Paul Shrimpling : 0:05

Welcome to the Humanize the Numbers podcast series Leaders, managers and owners of ambitious accounting firms sharing insights, successes and issues that will challenge you and connect you and your firm to the ways and means of transforming your firm's results.

Stephen Paul: 0:22

Every single time I look at the news, I look at social media, I hear about mental health, I hear about people that are having challenges, but what we do as business owners is we lock ourselves away in our own silo. Now, one of the things I shared with you before was I wrote in a journal that I felt trapped by value. Imagine if I sit and I'd say that to a client. Two years ago I felt trapped by my own business, but now I had three weeks away in Dubai and Mauritius. What I've now got is I've got a connection with that client, but also I'm saying to them I've suffered, I've had pain. By being human ourselves with the clients we've known for years. They will suddenly spin it back and say I felt like that. Can you help me with this?

Stephen Paul: 1:11

You probably know what their pain points are anyway, Because you probably, if you've dealt with them for 15, 20 years, you know what the wife, what the husband, what the kids are called. You've seen the kids grow up. You've heard about the journey. You've heard about the story it's. You've seen the kids grow up. You've heard about the journey. You've heard about the story it's. Just what you're now doing is you're opening up yourself a little bit. You're being vulnerable a little bit to help them be vulnerable and as soon as you've got that, you've got connection. Now what you've got to do and you're going to be really, really careful here is you don't want miserable people in a room. You've got to give them how do we get out of this? A vision, a journey.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:48

When a well-established accountant with over 900 clients launches a new page on their website called the Human Accountant, they make themselves instantly relevant to this podcast. But how does a human accountant use technology? How does a human accountant connect best with their clients and best with the team? That's what you're about to discover on this podcast.

Stephen Paul: 2:12

Hi, I'm Stephen Paul. I'm the founder of Valued. I started back in 2011. It seems like a lifetime ago now it does. I specialize in helping small business owners achieve their potential, so actually working with them to understand their goals, their objectives, what it is that they're trying to achieve, and helping them to actually humanise their numbers. But also, more importantly for me, I'm a dad. I'm a husband and I love to spend time with my family just to actually be there as a dad and understand that conflict that we all have at times between being a business owner and being a family person as well brilliant.

Paul Shrimpling : 2:48

It's great to have you on the pod, steven. Thank you, um thanks, paul. Would you just give us a a bit of insight in and around the the firm you know number of team members, number of customers just so we get a sense of the? Um scale and nature of the work that you do? Stephen, please?

Stephen Paul: 3:04

yeah definitely so. As I say, I started value back in 2011. In 2012, we became zero's fastest growing partner. It was unexpected at the time. In reality, if I should take a step back, I found out that my mom had terminal cancer. I wanted to spend time with her, so, instead of actually working 60 70 hours in my old partnership, I decided I would go alone. By going alone, I bought my clients that I looked after at the time. That was great, but I got involved in the zero journey from day one.

Stephen Paul: 3:34

All of a sudden, we became their fastest growing partner, which meant we were number one on the listing on zero. So we ended up getting clients all over the world all over the country predominantly, to be fair, but there was a few that were international as well and all of a sudden, it was a case of actually there's three of us in this business. This doesn't work anymore. We need to grow and we need to go pretty quickly here. Where we're at today is we have 16 in the business. We service around about 900 clients throughout the UK, normally specialising in that small to medium-sized business. We don't do audits. It's normally up to 1.8,. 2 million pound turnover is our ideal sweet spot.

Paul Shrimpling : 4:14

Right, so 16 people, 900 clients. So that's a lot of clients across 16 people. Stephen, it is it is how do you make that work?

Stephen Paul: 4:24

Yeah, a big part of it is it's actually understanding what the client wants and then using the technology to actually make those efficiencies. So actually making sure that we have the right systems in place for each of our clients so that we're getting the information we need on a timely basis. It means we can actually get that work prepared for them. Great systems, great processes, but also making sure that we're working with the right type of clients A huge thing, paul, you'll have heard this over the years Don't work with people that actually don't fit your model, because as soon as you do that, it starts to spoil everything that you've got.

Paul Shrimpling : 5:01

Yeah, absolutely. We'll unpack that a little bit as we go on, for sure, um, so I've got this. I can see three avenues that I'm looking at here. One is that you know small, small business, their potential, their goals question. I want to go down that route. And then also the uh, how do you build in those technology, process efficiency systems? And then we'll unpack also that right, right clients and not the wrong clients piece as well. But before we get there, what, um, what's your given? You've been on a, you know, practice journey for well before 2011, but this, this firm's journey since 2011, um, what does the phrase humanize the numbers mean to you? Humanise the numbers?

Stephen Paul: 5:46

it is everything that is important to me as a business owner, as an accountant, it's the most critical word that I use human, I think as a profession, we forget the human side of the business. So when we're going through COVID and we've got clients that have just closed down overnight, we've got clients that actually can't work. We've got clients that actually can't work. We've got clients that are suffering and exactly the same that we've got now we've got inflation dropping but potentially interest rates changing and a lot of uncertainty. We forget about the human side, the human behind the business. So every single relationship I have with the client is based around the human aspect. Your business is a tool to give you the life and the money and the purpose that you want. What we've got to do as a profession is we've got to understand our clients why and purpose. As soon as we're understanding their why and their purpose, we can actually help them to help themselves through their business to get a better life.

Stephen Paul: 6:45

It's so important to me, paul, I just I get so hung up on the fact and I've done this, I've been really guilty of it we look on instagram, we look on linkedin and we think, well, I'm not traveling first class.

Stephen Paul: 6:58

I'm not living that life. I aren't good, I'm not good enough and all of a sudden you've got this huge imposter syndrome which, let's be honest, we're all from anywhere. We end up with this imposter syndrome that grows and grows and grows and you shrink and shrink and shrink. As a person, I did that for a couple of years where I just hid away. But also we compare ourselves to other and when we're comparing ourselves to the other business owners that we're seeing on Instagram, on media, we feel inadequate and because we feel inadequate, we don't actually grow our business and we plow ourselves even more into the daily grind. That's not the right thing. As soon as we talk to our clients about humanizing the numbers, to use that phrase it's like a light bulb goes off. It's a spark that can turn someone's dull I'm going to say dull existence, but that's probably the wrong word but someone's dull work. They become a slave to their own business in something that they've got that day one passion again and it's wonderful to see that.

