute, can't stop talking, and is forever thinking of new ideas (some of which are good, some not so much). But I realize that if my blogging is going to be of value to anyone, it should have at least some kind of focus and direction.

Hence, the creation of yet another blog. Perhaps someone will read it, perhaps not, and that's okay. I enjoy the writing process, and so I blog.

And here's where I blog:

Confessions of a CPA: Musings and observations about life in public accounting, including thoughts on becoming a CPA, working with clients, training and mentoring.

The Tax CPA: Discussion of developments and issues in tax.

ThomasYork, LLP: Items that may be of interest to ThomasYork clients, or any other interested readers, particulary related to small businesses, construction, tax, and audit.

Hopefully, something that I post somewhere just might be of interest to someone. If not, c'est la vie!

Myths & legends about the CPA Exam

2009-04-29T21:14:00.012-04:00

As posted by Rick Telberg and CPA Success, the AICPA published its responses to questions about the CPA exam that were submitted from readers of Another71.com. I just discovered this site, a CPA exam blog, which appears to have a lot of helpful information for candidates.

The AICPA circulated the Q&A, which includes:

Is there a curve on the CPA Exam? (Answer: No)
Why must candidates wait for their score on the BEC section?
Is re-scoring worth the hassle (and time and money)?
What steps is the AICPA taking to improve the transparency of these processes and to keep candidates better informed?
Is real-time scoring in the works?
If you receive your scores in the later waves, are you likely on the border?
Is it possible to get an immediate raw score?
Has there been any discussion of expanding the arbitrary 18-month timeframe to 24 months?

You can read the full discussion at Another71.com. To those preparing for the exam, I wish you the best of luck!

Treading water

2009-04-27T21:48:00.017-04:00

My early years in public accounting felt like barely treading water. I was overwhelmed with the infinite mass of knowledge in the profession, and disheartened by the reality that I could never, ever learn it all.

It was several years before I realized that I did not have to learn it all. My clients do not expect me to know it all. There probably isn't a single person on the planet that knows absolutely everything about the tax code. (Well, except for maybe taxgirl...) What a relief that was!

That of course begs the question: So what exactly do I need to know?

Our firm is currently working on answering that question as it applies to each position in the firm. No one is required to know it all, but more senior staff do need to know how to find information through research, and are expected to stay current on developing issues.

So how do I stay current on tax issues?

Daily e-mail updates from RIA tax service
Regular e-mail updates from the IRS, AICPA, WebCPA, CalCPA, and Spidell Publishing
Tax and Accounting Blogs, using Google Reader (blogroll on the right of this page)
Continuing Education Courses

Keeping up is a challenge, to say the least.

Thankfully, I love a challenge.

To other CPAs out there: How do you stay up-to-date? What resources do you recommend?

Band-aid solutions to tax complexity problem

2009-04-25T18:06:00.030-04:00

On April 15, President Obama addressed the nation on the issue of tax simplification.

When I posted about this on my firm blog and on Twitter, I mentioned that the Wall Street Journal article indicated one proposal under consideration would exempt up to 40% of Americans from having to file a tax return.

In response to my post, Omaha CPA Shane Eloe posed a very good question: "What is he really going to do to make it so 40% of Americans don't file a tax return? (what if they were getting a refund)"

Now my curiosity was officially piqued about this proposal under Presidential consideration. So I emailed the authors of the WSJ article, who were so great as to email me back the same day. (Thank you very much to authors Jonathan Weisman and John McKinnon. I was very pleasantly surprised and impressed with their quick response, as this is the first time I've contacted reporters for further information on a story.)

Mr. Weisman indicated in his email response that the plan was written by Austan Goolsbee and adopted by the Obama campaign. Titled "The Simple Return" plan, the proposal would not actually exempt up to 40% of Americans from filing a return. Rather, it would make it so the only action required by the average taxpayer would be "checking the numbers, signing the return, and then either sending a check or getting a refund."

A few of the key points in the plan:

The proposal assumes the tax law remains as is, with the same mass of deductions, credits, exemptions, and so forth.
The program would be voluntary. Anyone who preferred to fill out his own tax form, or to pay a tax preparer to do it, would just throw the Simple Return away and file his taxes the way he does now.
The IRS would prepare a "Simple Return" with the data it receives from employers and banks (including froms W-2, 1099, and 1098), which the taxpayer could then just review and sign.
California has already implemented a pilot program of the "Simple Return" plan, which it calls "Ready Return."

