I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Hector Garcia about RightTool, a QBO navigation tool he developed with Mark Corum and Patrick Cummings.

Eeeek!

Tomorrow some of us are heading to #QBConnect and I am so looking forward to seeing old friends there, and meeting some of you IRL for the first time.

I will be overwhelmed, though - in a great way - as will many of you.

I recently had a quicky Zoom with a lovely woman from my FaceBook Group, The Workflow Wateringhole. She wanted to know the best steps to take to become a professional cloud based bookkeeper. We chatted, I gave her some advice which she said was great and she was going to follow up on it.

I decided to take that conversation from 1:1 and make it 1:many through this post.

It’s how far you go, not how fast.

― T. Rafael Cimino (ish… same concept, slightly different words)

I am a short, flat-footed klutz - I liken myself to a penguin - but that’s okay by me. I’m out there consistently - day by day, year by year. The rhythm of my feet, the time out from the world, the changing face of the seasons - it’s all so soothing.

If you are disorganized in the physical world, you will be disorganized in the cloud one.

Sure, you can search for many things in many ways in the cloud. But even the most robust of search options get dodgy if you don’t have systems in place to organize your digital world.

Operating digitally is as inefficient as operating physically if there isn’t an organized system for it.

It’s a frustrating, time-sucking dog’s breakfast either way.

Are you exhausted right now?

Most folks we know are, right?!

Together, we are all coming off a couple of tough years, and collaborating in an entirely (or mostly) virtual model requires us all to work differently. The old ways don't work as well anymore - we can't just pop our heads over the cubicle walls and ask co-workers “what’s up"?”. Instead, we have to peck things out in an email/Slack/Teams/WhatsApp… or schedule* a Zoom/call them to ask questions. It takes more work. And confusion can often reign supreme.

You are not being hired, you are engaging.

Lucky for you dear reader, this week my email is super quick. I have stuff on the go that I need to put my energy towards.

But I wanted to ship out a quick note reminding you that if you are a business owner, make sure you think like one. And make sure your communications and processes reflect it.

Accounting professionals are uniquely positioned to offer their clients business devastation insurance advice.

To mitigate the total loss of not just their livelihood but also to protect them personally.

I bet you thinking “wait, what isn’t that the role of insurance brokers?”

Yes, but… you should be a partner in this because insurance is based on business valuations and income. But by and large insurance brokers don’t follow up enough on the health of a business and owners almost always don’t take the consequences of misinformation seriously enough.

You are so not alone if you struggle with pricing your products and services!

Even the most seasoned of business owners wonder and worry if they are doing it right.

It’s a fine balance between leaving money on the table and pricing yourself too high on the work you really want.

And then buckle down to make it happen.

I am going through big changes in my business right now. And as I preach “Change is hard. Not changing will be harder.”

I have really nailed down what lifestyle I want. I think many of you may be navel-gazing right now as well. The last few years have got a lot of folks re-evaluating their lives and their work.

I should have replaced my computer a few months ago.

It was freezing, and took a looooong time to start up (I had it set to shut-down & start-up automagically every morning, but it stopped starting up without me)

I was frustrated, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to part with it.

It worked just well enough to get through my day until one day it didn’t.

In the days of old, as in less than a decade ago, the technology was far different than today. And the mundane task load was heavy. Opening mail, entering transactions, cutting cheques, printing invoices, mailing stuff…and then filing, filing, filing!

Not anymore more. Cloud technology has changed all that.

I was still enjoying virtual workshops, open mic, and panel discussions - any session that was meeting format rather than webbie format.

I didn’t love them though, and I am so happy to be back in the live event world.

But a thing happened last week at a virtual conference that I’m not sure could be replicated IRL.

QBO Tech Tip - Dealing with bank feed orphans

It will be harder to step in it, if you have a clear idea of who you are dealing with.

My Dad* is a bit of a rough & tumble guy. He wears Carhartt coveralls, a green polka-dot welder’s cap and is generally a little scruffy. Clean but definitely scruffy. He looks like your average working Joe and talks like one too. He loves a good convo about backhoes and tractors while sitting at a bar with buddies.

If you can swing it at all, go to a live event.

I think my biggest takeaway from the AWLS conference was that I need to think about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion much more.

You didn’t see that coming as the most important thing that I got out of an accounting conference, did ya?

Actually, I’ve made too many to count but last week I made a mitake that I want to share.

I got out ahead of myself on my free online scheduler event, in terms of sponsorship.

I did not think it through and put an automated process (or really any process) in place. I just sent out a note to my app partners to see if they wanted to join in, on a bit of a whim.

A blog about dogs and loyalty. We can learn a lot about it from our canine friends.

Take a few minutes to assess if you are creating sustainable client loyalty.

Work through what you are doing well and craft up ways to improve where you are falling down.

My corporate and personal tax experience is a calm and, dare I say, enjoyable (almost) one.

My tax dude, Mike, sends a Typeform , I fill in only new/changed info.

Then he sends a Karbon checklist, which auto-nags me to get my shit into him - including warnings of the consequences of missing his deadlines.

Next up is an Ignition engagement with the option to pay for and schedule a tax planning meeting - right, this is extra and I have to commit to it with my wallet.

He uses RightSignature for me to sign off on my tax returns.

All of it is automagical!

Yesterday I celebrated my 60th year of being 5 feet above.

I am off making poor life choices in Key West as this blog is posting. Not all my friends have had the same privilege. So I never lose sight of how precious life is, and how fun it can be.

A lot of the fun comes from embracing change and adapting.