Paul Shrimpling : 8:00

I don't think there's a better feeling, to be honest, it's interesting I was reading something over breakfast this morning um, around core purpose and the and the why it's. You know we've got a inbuilt obsession in that space because it does make such a big difference. And there was, there was a study which said a deep study across over a thousand businesses, larger businesses and the stats were 82 percent of ceos believe that purpose makes a huge difference to their team and their customers and the future success of their business. The same survey said 42 percent of those business leaders haven't got a meaningful purpose that has an impact on anybody. And you go whoa. So they all agree not all, but certainly 82%, which is enough, isn't it? Agree that it has such a big impact and yet half of them maybe aren't doing anything about it. I might be slightly misinterpreting the stats there, but hey.

Stephen Paul: 9:02

To me it's absolutely crazy If I go back to the stuff that you used to do with avn many, many years ago. Yeah, we talked about perceived indifference and I remember somebody saying the number one reason why people leave accountants firms is perceived indifference, and I think it was 67 something I can't remember the steps, but it is, it's, it's, it's.

Paul Shrimpling : 9:19

There was two or three different surveys. I know we've gone back 20 years, but I don't think a lot's changed. Quite frankly, steven and I don't think so.

Stephen Paul: 9:25

But by asking the client there why their purpose and actually delving into helping them, yeah, that's got rid of perceived indifference straight away. Yeah, it gives us as business owners, as lead advisors, more time with our clients. That actually is more rewarding, but also gives the team, our team a better quality of purpose as well yeah, and there was a, just because it was this morning and you brought it up.

Paul Shrimpling : 9:51

There was a piece in this, a different piece of research, just talking about that. Um undergraduates and and um masters graduates would take a job significantly less money with a business that had a meaningful purpose compared with one that would pay more money. But it was just a job and it's just that. Team impact of purpose, customer and revenue, profit value impact why isn't everybody making the most of it? So it's a big question, isn't it? So I want to challenge you now, then. So it's not an easy conversation. Is it core purpose? You know why do you exist? It's, it's not. It's not your classic, typical accountancy type conversation. It's not. You've got 900 clients. How on earth do you have that conversation in a repeated way, year in, year out, or quarter in, quarter out, with 900 clients? I just don't see how you can do that with 16 people yep, simple way.

Stephen Paul: 10:50

We automate some of it, right, but we automate it from a human side. Right now, the human side of that is using our social media. So actually we have and this is a big part of it where I've created a separate website, which is the humanaccountantcouk. If someone signs up to a newsletter on there, they get five daily tips, and the five daily tips talk them through what they need to do to find their core purpose, and it's something as silly as get a blank sheet of paper and write what makes you happy. Well, actually that doesn't work. So what I did was I was actually I was in.

Stephen Paul: 11:25

I managed to take three weeks holiday in 2025. It was 2024, was crazy Three weeks away, in Dubai, mauritius, and I was sitting in the hotel room and it was my daughter's birthday and one of them was bouncing the balloon to the other and then backwards and forwards, and you remember that energy when we were kids and we bounced a balloon around and I started to get involved. It brought back all these memories. So actually, one of the exercises that I wrote on that day was imagine you've got balloons, what's your core energy, what's your core focus? That that gives you, and then write it down. So what gives you life? Watching Newcastle United gives me life.

Paul Shrimpling : 12:02

Oh, you're getting it.

Stephen Paul: 12:07

I'll get on with you watching Formula 1, going for a walk with my friends, going swimming. I've developed this concept of fun money, and fun money to me is actually just putting a little bit of money away every week it's £10 a week, sorry, £50 a week goes into a separate bank account and spending fun money with my family. That gives me life, that gives me energy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So by doing some of this with our clients, by doing some of this with our team, it actually starts the process. Now some clients go not for me, not interesting yeah, self select that, yeah, yeah, the self-select and a lot of our clients self-select.

Stephen Paul: 12:44

So your tax return only clients they're not interested in that. We've got a lot of zero account managers, other SaaS product account managers. They're not interested in that stuff. I get that, I understand that, but what we do is we let our clients subscribe to that service. What we also do is anybody that's on the management journey with us.

Stephen Paul: 13:06

So that could be a full mentoring mentoring service, which I offer personally, or it could be a case of actually the team doing the management accounts and pulling everything together. That is a compulsory part of what we do, right? We spend time with them, actually understanding their why and their purpose. So it's not that we do that for 900 clients, but we offer it to 900 clients and we make sure that everybody has the ability to self-select and say that they want to do that.

Stephen Paul: 13:33

The other side as well sorry, just as well, paul which is really important, as some clients can't actually afford the full service, so they can't afford the the. They might value it, but they haven't got the cash right now, for whatever reason. So what we're starting to do in 2025 is group sessions, sort of like a mentoring session, but one to many, and we're going to start to launch that so that your really smaller businesses are going to pay probably £49 a month, but there might be £15, £20 in a cohort and then that goes into a separate Facebook group and we help and we support each other through there. Brilliant brilliant.

Paul Shrimpling : 14:16

So what you signpost in there, Stephen, is you've got different categories of clients, and those different categories of clients receive a different service and pay a different fee. How would you summarise those different categories within your firm, Stephen?

Stephen Paul: 14:30

Yeah, it's a really, really good question because it's actually a journey that I've been on. If you go back to 2011,. My core client base was the clients I'd dealt with for years in my old partnership that I bought. I remember saying I want to get to £200,000 of the turnover. I had £160,000 that I bought. I needed £20,000 of the new fees and I estimated £20,000 of the projects.

Stephen Paul: 14:58

I remember walking into a building and signing up in week six a £12,000 a year client. I came out of there I'd hit my new client target because actually I was going through trauma. All of my clients that came with me wanted to help me and support me, so they all fed clients to me or potential clients to me and I remember walking out after six weeks going I've hit my new client target. I'll go and buy the Range Rover, I've won life. Actually, no, it took me two years to go and buy the Range Rover, but actually what I did at that time was I took on any type of client and that happens and then you grow and we won zero's fastest growing partner and then we won zero's firm of the year and it was brilliant. I had the whole head shift about I'm not good enough to run valued anymore. I had a huge self-confidence issue for a good couple of years at that point, but we brought more people on so therefore we took more clients on that actually weren't the right fit for us.

Stephen Paul: 15:54

Again, last year was a big turning point for me and that big turning point was establishing that actually we've got three ideal client types. Those three ideal types of clients are probably not worse people would expect. Number one for me is businesses that turn over less than 750 a year would have good computerized systems. Number two is clients that turned up to normally two million pound a year would have great internal bookkeeping systems. So it's not that we're going to do your bookkeeping. We work with a bookkeeper and they can do the bookkeeping. They can do that, but it's not something that we're going to offer now for new clients.

