Why you should come out of the green closet
A salesman once told me he was amazed that a regional accountant he visited had a picture of John Howard on his desk. Amazed because, in his words, “why the hell would you alienate half of your potential clients? Simple maths”. I have lived by this rule for a long time, keeping politics out of […]
The Rule of 40
“You have to spend money to make money” Yes, but how much? It’s questions like this we hear the most. “How fast should we grow?” “What should our profit be?” “How do we know if we can afford to put on new staff?” How do you know if your numbers are ok? How will a […]
Margins Are Built One Brick at a Time
Sales might ebb and flow but your margins should be built strong one small step at a time. Anyone that has lost weight knows about continuous improvement – calories in, calories out – run despite the cold morning, one meal at a time. Some large organisations try to do this by slashing staff numbers and […]
Have You Outgrown Xero?
We love Xero. We’re Xero Partners. We have recommended and installed Xero for years. If you think you have outgrown Xero the chances are the core of Xero is absolutely fine but some of your needs around that central core might be better served by more specialised systems. So don’t be throwing the baby out […]
What is Fat? What is Muscle?
Just like Fat Bear Week do you have some reserves to get you through the next year if things turn down? Maybe like they did in 2008? Probably the best way to think about this is to concentrate on the effective things that good leaders did when things went south in 2008 and start thinking […]
Should You Employ Another Person?
One of the hardest things to decide is when to employ new people, it’s always better to be slightly resource-constrained but you will only really grow if you have the capacity to do so. If your accounts can tell you which income streams are making you money you should be better able to see where […]
How to Get Your Business Under Control When You’re Always Busy
Hands up anyone that thinks they have too much spare time? Do you have a nagging feeling that things might be getting out of control? Let’s stop and think for a minute. Maybe make a list? People make lists because we can’t keep everything in our heads. In 1956 George A. Miller published “The Magical Number […]
Which Businesses Make Good Money
When I was just starting out as an accountant I spent some time doing tax returns for SMEs at a small accounting practice. It was interesting to be able to see inside lots of different businesses and try to work out what made them tick. I just saw the numbers because I was stuck in […]
How to choose good accounts staff
Just a few years ago people were saying accounting jobs were dying out – about to be killed off by automation. The 20th-century dream of “untouched by human hands” is looking pretty unlikely – for a while yet at least. Turns out it’s often more expensive to automate than for a person to do it. […]
Stop The Years Flying By
If you feel that the years are flying by it’s probably because you are fundamentally bored. One of my favorite podcasts had a great post about this – A Counterintuitive Cure for Burnout. Check it out. It got me thinking about what I see inside businesses. We can only hold a few things in our […]