double your firmOur book “Double Your Accounting Firm: Lessons Learned on How Top Firms Grow Faster, Build Stronger Teams and Increase Profit” was released on Amazon. Hardcover copies will be available in the coming weeks.
With this book, we plan to add even more value to your accounting firm besides just workflow processes.

  • Page 52: Actual scripts to move clients into the more profitable fixed and value pricing model
  • Page 89: Top 2 crazy good strategies to get new clients in your firm this month
  • Page 136: Step-by-step process to meet and close new prospects (scripts and blueprint included)
  • Page 220: Building out 6-figure profit centers this year to double your firm

For a limited time, you can grab a copy FREE. Click here to get your copy.
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The First Step to Double Your Firm

Talking about workflow processes isn’t as “sexy” as getting clients, closing deals, watching cash pour in.
Here’s the rub — if you don’t have the workflows in place…
You can’t bring in new clients without

  • Chaos and overworked employees
  • Hiring brand-new employees (fast and under-vetted)
  • Work falling through the cracks
  • Current clients getting neglected
  • You will work day and night

Take care of the ‘less sexy’ stuff first.

Workflow efficiency leads to capacity opening up. Meaning, your employees aren’t spending time on things you don’t need to. Instead, they have open slots in their daily schedule to fill with new clients.

I get it…

When you’re first building an accounting firm, you’re simply trying to stay afloat. Little workflow and capacity issues get smoothed over and everyone moves on.

Multiply those problems as your team and client base grows, then the crack forms. I heard from a Top CPA Firm those cracks usually start appearing around 50 employees…then 100…and so on.

If you could head off trouble to save potentially hundreds of thousands in billables, I bet you’d take those steps.

Why doesn’t an accounting firm?

  1. It’s not a priority. Accountants are always playing ‘catch-up’ and thus improving the processes and future-think gets pushed down the ‘to-do’ list again and again.
  2. It’s difficult to discuss as the conversations can get uncomfortable.
  3. It’s not fun. Doing tax returns and closing deals sound fun. Not worrying about workflow.

But, let’s play pretend…what if you did have more efficient workflow and capacity wasn’t stretched as far as it can go:

Double Your Firm by Doing Your Job!

Suddenly…you have more time on your hands. You actually have a moment to plan ahead on how to grow the business. ‘Work ON the business…not IN the business.’ as the famous Michael Gerber says in his book, The E-Myth Revisited.

If you have the time, it means you’ll also have more profits. Profits to invest or share the spoils with your team. (They’ll like that.).

In order to get your team on track…you need distinct roles for everyone on your team to double your firm. You must create an ‘assembly-line’ mindset.

In an assembly-line, every person has 1-3 jobs. And that’s it. There isn’t someone doing 500 things at once. That’s inefficient.

The Exact Roles for Every Employee & Partner in Your Firm

Instead, each position of your firm should have set duties. Partners have their role, managers, associates, then administrative.
OWNERS/PARTNERS:

Normally, Partners have worked in the industry for many years and are experts in the field. Hourly rates are normally over $200.

Generally, a Partner should be focused on:

  • Business Development
  • High-level, High-ROI client work
  • Team-building

According to Rob Nixon, international speaker, and CEO of Panalitix and CPA advisor, it should be broken down like this:

  • 60% business development
  • 30% client work
  • 10% team-building

The point here is that Owners/Partners are doing HIGH-ROI activities for the firm. Everything else needs delegation down the chain.

MANAGERS:

Managers are responsible for correctly implementing the systems passed down from the Partners. Managers must discover the small cracks before they become big and approach Owners/Partners to alert.

Managers focus on:

  • Client work
  • Onboarding clients efficiently
  • Training the system/process
  • Team-building

Managers will normally bill between $125 – $250 per hour. Most of their time should be spent on onboarding new clients correctly and efficiently, hammering home the processes, and team-building. Client work itself should be in more of a ‘review’ role, not preparer except in very specific circumstances.

Their main objective, contrary to popular belief, is to keep the process. Trust it and implement it. When a Manager gets too involved in the weeds, they lose sight of this objective.

Like Partners, Managers should delegate a bulk of the client work down the line.

ASSOCIATES/PRACTITIONERS

These are the foot soldiers. They take a box of receipts and turn them into tax returns. They will also be the voice of the firm for smaller clients. Partners should handle

High-ROI clients.

Most new clients should move from Manager to Practitioner in one fluid motion.

Thus, they focus on:

  • Quality client work preparation
  • Touchpoints with clients

Associates normally charge between $60 – $120 per hour.

ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF:

Administrators don’t normally bill for time or fees. They’re on a straight salary. They handle all the paperwork to get to the client.

Their duties include:

  • Paperwork efficiency from team to client
  • Sending out completed work and information to clients
  • Scanning
  • Scheduling
  • Answering phones

The Administrative staff takes care of administrative work…associates and above should not be doing admin work. It’s a waste of cash-producing time.
Administrative help will normally cost around $40,000 in salary. Associates should start around $50,000 for the 2+ experience.

If you save a CPA 200 hours a year from admin tasks, at a base rate of $100 per hour, that’s $20,000 in additional revenues for the firm. Because the CPA will now be working on billable work. If you have 5 CPAs, now you’ve added $100,000 in revenues.
Hiring an admin for $40,000 in exchange for $100,000 in revenues is a smart investment.

Start with learning automation.
double your firmIn Chapter One of Double Your Accounting Firm, I go into much deeper detail on how to use these specific roles and turn them into a well-oiled machine.
Your first order of business to double your firm is to pick up a copy of the book.
Click here to get your copy.
After you do, it really helps when you leave a review on the book. It’ll make it much easier for other accounting firms to find the book. It’s an easy way for you to pay it forward.  
Related Articles:

  1. One, Powerful Law Can Double Your Employee Capacity
  2. Double Your Bookkeeping Revenue by Cutting 30% of Your Clients & How to Hire the Perfect Partners [Case Study]
  3. How To Create The Perfect Accounting Firm

See Jetpack Worflow In Action

Get under the hood of Jetpack Workflow’s accounting workflow and project management platform. See some of the top features and how it helps your firm standardize, automate, and track client work more efficiently.