Stephen Paul: 16:34

The third one is tax return. Only SAS employees predominantly. They're where we're doing their tax return, getting them the refunds, finding out what tax they owe, and we've got great traction with those three types of clients. That fits back to what works for us as a firm, but also, more importantly, what our team are really good at and what I'm really good at Now. That was a huge head shift for me, Paul, if I'm honest, because I had a new client came to me two days ago, wanted the full bookkeeping service, the full management account service, and I had to say, no, that's not great for us. And I was like this is crazy. I'm probably turning down £1,500 a month here. This is crazy, Stephen. Why would you do that? It doesn't fit with us because it takes away our core purpose, our values, and by doing that it's not right.

Paul Shrimpling : 17:28

Explain to me how that level of client valuable client you probably like them, but the way they work doesn't fit with the way you work. How does that conflict with your purpose and values? Explain.

Stephen Paul: 17:41

Yeah. So the interesting part is, if we're going to be there to help our clients and we've got six core values We've got integrity, supportive, dedicated, passionate, human and approachable. If we're looking to be supportive to our clients, if we're looking to do the human side that we've talked about here, then for that type of client, they normally want some strategic advice. They want the let's work on the goals. But if I'm having a chase, or my team's having a chase for purchase invoices or bank feeds that have dropped out or whatever it might be, yeah, that isn't great for us, right? Because I end up having a meeting where I'm going. I would love to give you this, but unfortunately you haven't given me that, so therefore, you haven't got the data. Yeah, and it spoils it. Yeah, it spoils the relationship, okay.

Paul Shrimpling : 18:33

So it doesn't enable you to have that human. Let us help you achieve what you want in the future of your business piece. So it conflicts with your core purpose and makes life difficult for your team. Therefore, you're walking away from a 1500 pound a month client.

Paul Shrimpling : 18:51

Yeah, yeah, so some people listen to this thinking you're um, you need, as my mother would say, who's from your neck of the wood. They need your bumps feeling because it's commercially. Commercially doesn't make sense in the short term, does it? Does it play out well over the medium to long term? Yeah, yeah, how do you know?

Stephen Paul: 19:08

how do you know? Great question. So how do we know? We look, we do a net promoter score on our clients and we do net promoter score every quarter. So the net promoter score for the clients is twice a year. We also collect google reviews now. So that's something that all of our team are being tasked with is to collect three google reviews by each person every single month, because you know what let's do, that. Let's get out there and find out what clients think of us. We also do the net promoter score with the team and the net promoter score with the team. And the Net Promoter Score with the team is amazing to actually find out what they're feeling where they're at.

Stephen Paul: 19:50

We use Charlie HR for our internal HR system there and part of that is the poll that's on there. It's scored out of five. The last one we did in December bear in mind it's a busy time of year for us was 4.5 out of five. I'm over the moon with that. How that translates back to net promoter score. It's a really high result.

Stephen Paul: 20:09

But actually, as a business, I've got two core values that I want to do. I want to hit the client revenue and I want a net promoter score of 85% and above, because actually, if we've got a happy team, we've got happy clients, if happy team, we've got happy clients, if we've got happy clients, we've got happy revenue, happy profit. The other thing as well that we do is we have a client advisory board. So I've got clients that actually speak to me on a monthly basis and tell me how we're doing. It's not a case of me actually mystery shopping or me getting other people a mystery shop us. It's a case of actually sitting with a client and saying what are we doing good, what are we doing bad? So instead of just hey, do you know what? Janine did a really good job, or Mike was brilliant at this, we're actually saying what could we do better? And this is what our clients have fed back to us is when we are free and we are enabled to actually help them work on the human side of the business. That's our strength, that's what makes us different, that's what stands us up.

Stephen Paul: 21:12

We've actually got a poster on the team wall there which is a bottle of sauce. It's like a Heinz bottle of sauce that someone drew for us and we describe it as the valued smell, the valued look and feel, and I wish I could bottle it. But when we get it right with a client, it looks a way, it smells a way, it feels a way and that just works for us. Now, if we didn't have the client advisory board, we wouldn't know that. If we didn't have the net promoter score and the open door policy with the team, we wouldn't know about that. It's not all just about the revenue. Because you get it right, the revenue comes. Yeah, if you get it right the revenue comes.

Paul Shrimpling : 21:54

It's an outcome, isn't it? The revenue and profit success is an outcome of the right inputs. The right inputs are, like you say, happy clients, happy team. Question mark over the happiness piece. I was thinking is that sense of achievement is maybe a um it's, it's where we go, just because there's lots of hard research.

Paul Shrimpling : 22:13

There's lots of hard research about happiness as well, but we um we're a big fan of the fact that if you've got a sense of achievement around your values, you've got a sense of achievement around your core purpose. If you've got a sense of achievement around your values, you've got a sense of achievement around your core purpose. If you've got a sense of achievement about your commercial KPIs, you're going to be in a good space, which I think is what you're saying. So client advisory board so some clients are feeding in every month. How many are feeding in every month, stephen?

Stephen Paul: 22:43

We've got 10 that we deal with over a year, so there's five predominantly every month, and then there's a couple that will drop in a couple of times a year as well, right, okay, and is it a structured?

Paul Shrimpling : 22:54

can you complete this or is it just? How are you feeling what's going on?

Stephen Paul: 22:57

It is. It's literally how you you feeling what's going on it is. It's literally how you're feeling. I go out for a bite to eat with them. We go for a walk. I'm a great fan of walk and talk. Right, yeah, so we'll go out for a walk. You're not in my office, I'm not in their office. We're just treading the fells or along the beach, us something, and just saying, right, what's happening? Yeah, we're talking about their business, we're talking about my business. That's how it actually started was going through covert. Yeah, I had a client. We went, we met, we went for a walk and the client started telling me what was really good and what was really bad.

Stephen Paul: 23:27

Yeah, and I was like this is brilliant, yeah this is like a gold mine, yeah because I it wasn't sitting around the table with a structured questionnaire saying are we good on this? Do we do this? What could we improve?

Paul Shrimpling : 23:38

Just have a conversation, yeah, yeah, which just feels a bit false, doesn't it?

Stephen Paul: 23:41

Yeah, it does. And, let's be honest, nobody wants to hear that they've got an ugly baby. So, as business owners, do we really wanna go and tell me what's wrong? Yeah, because they don't really wanna say it. By the way, this is going wrong. So, given permission, just have a conversation.

Paul Shrimpling : 23:56

Yeah, and it opens up the door to make a difference. Yeah, I was talking to, actually, a provider to the profession last night and they were asking us to do a piece of work about having check-in conversations with a handful, you know eight, clients Four that had gone and for that was still still here, still in the business, because they, they, they've got a team that get defensive about their baby, you know, and actually what we need to do is have real candid insight and maybe a third party can help in the short term until we maybe grow up a bit and just park the ego and crack on with understanding that every bit of feedback is, um is positive if you use it, whether the feedback is positive or negative very good, I think, to just to complete that as well.