I have just read this over in the last couple of days, so I'm far from qualified to render an expert opinion. Still, I'll go ahead an render my inexpert one:

This seems to be a valiant effort to make the existing system more manageable for the average taxpayer. But it treats the symptoms rather than the disease. The real problem is the complicated, convoluted, mind-numbing tax law.

Rather than trying to lessen the headache of working within a broken system, let's try to fix the system itself.

Unfortunately, that's where my "wisdom" (or foolishness, depending on who you ask) runs out. I hope to read more about others' ideas for real tax reform over the summer. Stay tuned.

My plea to Congress: Simplify the tax code!

2009-04-22T14:39:00.024-04:00

On many, many occasions, I've been asked if I oppose tax simplification because it would potentially put me out of a job.

Without hesitation, I always reply with an emphatic and unequivocal "NO." I do not oppose tax simplification, but vehemently support it. Whether it will or not happen, I dare not say. I grow more pessimistic with each passing year. Every year they pass an "AMT patch" is another year they delay real reform.

I strongly believe that, because the average American is required to file a tax return and pay tax, the average American should be able to understand the tax system. And that just isn't the case.

The President promised last week to simplify the tax code, and he set up an advisory board to make recommendations for simplification by the end of the year.

So what happens to me and my peers if tax simplification really does happen?

We innovate. We progress. We discover new and better ways to serve our customers. Even in the most simple of tax systems, there will be planning opportunities. We can also increase our role as business advisers, replacing our primary function as tax preparers.

I would love the chance to explore the opportunities in this hypothetical world with simpler tax laws. The more I work with clients, the more I realize how uninterested they are in the detailed calculations.

And why should they be interested? They are not in the business of studying tax law, filling out forms, or crunching numbers; that's why they pay me. I try to provide them as much information as they need, but not much more than that. The challenge, of course, is to generate that summary information. Hours of analysis and calculations are required before I can give the client the "bottom-line numbers." How great would it be to instead spend that time discovering ways to help my clients be successful in their businesses?

To quote again from Ron Baker's Measure What Matters to Customers: "[T]he last buggy-whip manufacturers were models of efficiency. So what? What happens if you are efficient at doing the wrong things?"

Right now, we must work within the existing tax system. As tax professionals, we strive to create efficiency in our operations, which is no easy task given the complexity of the system. If tax simplification were to become a reality, tax professionals would simply need to become effective and efficient at doing different things.

And wouldn't that be exciting?

I'm not supposed to just know that?

2009-04-17T17:53:00.017-04:00

Like most people these days, I'm doing a lot of thinking about my life and career. For as long as I can remember, I've always wanted to learn more. I want to find ways to make myself better, faster, smarter. Until recently, however, I have been trying to figure out how to do that all on my own. I don't recommend it.

In my defense, I have tried to learn it all by myself not due to an inflated ego or arrogance, but due to the flawed philosophy of: "If I were really smart, I would just know all this already, so I better not ask for help."

If anyone reading this is new to the CPA profession, I hope that perhaps I can at least communicate this message: No, you are not supposed to just know it all. Everyone starts somewhere, and even the most experienced CPAs had to learn it one step at a time. There's a wealth of information out there to help you navigate your professional life. The smartest people in the world know to take advantage of knowledge available from others.

Now that I've discovered this simple truth (which took a long time for a supposedly bright person), I can't stop reading. One of the many interesting ideas I've read is in Ron Baker's Measure What Matters to Customers, that: "Knowledge is a 'nonrival' good -- meaning we can both possess it at the same time."

I'm looking forward to sharing (or some might call it stealing) the knowledge of others. I'll never get it all, but I'll get a lot more than if I'd kept trying to just figure it out myself.

The time is now!

2009-04-12T18:00:00.001-04:00

In a post this week titled "How to close 'the knowing-doing gap?' Just do it. Do it now.", Rick Telberg wrote: "The problem is not a lack of theories, tools, or programs. The problem is EXECUTION."

Also this week, Rita Keller wrote: "Qualified leaders already know what to do, it’s a matter of implementation."

On the topic of tax simplification, Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson wrote in the Wall Street Journal Friday: "Clearly, there is no absence of good ideas. What we need now is the will to act."

Does anyone else see a theme here?

We all know that we are living in turbulent times, times our children will read about in the history books. Thousands of people have lost their jobs, homes, and retirements -- and no, it isn't fair.

