Old School vs New School

Sam Cherry CA

Business Sales | Valuations | Advice

Published May 22, 2016

No, I’m not talking about vinyl vs digital (well, not today anyway).

I’m talking about accountants.

I recently had a conversation with an accountant with a few years under his belt, who was telling me he has an issue with these so called ‘next generation’ accounting firms, that are doing things differently from ‘the way things have always been done’.

He didn’t like the way they used names such as “RightWay” instead of ‘Charriot & Associates’, and he sure as hell didn’t like that we were ambitious and actively trying to grow our client base.

He then went on to tell me that his reason for this view is that he’s of the ‘Old School’ and doesn’t see why things need to be any different from the way he’s always run his practice.

I bit my tongue, and stopped him there. I then proceeded to tell him that he may be of the Old School but I am of the New School, and we’re changing the game in the accounting world for the benefit of small business.

So I decided to explain the difference between Old and New:

Old School

·      Reactive
·      Spends time (paid for by the client) manually entering data from the client’s accounting system into their own system so they can produce a set of accounts
·      Tells the client what they need instead of listening to what they need
·      Meets once a year with the client, talks about tax only.

New School

·      Proactive
·      Works in the same cloud-based accounting system as their clients
·      Acts as a ‘Virtual CFO’ to small business owners
·      Works out what the customer wants and works back from that
·      Meets regularly with their clients with a set of management reports, talks about whatever is keeping the business owner awake at 2am.

Not sure if he really got it, but I know small business owners get it and that’s all that really matters, right?

Jeff Gordon CPA

Finance Management Professional (Finance Manager) with expertise across Finance, Operations and Administration. Highly Analytical, Profit, Growth & Results focused. Driving business and financial efficiency.

10,000 tax accountants will be retiring in the next 5 years so the old school will be lessened and their clients will be "inducted" to the new school.

1 Reaction

Robin Snelling

Virtual CFO at The Virtual CFO Group Australia and ceefo | Co-Founder of Association of Virtual CFOs

I completely agree with you, Sam. The old way market is diminishing and will continue to erode. The new way sees the big picture for clients, which opens up a whole new horizon of opportunities. The key issue for accountants is whether they can transition from the narrow perspective of tax and compliance to a broader commercial view. Even when a tax accountant struggles with the concept of doing virtual CFO work themselves, they can still provide this client service by partnering with a specialist virtual CFO. This will improve their client loyalty, their value to their clients and their fee base.