examples from nokia and bechtel.
by mark c. thompson
setting and maintaining goals is a fundamental part of our lives, but also one of the most challenging. two companies which do it better than most are proctor & gamble and nokia: they work with their customers to set mutual goals so they can achieve joint outcomes. this is a great way to do business.
five tough questions and five good tips to take your firm and your personal effectiveness to the next level.
gary adamson, former managing partner of brady ware cpas, has become a living legend in the profession for taking his firm from a small, local player to a regional contender. but he’s the first to admit he didn’t do it alone. coaching helped. in fact, during his career at the firm, he used two business coaches.
more from gary adamson at 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间: how to balance the six jobs of managing partner | the partner compensation checklist | how cpa firms make money in turbulent times
he learned a lot, and now he’s sharing what he learned with 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间.
…and what they’re not entitled to.
partners are entitled to a lot. at some firms, they are virtually royalty. but that’s no way to run a firm these days.
here, marc rosenberg, cpa, and author of how to bring in new partners and a 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 affiliate, lists what every partner – especially new and wanna-be partners – need to understand.
more from marc rosenberg: how to make partner? | why accounting firm partners are “popping prozac like m&m’s” | the 15-item checklist for your next partner retreat | five key responsibilities for a new partner | planning a partner retreat for real results | 6 steps to get your business to the next level | the 10 biggest mistakes in reading map statistics | re-engineering partner accountability | marc rosenberg: why cpas aren’t making more money [video] | marc rosenberg: slow learners need not apply | 10 to-do’s for a partner buyout
a partner is entitled to:
1. attend partner meetings and retreats.
2. have access to all confidential firm financial data.
3. receive a return on capital; repayment of capital when he/she leaves the firm. read more →
20 signs you can’t.
if paychex inc. knows something about leadership — and considering their position in the market, they might — then dan mccarthy may have had something to do with it.
dan was responsible at paychex for executive training and development, including succession planning, at a time when the company was consistently named a fortune magazine “great place to work,” a “training magazine top 125” training organization, and a bersin “high impact learning organization.” since 2011, he’s been director of executive development programs at the whittemore school of business and economics at the university of new hampshire in durham, n.h.
lately, he’s been thinking — and worrying — about the difficulties that leaders and managers face from the effects of the great recession. “job satisfaction has decreased since the beginning of the recession in 2008,” he notes. and 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research by bay street group llc bears him out in the tax and accounting industry.
some of the damage may be self-inflicted. here dan lists “20 signs you can’t be trusted as a leader:” read more →
dan hood, the new editor of accounting today, talks about the single biggest issue…
the art of giving and taking feedback for a happy office.
by rick telberg
we’ve been asking accountants and finance managers how well their offices use feedback to keep folks happy. it’s clear that a little do-and-don’t advice seems in order for some of the nation’s accounting firms and finance departments.
our sources report some pretty big problems on the do side. out of seven questions in a cpa trendlines study, five showed that fewer than half the accounting and finance offices nationwide were doing what they should be doing all (or most) of the time.
more for 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 pro members on management skills:
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for instance, feedback offered on behavior — rather than on personality: only eight percent of managers do it all the time, and only 37 percent do it frequently. a full 20% do it rarely or never at all. ouch! whoever’s doing the feedback could use a little feedback themselves.
so here goes:
how to focus on the big issues.
by marc rosenberg, cpa
guide to planning the firm retreat
most firms spend their time at retreats planning for the future, forming goals and addressing pressing issues and problem areas. the problem areas aren’t day-to-day issues such as purchasing a new copy machine or revising the policy on sick days. the problem areas are more strategic: morale issues, recruiting problems, profitability, etc.
here are some specific examples: read more →
how the best set direction, gain commitment, execute on plan and lead by personal example.
by robert j. lees, august j. aquila and derek klyhn
professional services is one of the most critical sectors in all western economies and an increasingly important one in every other world economy. but, the usual measures of scale, like revenues, the number of firms or the number of professionals, don’t adequately reflect the importance of the sector. what makes professional services so critical is the influence professional firms have on their clients’ activities.
whether the influence comes through strategic advice, legal opinion, transaction origination and support, tax minimisation, or an audit opinion, every business we know is reliant, in some form, on the opinion of a professional service firm.
in addition, and at least as important given the move away from self-regulation, there is the critical regulatory role of the accountants and lawyers tasked with ensuring the probity of the world’s financial markets. all of which makes the task of ensuring that each of the firms is a role model of its profession’s expertise, values and ethics absolutely key.
