A perennial TSOE fav, Ron and Ed were pleased to welcome back to the show for a fourth time, Joe Woodard. They talked about the state of the accounting profession and shared a preview of what will be happening at Joe's upcoming conference, Scaling New Heights.

Before we get to the show notes, here is a bit more about Joe…

As an author, consultant, business coach, and national speaker, Joe has trained over 125,000 accounting and business professionals in areas of practice development, changing technology trends, strategic consulting, and how to maximize the use of accounting software in their practices. In 2012, 2014-2019, Joe was recognized by Accounting Today as one of the Top 100 Influential People within the accounting profession. Joe has been featured repeatedly in Insightful Accountant, Accounting Today and AccountingWEB in both articles and in video interviews. Joe is the managing member of Woodard Events, LLC which provides education, coaching, resources and a Community for small business advisors.

Here are some brief show notes. Use these to follow along while listening to the show.

4 times on the show for Joe! Congratulations as you are only one step away from joining the 5-timers club.
It turns out that Joe’s conference — Scaling New Heights — is the nation’s largest accounting technology showcase under a single roof. Well done!
Joe noticed an interesting sub-demographic slice when he ran a live show during COVID times. The attendees were risk tolerant, entrepreneurial, and always moving forward.
Joe noticed that bookkeepers went from “adopt” to “adopt more strategically” as COVID forced technology choices. In other words they were much more intentional, careful, structured, and standardized in their technology choices.
Ed, Joe, and Ron are lucky because they are in a bubble when it comes to technology adoption and the bookkeepers they are exposed to. These folks really get it! (And if you are reading this, you’re probably one of them)
Lots of great things happened to the accounting tech industry over the last two years. What opportunities did bookkeepers and accountants miss over that time period? As an industry, we didn’t charge for work related to PPP.
On Joe’s site at https://www.woodard.com/webinars there is a class called “I can’t see” which features the 10 pain points accountants and bookkeepers face with the day in, day out interactions with their clients.
“Anything you can pull off a financial statement is by definition a lagging indicator. It’s like timing your cookies with a smoke alarm.” —Ron Baker
Clients don’t value your services because they are like all of your competitor’s services. Differentiated nature of your services and differentiated brand are just two ways to move further out on the y-axis.
Take a moment to refresh yourself about the Cobb Value Curve, explained by William Cobb at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDGoTjF6RI4
“We’re not paying our people enough and that’s because we’re not charging our clients enough.” There is absolutely nothing wrong with this statement from Joe.
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The secret is purpose according to Disney. For example, Disney’s purpose statement is, “We create happiness.” Thinking through this, you can be off task as long as you are on purpose.
What is Joe concerned about in the business world, particularly in the United States? He’s concerned about small businesses lack of ability to break past the barrier of taxation and regulation.
Speaking of purpose, what does Joe state as the purpose of the Woodard organization? “We empower small business advisors.”
Ed has future glee! And so does Joe. In fact, Joe has future glee about the fact that we can elevate accountants and bookkeepers into business coaches.
One of Joe’s favorite quotes, “Business must be run at a profit, else it will die. But when anyone tries to run a business solely for profit, then also the business must die, for it no longer has a reason for existence.” —Henry Ford
Joe nailed it today —> For bookkeepers and accountants, the biggest barrier to the subscription model is a focus on the individual profitability by client.
“If you let the camel’s nose in the tent, you get a camel in the tent.” This is a great quote Joe used to describe why NO change order is too small. Hilarious and fitting!
A big THANK YOU to Joe for joining us today. His conference — Scaling New Heights — is coming up next month! More info at this link https://www.woodard.com/2022-scaling-new-heights

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.

This week was bonus episode 393 - “Purpose and the employee”. Here are a few links discussed: