How to work with your accountant to get the best results

expense management
Businessman accountant working analyzing and calculating expense financial annual financial report balance sheet statement, doing finance making notes on report.

Your accountant might have a talent for getting thousands of cyphers neatly lined up in a row. Your accountant also has a knack for identifying where to tighten up your processes to improve revenue-generation in your business.

However, your accountant’s role is far more involved than that. You need to be able to pick up the phone and schedule a meeting as often as you feel you need guidance. It’s about building a long-term relationship that will foster growth in your business and develop trust between you and your confidant.

In short, your accountant is your best friend in the business. How can you work together to get the best possible results?

Embrace the raw truths: Come with honesty in hand

Do you feel comfortable with your accountant? Can you bring your brutal truth into the meeting room when you meet, or do you find yourself wanting to gloss over certain elements in your accounting books? You can’t address an issue if you’re not ready to face it in its truth. Visiting your accountant requires you to prepare yourself for the truth and to be honest about your books. If your profits are looking poor, there’s no need to feel ashamed, your accountant is here to work with whatever you bring into the meeting room. The more honest you are, the better the chances of addressing the issue at its root and improving the performance of your business.

Utilise all the tools and innovations available

It can be difficult to move with the times, especially if you’ve been in business for decades and have an established invoicing system on paper that you have grown familiar with. Utilising the tools your accountant has for you will give you better control over your accounting systems and enable you to get more value out of your accounting service. Getting organised makes it easier and faster for you and for your accountant to provide you with a better service. Learning these systems will also provide you with better insights, some of these tools actually give you real-time insights that enable you to predict your turnover ahead of time. Plus, automation is key in reducing your running costs. The challenge lies in changing your mindset and embracing new innovations. But your accountant will advise on the programs they work with in order to give your business the best results.

Build a long term relationship with one accountant

You have to view your accountant as your confidant. Someone you trust implicitly. For some, that means choosing an accountant that comes with a combination of superb qualifications and experience but also a friendly and personable disposition. There must room for a long term relationship to grow so that the growth of your business remains in the hands of the same trusted professional. Much like developing a relationship of trust with your physician, it pays off as your accountant gets to know your business, understand its potential weak points and strengths, and gets to know how you operate.

Understanding the value you can expect to get from working with an accountant

Your accountant is skilled at analysing and optimising various parts of the business. In order to fix elements in the finance department, your accountant needs a holistic view of the entire business. From there, systems can be implemented that work with your unique workplace dynamics. There’s no one-size-fits-all system. The financial flow of your business, along with your goals, your business setup, and your challenges, define how your accountant will simplify the way in which you manage your finances.

Sonia Gibson, Founding Director, Accounting Heart Chartered Accountants