Caleb Jenkins: Firm Growth Requires Owners to Shift Roles

Leave the stone age behind. Join the new paradigm.

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr

When Caleb Jenkins was eight, he started selling cookies to his dad’s firm during tax season. His dad told him, “For me to pay you, I need you to create an invoice for me.” So Jenkins set up his own QuickBooks file and has been playing with QuickBooks ever since, and eventually joined his dad’s firm.

Like most small firms, RLJ Financial focuses on the fundamentals of tax, bookkeeping, and payroll, but, as Jenkins says, “in the eyes of the beholder, there's really not a whole lot of value there.” However, shifting into advisory – a big talking point in recent years for the profession – is where accountants can bring “incredible value …beyond the baseline of traditional compliance services,” Jenkins says. Shifting into advisory also means “there's way more work that happens all year round.”

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