Stephen Paul: 24:53

One of the things I don't know whether you you'll see this with other firms as well, but one of the things that really works for us as well we've done this for three years, I would guess now is we've got a job on our uh, on center, which is our job management system. People be surprised I'm still on that, to be fair, but we've got a job on center, which is potential client disengagement and anybody within the team can suggest that a client is disengaged. That then gets reviewed and actioned right and if we haven't got a, there's a problem here, then that client's gone. Yeah, because actually we want that feedback to be a two-way. We don't want clients just to say I'm getting this and it's really brilliant, or I'm getting this and it's really bad. We want the team to be able to offer that as well.

Stephen Paul: 25:35

Again, probably going back to learnings over the years, there was the three S's of service. Wasn't there? Sensational not so good, shall we say and satisfactory yeah, you never hear about that satisfactory service. So that's where we're trying to work and just say, right, well, actually, how can we improve on the stuff that's not so good and how can we improve on the stuff that's satisfactory to turn that into a raving fan?

Paul Shrimpling : 26:00

that's interesting. Uh, the, the so on center. You've got this potentially, or potential, disengaged, which is, by the sounds it seems, an early flag that this might be a problem. Is that right? And that then triggers you considering how to then approach that client over the next few weeks or few months to rectify the challenge, assuming they're the right class of client for you. Brilliant, that's exactly it.

Stephen Paul: 26:30

But what we've found normally is there's actually been a bit of a blockage, right, so it could be that actually, the team member in the client didn't get on well, there wasn't a communication issue, or actually the client didn't understand why it was important that we got stuff. That's the biggest thing, yeah, and there's one client in particular. I remember having a conversation say do you know what? I've worked with you? It was actually one of my old ones, from 2011 and before. I'm really I don't know how to say this to you, but the client wanted me to sack you Because, actually and they were like what, what do you mean? They want me to sack you Because, actually, you're not bringing the information, you're appearing on the backside, you're bringing it in at the last minute and all of this sort of stuff they were mortified, absolutely mortified. All of a sudden, we got additional services because we were like we'll just take away the pin. I don't want another account, I want you. Yeah, it's like well, all right then?

Paul Shrimpling : 27:19

yeah, it's a communication education piece. Is it your team, your client manager, flagging up this? Is um, they're not a disrespectful client, but actually they're not responsive. Yes, enough for us to do what we do best, um, and the client needs to be made aware of that. Um, we we often have conversations even about encouraging firms to fold that into their pricing options is, look, you're a non-responsive client, so we're going to charge you two and a half grand premium because our team have to spend more time chasing you for stuff. If we can fix that, we can get that. You know you can save that money. It's up to you, um. But by the way, if it continues, you know you're going to make it harder and harder for us to look after you properly. And therefore, it might be that in the future, we're into clients. They're brave conversations to have, aren't they?

Paul Shrimpling : 28:06

But if you're committed to the right type of clients that look after you, look after your team, so that you and your team can look after your clients. You're taking the right decisions. Yeah, interesting, well, not interesting, really valuable. It's interesting. We're talking about two things in the same space. Well, three, which is the anchor Core, purpose and values. And then it's got to play out well with clients. It's got to play out well with team. And if you've got that triangle working, or if you will, what's just popped into my head is a seesaw you got working, you know, or, if you will, what's just popped into my head is a seesaw you've got purpose and the seesaw's got to work for both clients and team members. If it's not, then there's something, uh, a rally, something's not 100, yeah yeah, 100.

Stephen Paul: 28:48

Brilliant. I actually described it as a tug of war from a business point of view, and I had someone actually design this and sketch this for me. Um, and it's, if you imagine, you've got this tug of war going on and it's from a business owner's point of view. So you've got steven the business owner. Yeah, I've got steven the dad, the husband and my kids might say, dad, can you come to that, whatever it is a performance at school or something? Oh no, I've got to see a client. Oh well, can you do this from a client's point of view? No, because I'm doing a podcast or whatever it might be, and you've got this constant tug of war going on. It's a say-so analogy as well, isn't it? But it's which way we let our businesses affect us, and I do believe that normally, work tends to pull harder than personal stuff, which is why this core value goes backwards and forwards and it's a forever moving product there.

Paul Shrimpling : 29:46

Do you think that's because the work stuff is more tangible and practical as opposed to emotional and feeling driven? Do you think, or is it a bloke thing? Do you know to?

Stephen Paul: 29:55

use that analogy. I don't to use that. I don't think it's a bloke thing. I think it helped. I think part of the problem is it's a bloke thing because actually, if we go back to my dad your dad actually maybe it's not, but definitely my grandad and your grandad they went out to work and their wife would typically be at home. Yeah, those days have long gone, yeah long. But actually I do genuinely believe that some of my mentality is I've got to go to work, yeah, and I've got to provide and I've got to give and I've got to help and I've got to support, which is every parent's irrespective of gender or however they see themselves.

Stephen Paul: 30:36

Yeah.

Stephen Paul: 30:37

But you end up with this huge conflict of actually I want to be with family, but actually no, I've got to go and do all of this stuff, and that's that's why it's not a bloke thing, because that has changed over the years. Yeah, it's massively changed over the years, but actually when you start to look at some of the younger generation coming through now, they haven't got that mentality. My head shift during COVID was I don't have to go to an office every day, I can work from home. We worked from home for a good year and a bit after COVID. I absolutely love that. We are now flexible in terms of our work environment there.

Stephen Paul: 31:11

But actually the bit that's important to me is making sure that we understand and we feel that human side and remember that human side of us as business owners, the team and the client about. Actually we've all got a life away from our desks and how do we actually get more of that? And that's one of the critical parts for me. So that journey will evolve. There's lots of mental health troubles right now. Yeah, we actually work with all of this. It's being open, and I guess one of the questions I would ask you, to be fair, is that the community side, where, if we go back 20 years, there was a huge community and we all talked to each other and we all helped and we all shared. Do you think we've still got that these days, or has that actually been lost a little bit because it's LinkedIn, because it's Instagram, because we are a little bit more remote than what we used to be?

Paul Shrimpling : 32:11

60 year old white bloke? Not sure I can. I'm well placed to. I think all the stats suggest so, stephen. I was referring back to. I think all the stats suggest so, stephen.

