A Bit Of Breakfast Thinking
Richard Brewin • May 22, 2020
Funny where your mind goes first thing in the morning, especially when the sun is out.
Here I am, making my toast, when the thought hits me that creating your own perfect round of toast is a great analogy for building your accounting firm. Bear with me…
Choosing the right bread is key. Get this wrong or select a bread that isn’t quite right for you, and no matter how hard you try or how creative you get with all the later processes, you will never end up with that perfect piece of toast that you imagined at the outset. The texture, the taste, the smell just won’t be quite right. The bread of your firm is its culture. This has to be spot on, your exact choice and without compromise.
Once we’ve chosen our bread then we have the time it takes to toast it. You can’t rush this. Fetch the toast out too early and it will be underdone, not yet at its full potential. Leave it too long, get distracted and you’ve missed your chance, it's overdone with no going back. You’re scraping the burnt bits off to make the best of it. Important therefore that you keep an eye on it at all times to spot that optimum moment. Rush your firm and you’ll not see its true potential, but be too cautious, too slow and you’ll miss your chance. Don’t take your eyes off your own development if you want to avoid scraping the failed bits off.
Now we’re onto the spread, the basic element of the toast. This is fundamental, you have to have it, it's expected on toast. But you have a choice. You can go for a no-frills margarine, a creamy butter, a healthy option. You can make it slightly more or less expensive and you want to choose a spread that gets the most out of your bread, no point in quality bread and cheap margarine, but it will always just be the foundation. This is like your compliance work. It’s expected, it's basic, but that doesn’t mean that it unavoidably comes across the same as everyone else. You can tweak it, upgrade it, add some more quality, to build on that culture that you’ve chosen.
Then we come to the real differentiator, the topping. Here your choice is unlimited. You can go standard with jam or marmalade, cheap or quality, a safe all-rounder. You can go deliberately provocative with Marmite, love it or hate it. You can tailor to your own tastes, personally I love cheese on my toast. If you’re making toast for yourself then the choice can reflect just you but if you are making it for more people, do you play safe or challenge them? This is where your decisions on your added services really come to the fore. Here, you have an opportunity to really differentiate your firm but how brave are you? Are you prepared to really back your own views and accept that some won’t like it or do you want to please the masses? What’s important is that you decide, don’t end up with a confused mess. How Marmite are you?
That’s not quite the end because we can go further. How you cut your toast can make it more or less attractive. I certainly prefer triangular over square. The plate you use, the setting you go for, (kitchen, lounge, conservatory, garden) all will add something different to the perception of the breakfast. What you serve with it, coffee, English breakfast, Earl Grey, orange juice, all are decisions that will add or detract. Served with a smile or in silence? How you dress and present your firm is so important.
Food for thought maybe?
Look at any accounting firm website and there is a fair chance that the word ‘proactive’ will be prominent. Ask some business owners and taxpayers whether they consider their accountant to be proactive. There is commonly a gap between the two, between the intent of the accountant and the expectations of the client.
The tag ‘Trusted Advisor’ gets bandied around a lot. Without trying to be deliberately contentious, I often challenge its use. Undoubtedly, accountants were once the trusted advisor to their clients. When I came into the profession 44 years ago now, the older partners, especially, were seen by their clients as their trusted advisor, their ‘go to’ person on any issues, business, family or personal, that were troubling them. Without the filing deadlines of today, these clients were with their accountant primarily because they valued the relationship rather than the products.
All accountants are the same! We’ve all heard it said. It’s nonsense, of course, but, when you are asked what it is that your firm does that differentiates it from other accounting firms, it can be a challenge to come up with something tangible. Accounting firms tend to offer similar services, that’s what makes them accounting firms. Differentiating from competitors based upon services provided is therefore an issue.