Recruitment Series Archives - humanisethenumbers.online

Episode 128: Russ Byrd and Vicky Link of Byrd + Link.

Paul Shrimpling — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 13:26:00 +0000

It's such a privilege when you get the chance to speak to a couple of business leaders who founded a firm with nothing just a few years ago – in fact, set the business up during lockdown – and then have grown rapidly since then.
Last year, the business grew by 60%, and the year before by 25%. This year, they’re looking to grow in excess of 25-30% again, possibly more.
It was a terrific opportunity to spend some time with Vicky and Russ from Byrd & Link – an audit specialist, as it happens – to discover the insights, the lessons, the strategies, that they've been applying to their business to fully engage with their team and, at the same time, build an offer that's meaningful and valuable to their client base, which include accountants, not just business leaders in need of an audit.
I hope you find real value and insight looking at an audit specialist and seeing how their lessons can be applied to your own firm. I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as I did.
Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Vicky and Russ and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

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Episode 125: Billie Mcloughlin, Practice Consultant at 20:20 Innovation Training Ltd

Paul Shrimpling — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 14:14:16 +0000

It's just brilliant to have a chance to speak to an accountant who has worked in practice – right at the centre of adopting technology – who then moves on to being a provider to the accountancy profession. But rather than being a provider of software services, Billie Mcloughlin is part of the 20:20 Innovation team.
She’s working with a large number of leaders and managers across many firms and uncovering how they're adapting to the changes that are hitting the profession.
It’s great to have an opportunity to tap into Billie's insights around the fact that it's a growing firm that creates opportunities for your key people – and that's a challenge. The technology, AI in particular, is coming at us like a train, and that is a challenge too.
And then there is the challenge of demonstrating value to clients, because it's not just about 'Ooh, we saved you some tax' – it's about much more than that.
I hope you enjoy and find value in this conversation with Billie.

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Episode 123: Hayley Plimley, Director of Marketing and Communications at DJH

Paul Shrimpling — Mon, 17 Feb 2025 15:16:22 +0000

It's clear that, if you want to grow your accountancy firm, you need to master the art (or indeed science) of marketing and communications.
On this Humanise the Numbers podcast discussion with Hayley Plimley, Marketing and Communications Director at DJH, Hayley's been party to a journey from one office with a team of 60 people to 10 offices with a team of 568 people, in just four years.
You can imagine the communication and marketing challenges associated with that! In our discussion, we unpick what's helped Hayley do a cracking job of marketing and communications in such a high-functioning, high-performing, high-growth business.
Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Hayley and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

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Episode 117: Kat Wellum-Kent of Fractional Finance

Paul Shrimpling — Fri, 29 Nov 2024 13:51:33 +0000

What must it feel like to leave a promising, high-flying career with a leading firm and start up your own firm – to hand your notice in and, six months later, kick-start your accountancy firm with one client?
Well, that's exactly what Kat Wellum-Kent has done. She set up Fractional Finance and has grown that to a business with a fairly clear vision of building a £5 million turnover business in just five years. She already has clients paying her, yes, £400 a month, but also clients paying her £7500 a month.
On this podcast, you'll hear Kat share her insights around fairness for the team and the vision based around how this will play out for her clients and the capital value that she's going to help them grow. She shares the importance of building a vision board and having good reasons for why you're doing what you're doing, so that in those moments where it gets tough, you can have a quick check-in on your vision board and say, yeah, I'm on the right path.
Why not go to this podcast discussion with Kat Wellum-Kent to hear those deep insights and see how they might apply to your established firm, or your startup firm, or the firm that you've got in your mind's eye that you're looking to set up in the not-too-distant future. I'm certain you'll get great value and enjoy the discussion we have together.

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Episode 96: Conrad Ford and Sophie Hossack of Allica Bank

Paul Shrimpling — Thu, 30 Nov 2023 13:50:49 +0000

It's not surprising that I'd be so excited about welcoming two of the leaders of the fastest growing tech company in the UK and, according to Deloitte's, the third fastest growing tech company of all time, Allica Bank.
On this Humanise the Numbers podcast, we welcome Conrad Ford and Sophie Hossack, who share powerful insights, valuable ideas and principles around growth – and they should know, given the rate of growth they're experiencing at the moment.
If you want to hear Sophie and Conrad unpack some of the principles behind their rapid growth and how it connects and is relevant to you and your accounting firm, then please go to www.humanisethenumbers.online or go to your favourite podcast platform.
I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as I have, and I hope you'll take one or two of the insights and turn them into decision-making and action across your firm. I look forward to seeing you there.
Scroll down this podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Conrad and Sophie and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

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Episode 90: Robert Fiford, MD at djca Accountants

Paul Shrimpling — Fri, 29 Sep 2023 10:16:00 +0000

It can't be easy to transform an accountancy firm from one that's charging clients about £200 a month to one that's charging clients in excess of £1000 a month.
It can't be easy to grow from scratch an offshoring team out in the Philippines – from zero to ten in just twelve months.
And it can't be easy to approach every one of your 30 team members across two locations and ensure that every one of them gets what they want out of working in your practice, on a really personal level.
That's what Robert Fiford of DJCA has done and, in this Humanise The Numbers podcast, he shares how he's done it. I found this discussion wide-ranging, only because Robert has so many insights to share.
I hope you enjoy this discussion as much as I did and I hope you can take away one, two, three, or possibly even six or seven, high-value elements of this podcast. Please go to www.humanisethenumbers.online or to your favourite podcast platform. I'll see you there.
Scroll down this episode page for the contact information for Robert and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