Paul Shrimpling : 32:19

I was referring back to research from reading this morning and the fact that purpose delivers profit. It's not profit or purpose, no, no, no. The research is consistently showing that if you can do the hard graft, hard thinking, hard feeling about working out what matters most, what, where you're going to get your meaning from, from doing your work, and it will play out. If you turn that into an influence, a significant influence of your business decisions, life decisions, it'll play out and as business owners and leaders of teams because it's not just the business owner, leaders of teams, independent of what's going on in their bigger business, can establish a core purpose and values within that team. Don't get me wrong. It's harder to do it as a, as a silo, as a, an oasis in a desert where there isn't one. But it can and has been done and does get done. And so I think the community question is I think it's even directly related to purpose as well.

Paul Shrimpling : 33:29

You know, I think of, you know, as we were talking before we got on air my mum's from New Bransworth. Well, when my mum was brought up, new Bransworth was two rows of terrace houses and a pit. Yeah, you know that's community. And I've just come back from London and even in London the friends I was staying with they know, I don't know, 40, 60 people on their street corner and there's this. So that's. I think there's still an appetite, but I do think there's so many distractions in and around social media. So I think, as human beings, we are want to be connected. So it's a natural part of and it's how we survived. So it's hardwired into the reptilian brain, not the you know frontal cortex and conscious brain. Hardwired into the reptilian brain, not the you know frontal cortex and conscious brain. Um, so I think there's a and, by the way, the facebook, you know likes and all of that that that's a community in its sense. It's just a little bit um it's not as deep is it?

Paul Shrimpling : 34:32

yeah, yeah, um doesn't mean as much. And people are only showing you the best lives. They're not showing you their real lives. And the reason that everyone who listens to the podcast now I'm a big rugby fan, the reason I love supporting the rugby community, is because there's a culture of respect and everyone wants to help each other in that space.

Paul Shrimpling : 34:56

No one's bad-mouthing me as the referee or very rare and I've got the authority to deal with it if needs be. And what I love is if I'm getting abused refereeing a low-level tier game of that club and I report it in, they'll deduct points off their first team in their top league. So there's actually some teeth around the fact that this, these values and culture, matters. And I think and that's an interesting segue actually into I think there's maybe three types of businesses, three types of firms.

Paul Shrimpling : 35:33

Steven, those who've got no, haven't really done the work yet just because they don't know or they don't want to fair dues. If you want to make that choice in values and purpose, there's those who've got values and purpose and there's those that have got values and purpose with teeth, and so a value gets compromised and the client's contradicted on maybe three strikes and they're out and they've gone, or a team member is not playing the game that we've got in our firm. Um, I just wonder if what? What's your? What are your thoughts around the um? Yeah, it only really becomes authentic around purpose and values if you give it um some teeth.

Stephen Paul: 36:10

You've got the teeth there yeah, 100, and one of the big one of the big things for us is we're a huge fan of traction. Um, I love the book Traction. I love everything that comes along with it. That was the big thing for me in 2023. If I actually take a little step back, I wrote in my journal, my diary I feel trapped by valued. This is 31st December 2022. I feel trapped by valued. I can't do what I want to do. I want to spend time with clients, but I end up doing other people's work, and that was a horrible, horrible line for me to write, but I wrote it.

Stephen Paul: 36:42

So we implemented traction within the firm. Going back to your question, there, the teeth part was we worked with ourselves, with our team, to come up with our core values and what we thought were our core values, and actually they weren't. We tried that for a couple of months. We then changed them and redid that process again. But one of the things that we do which is really important within traction is the people analyzer, which says our core values are. You've got six of them and then you have to score yourself. So each person does a self-assessment on that. It's either a plus yes, I represent that.

Stephen Paul: 37:15

Minus, no, I don't. Or a plus minus. Sometimes, yeah, we accept two plus minuses at a maximum across the board. The team leader also does the same score and that forms part of our one to one discussion. So we're actually sitting with the team saying you've said this, I believe this, you've said this, I believe this and you mean, and you have that discussion. We have a policy if anybody has a no, they automatically go down the process that is describing traction, which is it's discussed after two months. It's discussed again because actually now we've got an issue and normally what we find is that might come around client service or it could be an issue which actually is then probably a disciplinary issue anyway, and after three months, that's it. Thank you very much. End of the road is it two months?

Stephen Paul: 38:06

no, we've never, or is it two months plus one? Three months in total. Three months in total. Yeah, we've never got anybody to the three-month stage, right, never, right is that stage Right?

Paul Shrimpling : 38:16

Never right. Is that because you're really nice and soft or is it because actually the process worked?

Stephen Paul: 38:22

Because the process worked and we actually had the conversation. Yeah, we had the conversation and that was the really interesting part for me was one team member was like a silo, wasn't getting involved, didn't really want to talk to clients, didn't want to do anything, didn't represent the supportive part. Did they have integrity? Yes, 100, but were they approachable? Not really. Were they human? Not really. Yeah, yeah. So it was a cross right. This is why. So, actually, what they needed to see was the end result. It wasn't just about giving someone a tax return set of accounts. It was actually about making that relationship special and seeing the white of the client's eyes, the smile on that client's face. When they get the difference whether it's more time with the family, whether it's a holiday, whether it's not having to worry about sleeping on a night time, whatever it might be it's actually realising that difference. Yeah, brilliant. And that comes back to living the core values. So you've got to, you're right, you've got to have some structure behind it, because if you don't, it's just disregarded. Yeah, it's totally disregarded.

Paul Shrimpling : 39:35

Traction is a great piece, I agree. It's a brilliant framework with their processes and how to's to back it up. Um, we've got, uh, we've got, a couple of business breakthrough reports which I'll put in the show notes as well as a link to the traction book. Um, around, um, well, one of them's called culture wins. You know, there's, there's actually, and culture's a reflection of all the habitual behaviors in the firm that are running, which, which is actually those habitual behaviours are a result of the values that you live by, and every business, every firm, lives by a set of values. It's just some of them. Some of the businesses have worked out what they are and then hold people to account to them. Ie, give them teeth. When we work with firms on values and establishing them, ie give them teeth. When we work with firms on values and establishing them, we encourage the leadership teams to let us loose with their team and let the team build them, as opposed to let the leadership build them. And you know if? It's a team of 10, it feels relatively simple.

Paul Shrimpling : 40:32

Doug in our team has just done a team of 170. It's slightly more complicated but it's worked. It works and the buy-in that you get from the team is significant because they're their values, not ours as the leadership team Harder process, but we'll put those reports in the show notes.

