Even without a start in public accounting, (or perhaps because of that) Rich Stang built a powerhouse of a firm by focusing heavily on one thing – Hiring for culture.In this podcast he dives into how his team is the source of that growth and success. The art of hiring well takes finesse and several counter-intuitive perspectives, some of which Rich explores in today’s episode.

In 2019 we helped Jim sell his CPA practice in the Washington, DC area and we wanted to share with you a bit about what it was like for him to successfully go through that process.He talks about taking the leap to start his own firm, how he decided to exit, and what he wished he had known in the midst of managing his firm.A pearl of wisdom that Jim shared with us in this episode is that: “You gotta understand one thing…you only have so many tax seasons in you.”

Guess what? You don’t get to choose whether or not you have a brand; you either have a weak brand or you have a strong brand.That’s just one of the powerful ideas that Matt Wilkinson and Maggie Antone share in this episode of The Accountant’s Flight Plan Podcast. Listen in (or watch) to learn from Maggie, a seasoned branding expert who’s worked with big brands such as Coca Cola, BP, McDonald’s, and World Vision, to name a few. She and Matt created Troika to focus just on branding for accounting firms.

If you’ve listened to this podcast for any amount of time you’ll know we usually focus on business fundamentals over tech, but Gusto was an exception to the rule.At Poe Group Advisors, we switched to Gusto for our payroll this summer and it’s incredibly easy to use. I haven’t been this excited about a software in a long time. It’s one of those companies where after you integrate it you sit there and think “Man, why didn’t I think of this?”

It’s no coincidence that niche rhymes with rich.Brandon Hall is the CEO of the Real Estate CPA. His company provides advisory, accounting and tax services to real estate investors. Brandon is also a CPA and a national speaker. Listen in about how he built his fast-growing, highly focused CPA firm, and his unique insights into the world of accounting and real estate.If you have been thinking about differentiating yourself by narrowing your focus, then you don’t want to miss this one!

Recruiting and retaining accounting talent is one of the most challenging and impactful responsibilities for CPA practice owners, so you don’t want to miss this one. Mark Goldman is the founder of MGR Accounting Recruiters in San Antonio, Texas. He has over 20 years of accounting experience and has served on the board of directors for the Texas Society of CPAs, the San Antonio Chapter of TSCPA, and Institute of Management Accountants and the American Payroll Association. He is extremely knowledgeable in the area of hiring and recruiting for accountants.

Wayne is the founder of both The Back Room, and Findlay & Co Chartered Accountants in New Zealand. Wayne transformed (and sold) his local accounting firm to go on to build a global business for Accountants by creating incredible processes and cutting-edge methods to increasing capacity. This is one you don’t want to miss!

We have a very special guest on our podcast today. Alan Miltz is a co-author of the global best-selling book – Scaling Up by Verne Harnish. Alan is a renowned author and speaker who is dedicated to helping companies scale up their profits. His techniques and Optimist software have become a global standard and are used by 500 Global Banks and 30,000 businesses! The common theme in Alan’s business is to make the complex simple.

Daniel Moshe is a successful entrepreneur and renowned speaker. Daniel founded Tech Guru out of his dorm room during his freshman year of college!Fast-forward to today, and Tech Guru has grown into a successful nationwide firm specializing in IT services ONLY for accounting firms. They are currently in “growth mode” with the increased need for remote systems.

Carrie and Sean have some great insights to the process of owning, hiring, training, and working remotely in a virtual world that may be new to many. They were the owners of Gnarlybooks.ca and managed a team of 14 remotely throughout Canada. They operated a full-service cloud-based bookkeeping and accounting firm with the fundamental concept of ‘Helping More’. With this belief, all decisions, operations, and approaches were based on this core philosophy at GnarlyBooks. This certainly pertains to employee retention, motivation, and engagement as much as it pertained to both customer satisfaction and business growth.