I think the key to navigating these times successfully is to come to terms with the loss, and then take action to move our lives (and our nation) forward. As with any loss, there is a grieving process. As part of the process, we must cease to focus on the injustice of it all and instead focus on what we can do about it.

Of course, this is easier said than done; hence, the quotes from Telberg, Keller, and Olson above. Until the one-step-easy-formula is developed, we'll all just have to try and implement our best ideas one step at a time.

God grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference.

Is there life after this?

2009-04-04T23:21:00.006-04:00

Right about now, I start to wonder. Is there really life after April 15? I occassionally stop and think of how I'll soon be enjoying the beautiful season of spring, and I feel a twinge of excitement.

The excitement quickly fades when I think of the countless hours of work standing between me and that lovely vision.

What will life hold after April 15? In addition to the usual tax-season recovery, spring cleaning, and summer vacations with family, I have my professional plans, some of which are loftier goals than others...

Publish an article in a peer-reviewed accounting journal
Earn remaining continuing education credits to renew my CPA license
Participate in a CPA professional organization
Develop training and step-by-step instructional material for staff for various projects

You probably aren't interested in my summer goals, but at least this way I have written them down! We'll see how it goes.

For now, I must go back to the bat cave and crank out returns.

Are we there yet?

2009-03-31T23:50:00.001-04:00

It's midnight: do you know where your CPA is?

Well, if your CPA is like me, he or she is probably hard at work.

This time of the year we call "tax season" or "busy season" is an odd annual ritual in which so many thousands of us engage. Once entering the world of public accounting, one never looks at the calendar the same way. Life is scheduled around busy season, including all vacations, and whenever possible weddings and babies.

Every year after April 15, I begin the work of preparation for next year. Identifying any process I can streamline, instructions I can prepare, and training I can give, I do all I can to make next year's busy season better than the last. At times, this "off season" of intense preparation can feel nearly as busy as tax season itself.

I like to think I will have perfected the science of an efficient (and less stress) busy season right around the time I'm ready to retire. We'll see how it goes.

How to manage remotely

2009-03-26T15:18:00.000-04:00

Working remotely brings unique challenges, both for those in the office and the employee working from afar. After almost 3 years of working remotely, I've learned a few things, often painfully. These are a few suggestions I’d give other managers in public accounting who work remotely:

Set up an ergonomic home office. Take the time up front to arrange your work space to prevent pain rather than cause it.

Set office hours, and stick to them. When working from home, you can feel like you are in the office 24 hours a day. If you do not set limits (even during busy season), you are destined for major burn out. Set aside “free days” that do not involve work, and do not allow yourself to so much as check email.

Establish clear expectations with staff about e-mails. The reality for those in the office can easily become “out of sight, out of mind.” This is not a poor reflection on the staff, but just a fact of life. An example of a clear expectation to communicate: any emails that require action or response are flagged for follow up, and follow up occurs in a timely manner.

Establish a firm-wide policy for prioritization of work. It’s understandable for staff to respond more quickly to the manager across the hall than the manager across the country. To prevent your work from going to the bottom of the list, your firm needs a system for staff to prioritize their work – one that everyone follows.

Provide specific deadlines, and enforce them. Telling staff to “get it done as soon as you can” is not nearly as effective as providing an exact date by which you expect the work done.

Develop professional relationships where you live. As technological as our world is, nothing can completely replace connecting with others in person.

By no means have I got this all figured out -- I have good days and bad. I’m hoping to find “others like me” and learn what works for them. If you have any suggestions, whether you work remotely or not, please share them with me!

This is hard

2009-03-19T17:30:00.002-04:00

I'm the first to admit that my passion for tax accounting makes me a very odd duck. Why do I like this stuff? Because it's like one giant puzzle, and I like puzzles.

I love what I do, but I still think the tax law is ridiculously complicated. (For an idea of just how complicated, click here.) And there are parts of my job that I really, really don't like. (Have you tried calling the IRS lately?)

After several years in the industry and a master's degree from a great school, I am just now starting to feel like I get this stuff, at least to the extent if affects my clients. When that's what it takes to get a handle on the tax law, you know it's way too complicated.

Just recently, I realized that in my eagerness to solve the tax puzzle, I have unintentionally given the impression that I think this is easy. At times, I think my zealous efforts to figure it out and to teach others has communicated: "This is fun, and easy! Everyone should love this stuff! Don't you get it? Don't you want to learn more?"