Stephen Paul: 40:56

I think the other side as well is if we go back a couple like 10, 15, 20 years, it predominantly was white, middle class male in our profession and we all look the same, we all acted the same, but actually it's not anymore. I'm over the moon that 70% of our team is female. I'm over the moon that actually we look at some of the most inspirational people that I see on Instagram, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, and they look nothing like me. I love that, by actually looking at other people and being different and embracing everybody's difference and how they all work. That's how you get your real core values, because it's not just steven that wants to do something the old way, because we've always done it that way. Yeah, it's actually a different way of working and it's brilliant, so refreshing. I say to my daughter, as I actually said it this morning I says every day is a school day. Dad will learn something today. Every day is a learning day absolutely, it's brilliant.

Paul Shrimpling : 41:53

Yeah, it's inspiring well for everyone, especially your kids. It's interesting, stephen. I've got a conversation tomorrow with probably the fastest growing firm organically we've come across. They've gone from a start-up business to an £8.5 million turnover accounting firm in six years, which is going strong, isn't it? Definitely.

Paul Shrimpling : 42:17

And they don't have a recruitment problem, and you'd think they would have if they were growing that fast, wouldn't you? Yeah, they don't. I mean, there's problems, and problems isn't there? They have to recruit because capacity comes before growth. So you've got to keep feeding the growth engine, haven't you? And so their fees per full-time employee doesn't look as good as some other firms we work with, because they're building in capacity early all the time, because they're on this rapid growth curve, and one of the reasons they don't have a recruitment problem is because and you just hinted at it they've got the diversity in their business. So within their team and their team's got about just short of 100 people, 39 nationalities, people, 39 nationalities. There's more females than males, and then you know that there's the rainbow cultures in there as well. They speak across the business 24 different languages, and it's just. And so this is our firm, this is our firm's story. They're sharing the fact that this is you can fit in here.

Paul Shrimpling : 43:38

You can fit, because everyone and I just it put me away when we were unpacking. Go on, then run me through your employment proposition, your team proposition, and it's just like. Go on, then run me through your employment proposition, your team proposition, and it's just like oh yeah, just gives me goosebumps to think that you've got the archetypal DEI diverse, equity and inclusion business and it's fueling their growth. So anyone who's in any doubt that actually you know, the accountancy profession is for everyone, you just need to look at this accounting firm. Just loved it. We're really proud to work with it, you know, with it as it as it comes.

Paul Shrimpling : 44:12

Yeah, um, I just want to take change tax slightly now steven, if I can. Um, it's in and around that systems and processes. So you've got your three grades of clients. So I'm really interested in the, say, the top tier, the up to two million brilliant bookkeeping, so that you've got accurate, up-to-date records that enable you to have meaningful conversation about either monthly or quarterly kpis. I think that's where you're coming from with that. Yeah, um, but I just want you to what unpack, if you would. What are the key pieces of tech, technology and processes that fuel your ability to have meaningful conversations with your top tier of clients every month or every quarter? What's going on in that space, that's?

Stephen Paul: 45:00

brilliant. Our core app stack for every client is either Dext or Apron. It was always Dext. There's a little bit of Apron creeping in there just because of some additional function within that. Right now. Right, xero predominantly, yeah, and Fathom for that type of client. All of our clients have that, and that is their tech app stack.

Stephen Paul: 45:22

Now, what's really important on the back of that and I think this is where some of us go wrong we go to Accountex, we go to Daz, we go to Zerocon, wherever it might be. We see a new shiny bit of software. We subscribe to it all you can eat and try and bolt that on for every client. It doesn't work in my experience. So what we've got to do is we've then got a handful of apps around there that are industry-specific and apps around there that are industry specific, and we only bring those in by asking one question to a client what keeps you awake at three o'clock in the morning? And it could be actually get my cash in, right, okay, let's bring chaser in. Or actually it's stock control, right. Okay, let's bring unleashed in, or whatever that app might be to actually help and overcome their problems, because I don't just want to put tech in for the sake of it. I'm not a tech reseller. Fundamentally, I'm trying to help that client to get what they want from their business.

Stephen Paul: 46:15

The other thing as well that I do for every single meeting I have is I record the meeting. Every single client meeting is recorded. I currently use I've tried all sorts of different apps, but I currently use father firefliesai and I absolutely love it now. What that does is it'll summarize the meeting. It'll come up with the action points. It will give you an exact executive summary. It'll also tell me who's talked the most, whether it was positive, positive, whether it was negative. It'll give me all the stats around that. So the meeting's done.

Stephen Paul: 46:51

Every client then gets their meeting notes by meeting notes. I take what's on there and I then add a bit more detail, a bit more context. I don't just want it to be AI-driven, but I then give them their meeting notes, typically within two hours of their meeting, definitely the same day as their meeting. It's critical to do that. They have access to the recording as well, because at that point we've all been there, we've talked about something. Client got distracted or actually didn't understand, didn't want to ask. They can go back over the video and they can see exactly what was done. That's probably one of the most transformational bits of software that I've brought into my firm over the last six months.

Paul Shrimpling : 47:35

So do you get any pushback about recording the meeting?

Stephen Paul: 47:40

One client. So I mentor a couple of probably one of the world's best kept secrets. I mentor a handful of clients who are accountants, accountancy firm owners Right okay, I do believe it's a lonely space at times. I've got one accountant that doesn't want it recorded Right okay. And she doesn't want it recorded because actually she's going through some troubles at home. Right yeah, therefore, and doesn't want it, you don't want it in the stratosphere.

Paul Shrimpling : 48:02

You don't want it in the stratosphere, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stephen Paul: 48:05

I get that, I understand that, and so the other thing as well that I do there Paul as well is I then put that summary into ChatGBT and I say, right, as a coach, what should I have done differently, what should I do different, what could I do better? So it's a continual learning process for me as an individual. Obviously I'm not putting things about specific clients in there, but it's a summary that I'm putting in there.

Paul Shrimpling : 48:32

Yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's about the quality of the questions. You asked, jack GTPT, as to whether you get any insights, isn't it? Yeah, that's exactly right. So that suggests the vast majority of your meetings are on Teams or Zoom, as opposed to actually face-to-face in a room with handshakes.

Stephen Paul: 48:47

We offer a face-to-face with every client. We actively encourage it and before COVID everything was face-to-face. Now a lot of our clients want Zoom or Google Meet A lot of them.

Paul Shrimpling : 49:01

I've been challenging a few firms in this space recently, stephen, because there's a firm who I'm seeing next week and we did a quick analysis of a month pre-covid um, a year, a year and a half before covid um 2018 I think it was and in one calendar month and it was either may or june, forgive me if I can't remember the exact month they conducted 49 face-to-face in a meeting handshake meetings with clients. Some of those were in their office, some of them were in the client's place of business. They got, as a consequence of those meetings, had 16 referral conversations within the 49 that resulted in seven referrals within a you know, a week or a month or so. Of those meetings and of of the seven, they did four proposals and converted three clients. It was valued at just short of £10,000 worth of fees. I may have one or two numbers slightly wrong, but the quantum is fairly accurate, right? So every month's meetings was generating an extra £10,000 worth of fees.