when firms were relatively small, that wasn’t a difficult task. however, as firms have increased in scale, geographic reach and service offerings, the task of running a professional service firm has become extremely complex. and that’s without considering changing client expectations, increasing competition between firms, threats to the traditional business model from offshoring and the increasing number of virtual firms, the increasing number of western economy-based firms operating in countries with social and business norms sometimes far removed from their own, the arrival of a generation with very different expectations than their predecessors, and calls for greater transparency and regulation in the light of the financial meltdown.
in our twenty year association with professional service firms (psfs), every one of the hundreds of firms we have worked with around the world has seen the number, scale and complexity of the challenges they face increase significantly. being a managing partner, never the easiest of roles, is now one of the most complex and challenging roles in any organisation in any business sector anywhere in the world.
and yet, every managing partner we know admitted that they took on the role without any real understanding of what the role entailed and without being sure if they had the capabilities to do it effectively. they also described how the typical high need for achievement culture within professional service firms, with its intolerance of perceived failure, made it almost impossible for them to ask for help when they needed it and for their colleagues to offer it.
rob lees is a founding partner of moller psfg ltd and consultant to professional service firm leaders worldwide. he is also co-author of the best-selling “when professionals have to lead.”
august aquila is an internationally known speaker, writer and consultant to professional services firms. he is ceo of aquila global advisors. he is also the co-author of “compensation as a strategic asset” and “client at the core.”
derek klyhn is a founding partner and director of møller psfg cambridge ltd and consultant to professional service firm leaders and their teams. he is chartered accountant and has an mba from london business school.
instant download [free for pro members]: to get the complete report, click here: read more →
hint: it’s not about how smart they are or hard they work.
by rick telberg
how do you spot the hidden rock stars on your staff?
and what do up-and-coming tax, accounting and finance professionals need to know to get ahead in today’s profession?
these aren’t idle questions. many firms and individuals are struggling with these issues right now. but don’t take it from me. just listen to the decision-makers from a dozen firms i met with in a milwaukee hotel recently. the mission: learn how to deal with a looming new staff shortage. some took away solid action plans. “our firm,” said one, “is trying to develop our rock stars and this showed me we need to be doing more.” another said, “excellent! it gave us the details and the ‘how-to.’”
interestingly, the milwaukee group’s conclusions and recommendations closely parallel our related research findings. so we can be fairly certain that we’ve obtained some of the profession’s favorite strategies.
you could probably adapt one of our methods for your firm. in milwaukee, we divided the group into two teams, the green team and the blue team. after some preliminary coaching, each team hammered out a list of the top five talent indicators – the clues in an employee’s behaviors and attitudes that demonstrate the highest likelihood of the best roi for a firm’s time, energy, and money in training, coaching and mentoring. then the group filled several flip chart pages with their lists and hashed them out with each other. after identifying the key indicators, we moved on to identifying the best strategies for recruiting, grooming and retaining top talent.
by far, the top predictive indicator across all firms is the trait, “they are always trying to improve.” it comes in a few flavors or variations. for instance, the green team at the milwaukee strategy meeting favored a passion for “continuous learning.” the blue team preferred, “they do ‘extra credit’ – things that the partners wouldn’t normally expect from someone at their level.” but they add up to the same thing.
you run the job, or it runs you over.
by gary adamson
adamson advisory
most of us are thrust into the managing partner role in our firms with little or no training or coaching. who teaches you to be an effective mp? how do you know if you’re performing well?
your partners won’t tell you. if you’re new to the job, do you just do it the same way as your predecessor? is that the best approach for the firm? who will mentor you?
as i can attest from experience in running my firm for over 20 years, it is a thankless job. i just took a deep breath and jumped in. the best feedback that most of us get is from other managing partners and from benchmarking ourselves against other firms. there are not too many places to turn for help.
whether you are new at the job or a veteran, here is an approach to organizing the job into six buckets that will help you. it is how i approached the responsibilities and it lends itself to dividing and conquering with the ability to delegate some responsibilities.
here are my six buckets: read more →
what’s partner material at your firm?
click here to join the survey; get the results.
by rick telberg
卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间
early returns from the new 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 survey into identifying and managing high-potential professionals suggests that, beyond ability, firms are more intent than ever on finding well-rounded individuals capable of taking initiative and developing new business.
above is a word picture of some of the verbatim responses we’re capturing. what are the traits you look for in new hires? here are a few of the more interesting answers: read more →
nor should they.
by edward mendlowitz, cpa
partner, withumsmith+brown
time sheets are an essential part of any professional services organization. some people contend that they should not be maintained since they should not be the basis of any pricing – that fees should be solely based on the value to the client. i disagree.