I wish I'd realized this sooner, but such is life as an imperfect person. Since this self-discovery, I have made a concerted effort to instead communicate: "This is extremely complicated, and the constant changes from Congress keep making it worse. Unfortunately, I can't change that. But what I can do is help you understand how the tax law affects you, keep you out of trouble with the IRS, and try to save you as much money as possible."

Hopefully this "new" message will help others see me as a bit more normal. Well, at least just a bit less crazy.

You get what you reward

2009-03-17T15:00:00.001-04:00

"A good deed is its own reward."

This old adage is a lovely sentiment, and most people do good deeds every day with no expectation of reward. But few of us can afford to spend all our time in altruistic goods works, because we also have to put food on the table, make student loan payments, and pay an endless list of other expenses.

Every boss reinforces certain employee behavior every day, good deeds and bad, often without even knowing it. Employers encourage the behaviors they reward. In accounting, a common method for determining bonuses, raises, and promotions ("rewards") is based on billable hours. (A "billable hour" is an hour spent on client work that the firm can actually bill the client for. )

Spending time on client work, and doing it efficiently, is important. But if billable hours are 99% of what determines an accountant's rewards, other things are not as likely to happen. Experienced staff may be less likely to spend time mentoring and training newer staff, since those hours don't increase their bonus. Staff may hesitate to strengthen client relationships by chatting about the client's personal and professional life and goals, since the client can't be billed for that.

Billable hours are a simple, objective measurement of performance. But they are just one measure, and perhaps not even a good one at that. As CPA firm leaders, let's find a way to measure success in all important areas, including client service, continued professional and personal development, and training and mentoring staff.

In summary, I believe you get the behaviors you reward. After all, how many people in the world would go to work each day without getting paid? I have the great fortune of loving my job and my company, but even I would think twice before working for free.

Managing from 2,356 miles away

2009-03-16T20:41:00.000-04:00

My inaugural blog was read and commented on by two women of which I am a huge fan. Thank you to Kel and Rita for commenting on my first post. You completely made my day -- shucks, you made my busy season!

One fact about me that Rita mentioned is that I work entirely remotely. Almost 3 years ago, I began this unique adventure of working from across the country when my husband's career moved us. Thankfully, the move is temporary, so we will return to the San Francisco Bay Area and to my fantastic firm as early as next year.

About a year before the move, I simply suggested to one of the partners: "When I move, why don't I still work here by telecommuting?"

And so it began.

Between the stress of moving and getting our family settled, I honestly never thought to find out how others work remotely. With no idea how I "should" do this, I've simply made it up along the way. If there is some kind of guidebook or manual out there, I'd love to read it, even though I'll be reading it 3 years later than I should have.

Over the weeks and months ahead, I'll occasionally try to articulate my experiences in as eloquent yet concise a manner as possible. Today, I'll share just a couple of thoughts on how to make the remote set up work.

A great team. This has been the single most important variable. The members of my team are responsive to emails and phone calls, and are very respectful the 3-hour time difference.
A firm that embraces technology. Working across the country brings a whole new meaning to the term "paperless."
Clients that embrace technology. My clients are happy to communicate via telephone and email.

When we moved out here 3 years ago, I had no idea if this whole remote thing would work. In spite of the many bumps along the way, I'm happy to say it's working out pretty well.

P.S. Could anyone help me figure out how to let people leave a URL with their comments on Blogger?

Stuck in the middle

2009-03-15T19:09:00.000-04:00

I'm stuck right in the middle of Generation X and Generation Y. What does that mean? Well, I don't really think it means much of anything.

A recent story in The Economist discussed the differences between the stereotypical "Baby Boomers" and the members of "Generation Y." Perhaps just as interesting as the article were the comments posted by readers representing multiple generations.

The reality is that anyone at any age can be hard working or lazy, respectful or rude, teachable or arrogant. Instead of trying to convince each other one generation is right and the other is wrong, I'd much rather use our energy sharing ideas across generations. Everyone has a lifetime of unique experiences, whether that lifetime has consisted of 20 years or 60. I say, let's share what we've learned, and find the best way to succeed as a team.

Many people have already said this, most of whom have more experience and insight than I. So, it may turn out that no one wants to read this blog, and that's okay. Most of my observations about life in public accounting have been made before.

But I'll write anyway, just in case there's someone out there who's interested in the ramblings of a tax manager working in public accounting. This blog will not be about taxes (I've got my firm blog and website for that), but about life in the trenches as a CPA in public accounting. And just maybe someone out there will share a comment about their life in accounting -- whether as a student, intern, or a partner on her way to retirement.

We'll see how it goes.