Paul Shrimpling : 50:06

You could conclude we all know, in reality, that ebbs and flows a little bit, but it was interesting. And then we went right. Let's look at May Again forgive me, I can't remember May or June 2023, there was 16 face-to-face handshake meetings, not 49, and they had no referrals. So therefore no new work, wow, um. And so there is a huge value, isn't there in the um teams and zoom approach. But there's more value if you can also fold in the right volume and cadence of let's um, shake someone's hand because the depth of the conversation is different, or do you think I'm just stuck in an old way of seeing things better, both better, but that's the question.

Stephen Paul: 50:58

I don't agree, push back. So better, both right by letting in my experience, by letting the client decide, it gives the client the choice. So if, if, you want to come and see me, you come and see me. But actually I would actually turn it on its head and say, if you're just sitting there having a conversation over Teams, over Zoom, over Google Meet, have you lost that human element, have you lost that human connection? Because it's not as easy to have a human connection. But right now I'm looking at you, you're looking at me and actually we've got a human connection going on, we've got a conversation going on. But actually, if you haven't got that, it's very easy just to share your screen and talk through some numbers and not really interact. Yeah, you ain't got a human connection at that point, yeah.

Stephen Paul: 51:39

So let's be honest, the other side of it as well is typically you have a face-to-face meeting. It's longer than your Zoom meeting. Typically, by the time you've had a bit chit-chat, you've got the coffees, you've done all that other stuff. So what I found was actually I was having more meetings available, more meeting space available, because what would have took two hours is now an hour or half an hour or whatever it might be, but it's now about using that time more effectively, instead of trying to run that with more clients. Now about using that time more effectively and instead of trying to ram that with more clients.

Stephen Paul: 52:09

What I do with all of my team is I say, right, go and see clients. So every one of my client team have an air wallocks card and I actively encourage them to take a client out for a coffee. Just go and say the client didn't for a cup of coffee, because actually that's connections and it's potentially two, three connections during the year instead of just once with me, with Michael, with whoever's finalising the accounts. Yeah, and it's actually about making them more accountable, giving them more power to actually help their clients.

Paul Shrimpling : 52:37

More connected, yeah, absolutely. More responsibility, more autonomy is all of that, isn't it?

Stephen Paul: 52:41

Yeah, and that's exactly it. And it's people want physical connection a hundred percent, but emotional connection is huge and it's actually getting that emotional side and linking that back again to the human side, the why, the purpose. You've got that they don't really care when they're meeting and how they're meeting. But what I will also say, so that's the not quite sure the bit where I insist it is face to face is when we are kicking off a strategy meeting. That's got to be face to face, because if we don't do that and I haven't found a way of doing that, obviously deep enough.

Paul Shrimpling : 53:19

Yeah, gotta do that in person? Yeah, there's. You might find this interesting, steven, when you look at the derivation of the word company. So you run a company, I run a company, you're, all your clients run a company. Um, you know, we have people around, so someone you know calls you so I can't speak. Now I've got company. The derivation of the word company is to break bread and there's a depth of relationship. So everyone who's uh managed to make a marriage or a long-term relationship work is because they've had meals with that person before. You get to a level of commitment, amongst other things, of course.

Paul Shrimpling : 53:55

But there's a. You know, are we having a coffee, having a bun with a client? You know, there's a. You know what's the break bread strategy in the firm that builds relationships, shaking hands and having a deeper conversation. And I argue very strongly that if you've got to have a challenging conversation with someone, it's face-to-face in a meeting, not over Zoom or Teams, if you really want to manage that with grace. Our experience is we mostly work with multi-owner firms and doing that over Teams. Where there's a challenge in the space is they're all in a room in Europe.

Stephen Paul: 54:31

It's just I'm not good enough to do that maybe other people can, but dear me I couldn't do that either. But I think it is that human connection and just being there and understanding what actually makes a client tick. The other thing as well that we do gone, sorry, just very quickly there is. We actively encourage the team to write a client a card, so a handwritten card, which says well done on whatever it might be. Yeah, yeah, yeah, something like that. You've got that connection. It sits behind. Yeah, it's on the desk, it's on the screen yeah.

Paul Shrimpling : 55:08

I't help but love my accountant because he sends me a birthday card. I mean, how simple and obvious is that? But a DMA and it's all hand signed. The whole team have hand signed it and I've been with them for 18 years. I just you know I can't leave just because I'm getting a signed card. That's not quite true. I have four very, very effective meetings with them, with all our projections in. But projections in, but there's some real depth to it as well.

Paul Shrimpling : 55:30

Just in this challenge space, stephen, because I wanted to unpack. You're having purpose and values conversations with your clients and the higher grade clients actually deep not in your light way, in terms of newsletter type approach. That's a difficult conversation. How do you kickstart that with a new client? There's lots of accountants listening to this going I can't have a purpose conversation with a client. I've worked with it for 20 years. If I start having that, I will think I've gone gaga. And again, it's harder with clients that you've worked with for a long time. With a new client it's easier. So, listening to this, they're going okay, stephen, you go to a new client. You're going to have a purpose conversation. How do you make that work so it plays out well for the client who doesn't look at you askance and think you're one step away from going bonkers.

Stephen Paul: 56:24

Yeah, 100%. Every single time I look at the news, I look at social media, I hear about mental health, I hear about people that are having challenges. I hear about all of that space. Yeah, but what we do as business owners is we lock ourselves away in our own silo. Now, one of the things I shared with you before was I wrote in a journal that I felt trapped by valued. Imagine if I sit and I'd say that to a client Two years ago. I felt trapped by my own business. I couldn't do what I wanted to do. But now I had three weeks away in Dubai and Mauritius.

Stephen Paul: 57:08

What I've now got is I've got a connection with that client, but also I'm saying to them I've suffered, I've had pain. I talk about the pain, the suffering that I've done. I talk about the inadequacy of actually winning that award with zero and walking off the stage and thinking I'm not good enough. I need to bring people in that are better than me. By being human ourselves and it's really difficult to be on to do I've been our human ourselves with the clients we've known for years. They will suddenly spin it back and they'll say I felt like that. Can you help me with this? They prop. You probably know what their pinpoints are anyway, because you probably, if you've dealt with them for 15-20 years, you know what the wife, what the husband, what the kids are called. You've seen the kids grow up, you've heard about the journey, you've heard about the story. You've probably caught them on a bad day. I've had a problem with whatever it is. It's just what you're now doing is you're opening up yourself a little bit, you're being vulnerable a little bit to have them be vulnerable and as soon as you've got that, you've got connection.

