Nicola Fowler shares what she’s achieved in the first few months of joining AVN.
It’s been quite a four months. At the very beginning I found it really tough. I was being asked questions and having to pull back and look at what things were really like, and that was hard. But I kept reminding myself that this is the basis we start from.
Emma has been brilliant, so easy to talk to, sensible and matter of fact. We just started picking things off. Right at the start I said I wasn’t going to be one of those people who claims their turnover’s gone to half a million in four months; I knew it would never be like that. Emma said, “No, no — we just do everything you need, your way.” And I can see how far I’ve come, mainly in my knowledge of the business and understanding where I’m going. I came from quite a low base: no procedures, not really tracking much at all. Sometimes I feel like I’ve not come far, and then Emma reminds me just how much I’ve done.
The biggest change is in me; I feel like I’ve found my business head again. I can see where the business will go and what we need to do, and I’m not overwhelmed by it. Whenever I do start to feel that way I can pull it back, knowing I’ll be chatting to Emma the following week. We talk it through, come up with solutions, and move on. I honestly don’t know where I’d be if I hadn’t been doing this over the last four months.
Getting a handle on the business
Some of the frustrations are still there. I still need to move work over but I’m far more aware of them now. When I was first asked how much scope creep there was in our work, I gave quite a low figure; now I know it’s much higher. Before, we were doing the work and charging a price, but I didn’t really have a handle on that price. Now I know what clients should be paying and what I’ve quoted, and I shouldn’t be giving more than that without a pricing conversation.
Because I’m being honest with the people I work with, they’re getting on board too. My colleague Anita, who’s worked with me for a long time, is getting to the point where she’s angry about this stuff now. And I said that’s exactly where I want her, because now she wants to do something about it. We enabled the clients, we know that, but we’ve reached the point where it has to stop. It’s like turning a super tanker; it doesn’t happen overnight but it helps knowing the direction of travel.
I never used to track my fees or my whole fee structure. Now I’ve got work-in-progress spreadsheets set up, I’m tracking quotes far more, and we’re building ways for the whole team to see what’s been quoted, so everyone knows what a client should and shouldn’t be getting. It’s been a real shift in self-awareness. We’re moving away from that old sole-trader mentality of just two mums getting the kids to school, to realising we’re a proper business with employees.
What’s next
A lot of it is putting procedures in place so I can move work over to other people. February and March will be all about pricing; we’re bringing in pricing software to standardise prices. I did the Earn More course with Jenny, and because no one else was on it, it was like two hours of extra one-to-one coaching — fabulous. Some of the solutions are simple once you see them, like how to measure scope creep. With Making Tax Digital, and our pricing being seasonal, April will be the major change to the pricing structure and to how we handle client work and deadlines.
We’re also automating more. We use Scribe to create procedures and resources so we’re not doing the same things over and over. And we’re getting everyone onto Making Tax Digital and checking our software is compatible. I’ve got the team taking ownership of different areas, and we’re all working together. It’s much more of a plan than I’ve ever had.
I always have one eye on what’s coming — marketing and defining my ideal client will come later, because right now we’re getting the foundations right so we can build on them. I went through the AVN stages early on and it all made a lot of sense. So even though it isn’t easy yet, I know to trust the process, and it’s working.
My advice to other accountants
I’d tried another group before, and I’d tried doing it on my own — neither worked. When I saw Shane’s ACCA sessions it came at the right time; it was very practical, and he couldn’t have described the situation I was in so accurately unless he’d seen lots of people like me. It’s easy to feel like you’re failing, and then you realise there are lots of us “failures” out there and AVN knows how to turn us around.
The other thing is you’ve just got to do something and commit to it. This works, but you also have to make it work. Be honest with yourself, make the time even when you’re time poor, and work with it. Make that leap, say you’re prepared to do something, and it will work. You just don’t get there on your own.