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Episode 81: Lucy Cohen, Co-founder of Mazuma

Paul Shrimpling — Fri, 02 Jun 2023 16:20:00 +0000

When we started the Humanise the Numbers podcast, it was a bit of an experiment to see if there was any life in talking with leaders of accounting firms and some of the top advisors to the profession from around the world. And now, two years on, it's no longer an experiment, because I consider it a privilege to be able to have deep, meaningful, valuable conversations with leaders in the profession. And it's not surprising, is it, when you come across a great leader of a great firm, that they'd want to focus on reducing the grunt work, they'd want to have a real systems approach to support reducing the grunt work. They'd want to recruit and support the right people and at the same time build in accountability so that high performance can be measured. And that's exactly what Lucy Cohen at Mazuma is doing. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed this conversation with Lucy, especially the value of the small comments that Lucy makes throughout the discussion. And if you've followed what we do at Remarkable Practice and my obsession with KPIs (Key Predictive Indicators, not just Key Performance Indicators), I was very keen to understand Lucy's approach to measuring the performance of the team and how she brings that to bear, so that their 35-strong team have a sense of achievement and deliver a great result across their 3000 clients. This is a really interesting team member-to-client ratio, and they actually measure the number of calls that take place between clients and team members – approximately 750 calls a week. It's definitely worth your while to check out this Humanise The Numbers podcast with Lucy Cohen from Mazuma. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did, please scroll down the page for the contact information for Lucy and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

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Episode 70: Michael Hemme of MDH

Paul Shrimpling — Tue, 31 Jan 2023 10:57:55 +0000

How do you change, even as a sole practitioner, the tone of the work in your firm so that you become increasingly valuable to your clients, so that your clients are willing to pay more money for what you do with them and for them?
In this podcast discussion with Michael Hemme of MDH, an accountancy firm in Croydon, you’ll hear Michael share what he’s doing to build what he calls “soft” skills. I call them hard, because I think that the human skills, the conversation skills, come less naturally to accountants because of the way they’re trained and because of their focus on the numbers.
But those human skills, those conversation skills, ultimately determine your true value in your clients’ hearts and minds, and Michael seems wholeheartedly committed to building the knowledge and skills of his team so that they can have more high-value conversations with his clients.
It's a really worthwhile conversation on many levels, including his willingness to actually dig out some ancient history – he talks about a Dale Carnegie book, which is the best part of 50 years old, and on which I relied in my early formative years in business, and he uses the insights and the principles of great conversation that were the same 50 years ago as they are today.
He then works with his team on developing those skills so that he builds stronger relationships or, rather, his team build stronger relationships with his clients. Clients become more loyal, they’re more likely to recommend the firm and they’re more likely and happier to pay more as well.
If you are tempted to listen to what Michael’s got to say in more detail, please go to humanisethenumbers.online or to your favourite podcast platform and look out for that podcast with Michael Hemme.

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Episode 61: Sam Mitcham of SJCM Accountancy

Paul Shrimpling — Wed, 14 Sep 2022 11:48:00 +0000

How do you and your firm win younger, dynamic clients with a long lifetime value (because of their age), if you are able to do a brilliant job of looking after their businesses?
As a firm, you and your client portfolio have almost certainly got clients who started young with a small business and then grew them into substantial businesses. So, how do you tap into that younger audience?
In this podcast discussion with Sam Mitcham, you’ll learn how Sam, though in the early stages of building a successful accounting firm, demonstrated energy and enthusiasm in winning the 200 clients she's already got, despite only setting the business up a couple of years ago. Discover her methodology of appealing to and attracting younger business owners.
Why not join Sam and I on this humanisethenumbers.online podcast discussion, or go to your favourite podcast platform and locate it there, and you'll hear Sam share her insights into the use of social media and marketing, as well as a number of other profoundly powerful insights on how to grow and, at times, hold back from growth when it really matters. I hope you enjoy this podcast with Sam as much as I did.

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Episode 60: Andrew Jordan of Connect 4

Paul Shrimpling — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 11:37:00 +0000

If there are two things that ultimately, fundamentally influence the success of your accounting firm, it's your firm's ability to retain and recruit the right people and build your team and to recruit and retain the right clients.
So, it was a real pleasure to welcome Andrew Jordan of Connect 4 onto a podcast discussion where we actually unpacked, thanks to Andrew's experiences at BDO, his experiences of establishing Fathom in the UK (the KPI reporting tool, Fathom), and his experiences of founding and growing Connect 4 in the UK.
Andrew shares some brilliant insights into building client relationships and therefore building the loyalty clients have for your firm, their willingness to stay, to buy additional services and also recommend you and your firm, but also how your approach to client relationships has a serious impact on your ability to retain and therefore probably recruit new high quality team members.
So why not join Andrew and I on this humanisethenumbers.online podcast and see what you can take from it and apply it to your firm, so that you can help transform and grow the success of your firm.

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