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Don’t leave me hanging on the telephone…
Each day I speak with lots of different business owners over the phone. As you would expect sometimes, I get an answerphone or an answering service. Sometime one of the team picks up the phone. At times I encounter a pleasant person who answer the phone with the firm’s name and takes the details and…
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Thinking of merging? Read this first
Mergers, on the face of it, are a great way to scale up and position the newly formed firm as larger. Finding another firm, getting ‘married’ to them and becoming one entity, often sharing resources and overheads, reducing costs, tapping in to the skills of other partners, seems like such a great idea. I…
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STOP! Here’s your solution
Social media is full of solutions, I get out my credit card and hey ho! I’ve bought a solution to a problem I didn’t realise I had. Once I’ve looked at their advert, or even stumbled across it, that’s it, it’s everywhere. You hear about mattresses in a box, well look at it once and…
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How could you become great?
The last couple of weeks we have had 2 amazing members achieve AVNExcellence Six Star, which is fantastic achievement and they both have amazing practices. Big calls out to MDH and Blend Accountants, the two practices that have made massive changes to their practices in the last few years. But at what point did they…
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When it’s just not good enough
Recently my boss said to me, that from what he had heard, one of my clients wasn’t really making progress. When I asked where he had heard this, he said from the client themselves! I was astounded and reeled off a list of all the things I know they have accomplished in the last 12…
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Held to ransom by a team member
Isn’t it funny how sometimes our good nature doesn’t always work in our favour. I have heard several stories this year of Accountants who have allowed a once trusted team member to become the most terrible of business terrorists. It often happens because we need someone to turn to, because we don’t have anyone else…
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Who holds you to account?
I would love your thoughts on this one……. My 12-year-old son had a science test set by school. He came home and we set out a revision timetable using his schoolbooks and BBC Bite Size (this is a fantastic online resource by the way to support the national educational curriculum) We provided lots of encouragement…
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Why giving a little can go a long way
In a world where everything has a price – sometimes giving a little bit of help or support can go a long way. We are also so busy that doing anything extra seems like a big ask. Many years ago, I picked up a little book called ‘Random Acts of Kindness’. If you haven’t heard…
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Improvement doesn’t happen by chance
Having a wish to improve, earn more money, work less hours doesn’t happen by chance. It happens by deciding on what you want to – having an aim and then working towards it. Often our role at AVN starts with helping Accountants determine what they want from their lives and business – this isn’t navel…
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You’re not alone.
We recently ran an event with some of our members where we shared our challenges and came up with solutions and resources to help. When we asked what the most valuable part of the day– they all said– without exception– that it has been finding out that others in the accountancy profession have the same…
