Episode #502: Geraldine's Guide to Greatness for CPAs

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SHOW SUMMARY: Join Ed and Ron for an enlightening interview with Geraldine Carter, a consultant to CPA firms and author of the transformative book "Down to 40 Hours: A Roadmap for CPAs to End Overworking Without Giving Up Revenue." Geraldine's mission is to help overworked CPAs reclaim their time and create the accounting firms and lives they've always dreamed of. Since 2016, Geraldine has been coaching CPAs, bringing a unique perspective from her experience as a client who has worked with numerous bookkeepers, accountants, and CPAs. She'll provide insights into her coaching approach and how her book offers a practical roadmap for CPAs to reduce overworking without sacrificing revenue. We'll also delve into Geraldine's adventurous spirit, shaped by guiding luxury travel adventures across all seven continents and 50+ countries, and how her experiences have enriched her coaching philosophy. Tune in to hear about her impressive athletic achievements, including marathons and an Ironman, and how she balances her professional life with living in the mountains of Idaho with her two young children.

ABOUT GERALDINE CARTER

Geraldine Carter helps overworked CPAs create the accounting firm and the life they have always wanted.

  • How did you get to coaching CPAs? I was coaching a variety of business owners when two CPAs reached out simultaneously to ask if I could help them with their businesses.

  • But you’re not a CPA, right? Nope. Tax gives me hives. I speak 3 languages; tax is not one of them.

  • Connect the dots then? Here’s the string you need: I have a degree in Civil & Environmental Engineering from Cornell University. I think in numbers and formulas. When I co-founded a company in 2008, I fell into managing the money and the operations because of my background. That’s how I came to appreciate accounting. I bring the perspective of the buyer (your client) to the table. I know what it’s like to be in your client’s shoes because I’ve paid half a dozen bookkeepers, accountants, and CPAs.

  • How long have you been coaching CPAs? Since 2016.

  • What was the company you co-founded? Climate Ride. It’s granted more than $13M to support conservation, climate, sustainability, and active transportation. It’s awesome – check it out.

  • What else has shaped your worldview? For ten years, I guided adventures for a luxury travel company. I have been to all seven continents and 50+ countries. I carry a French passport; it came in handy. My academic education was excellent, but nothing taught me more than spending time in faraway places.

SHOW NOTES

Segment one

  • Geraldine Carter is our guest today! She is all about helping you work less without losing revenue or hiring. I like her already!!! More here: https://geraldinecarter.com/ 

  • Geraldine Carter’s book is “Down to 40 Hours: A Roadmap for CPAs to End Overworking Without Giving Up Revenue” https://www.amazon.com/Down-40-Hours-Roadmap-Overworking/dp/B0CYY1PGT2 

  • Accountants are excellent at complexity and these puzzles that most of the rest of us cannot solve. [they think] if it's simple, it must be obvious and easy and somebody would have figured it out by now.

  • Hilarious from Geraldine Carter today: “83% of people think that they are better than average.”

  • With respect to pricing your services, “If we do a clean sweep of your client roster and adjust your pricing, you will feel a significant difference inside a month or two. .” —Geraldine Carter

Segment two

  • From Geraldine: The [accounting] profession has set itself up for what it's experiencing right now, by not learning the fundamentals of business, by ignoring value, by ignoring pricing tools, by ignoring positioning and niching

  • “It's wonderful that AI is coming in at a great time to relieve the shortage, but I think that fundamentally CPAs who are in business need to learn business fundamentals.” —Geraldine Carter

  • “We go into [public accounting] because we want to work with a variety of different businesses. That's great for your intellectual curiosity, but it sucks to build a business like that.” Ron Baker

  • So how should an accountant look at pricing? Here’s a great quip from Geraldine Carter, “So, accountants are already creating transformations, and the transformation is where the most value is. But the accountant is pricing the service instead of pricing the transformation.” 

Segment three

  • Geraldine has a great phrase in her book called horizontal niching. Simply put this is niching by topic, instead of niching by industry.

  • “What I see for accountants and CPAs is niching by psychographic just doesn't have near the juice from the squeeze as niching by vertical or niching by horizontal.” —Geraldine Carter

  • “Going through the exercise of creating a website forces you to get clear about who you serve, what value you create for them, how you serve them, what outcomes you deliver, and how you price.” —Geraldine Carter

  • “Most of us didn't go to business school and, even if we did, we wouldn't have gotten the education that we needed to be high quality business owners…skilled business owners.” —Geraldine Carter

Segment four

Bonus Content is Available As Well

Did you know that each week after our live show, Ron and Ed take to the microphone for a bonus show? Typically, this bonus show is an extension of the live show topic (sometimes even with the same guest) and a few other pieces of news, current events, or things that have caught our attention.

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