Stephen Paul: 58:18

Now what you've got to do and you've got to be really, really careful here is you don't want two miserable people in a room. You've got to give them how do we get out of this? A vision, vision, a journey. Yeah, you've got to give them a pathway. Now, if I go back 20 years, we used to sell consultancy meetings, which was something along the lines of I'll tell you how to do it. Option two I'll give you a map on how to do it. Option three I'll grab you by the hand and we'll do that journey together. Actually, I want to help clients be on their journey, and a big thing for me is realising that not everybody wants to be a multimillionaire that has a huge empire. Some people, like me, just want to be able to drop the kids off at school and it's a non-negotiable for me. I could go and get another million crits at the face, but actually I don't want that because it'll affect my life.

Paul Shrimpling : 59:10

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So if I look at the process there, what you're suggesting is, if we're going to have a purpose and values conversation, we're going to stick with purpose. You know what's a client, what is a business owner's core purpose. You've got to be vulnerable about your own experience in and around core purpose and the struggles and difficulties and challenges you've faced to frame up a conversation, because what I want to do is understand what your core purpose is. So this is mine. These were my challenges and struggles and actually, um, you know, I was never sure whether I was on the right path, but now I am and all the research backs it up. But actually, you know, I'm just wondering what. What really matters to you because you framed it up from a personal perspective is that have I captured that 100%, 100%.

Stephen Paul: 59:55

and what you will get is you will get pushback because you'll get some clients that say, not interested, not for me, that's okay. Yeah, but by you being vulnerable and showing a little bit of that on social media. And and I've got this huge dilemma going on in my life I've got Stephen Paul Instagram, which is me, and the kids, and the gigs, and the phone and all that sort of stuff, and I've created the human accountant on Instagram as well, which is my thought leadership, and I kind of look at it and go how does the two meet together? I'm not quite sure, because actually I'm one person and it should probably be one, but and it should probably be one, but actually do I really want to share pictures of my kids? No, not really. I don't know all about yeah, yeah, and you've got all those dilemmas going on, but actually starting to be a little bit vulnerable, starting to come up with some ideas, don't unpick some stuff.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:00:42

it makes a difference.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:00:45

But yeah, you remind me we had a pod with a guy called Andrew Van Der Beek from Australia runs an accounting firm down there. I'll put the link in the show notes if people want to go. It's a really, really engaging discussion, just as this is, and he talked about the 80-20 rule. You know Pareto's law, but he shared something which I've used many times now because I just think it's a simple piece of genius is, when you're doing a set of accounts, an audit, some payroll, a tax calculation, you're 80% accountant and 20% human, and when you're in a discussion with your client, you're 80% human and only 20% accountant. And I just thought what?

Paul Shrimpling : 1:01:34

a brilliant piece of framing that is. So just drop out of being an accountant. Not completely, but let's get into having a human conversation. I just thought it was a piece of genius, but I think, going back to that diversity piece, that's where we are.

Stephen Paul: 1:01:46

Just thought it was piece of genius. But I think, going back to that diversity piece, that's where we are turning more 80% human, because sometimes, if we've done it the same old way, we are 80-20 and we will permanently be 80-20 accounts. Yeah, that's not where the profession's going. Yeah, indeed, indeed fab.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:02:06

So core purpose big deal for you, stephen, big deal for the clients that you end up working with, and if they're not going down that pathway and may not end up being a client of yours, value's important that it occurs to me at the time I never bought it all. You know, that walk and talk piece. I like that, by the way. I really like that. The reason I like it is my wife, kate, is.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:02:28

Um, if I'm mad into rugby, kate's mad into history, I mean, but she makes my madness look like I'm sane because she's okay, um and um, so studied the you know roman history is she's really passionate about, and all of their meetings were walking meetings around the forum. If you've ever, you've been to rome and you've been around the forum, which is just not not quite as fancy as it was when they were alive back then, but it's still a remarkable piece of history, architecture, what have you? You walk around the forum. They conducted all their small big discussions, decision-making, while they walked, and so you're following great footsteps in that walk and talk space. Love that.

Stephen Paul: 1:03:15

To be honest, I'll be honest. The reason for that is because my number one priority, my number one quest for me personally is to improve my health. How am I going to do that? By walking. Walk. It's a big difference, Absolutely Big difference Link two things together.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:03:30

Yeah, yeah, Get your step count up, get your diet right. You're in a good place, aren't you? So I'm wondering what's stood out of being of most impact. As you've unpacked your story and your insights, what's flashing in your head that you go? Actually, that's something that I could and should do more with.

Stephen Paul: 1:03:54

The biggest bit for me is, yes, as accountants, we want to hit numbers. As business owners, we want to hit a number, whether that's turnover, whether that's cost of goods sold, whether it's profit, whether it's drones, whatever it might be. But as business owners, we've got to have that human side and I want every interaction we have to come from a human side. We've got to do more client advisory boards. That's probably one thing I've took away from this. I said every day was a skill day. We've got to do more client advisory boards. That's probably one thing I've took away from this. I said every day was a skill day. We've got to do more client advisory boards. But they should probably not just be with me, they should be with some of the other exec team members, so that we're spinning that around ever so slightly. Yeah, yeah, the other side as well, and it's something that we did years ago and this is pre-covid was.

Stephen Paul: 1:04:50

I remember one of the dads at school. He came in, it was a children's nativity. He came in, he watched half an hour of the nativity and ran out as soon as it was finished. But there was two classes doing a part of this nativity and I was like that's a bit unusual. You normally stay for both. So I seen him afterwards. I said what's the crowd? He said I could only use my lunch break. It's 10 o'clock in the morning. What do you mean? You can only use your lunch break. Oh well, I had to use my lunch break and he's an accountant and I had to do this that day.

Stephen Paul: 1:05:28

I life moments, and life moments is something where you don't want to use a whole day, so it could be actually the boilers getting changed or amazon's delivering something or whatever it might be, the kids nativity play, and I give my team five days with the life moments a year. Five days. That was really important, five days extra, so that's on top of your holders. But it had to be for something that was significant for you, and we tried to come up with a list of what these things were. So it was actually a big birthday. It was your wedding anniversary. It was actually. What we found was we've got some people that don't have kids, that aren't married, so we couldn't actually have a comprehensive life. So we defined it as something that's important for you.

Stephen Paul: 1:06:03

One of the things linking it back, just as we're talking here, is I've changed that and I've changed it because I've actually reduced it to three days because no one's ever gone over three days. So I thought there's no point in trying to give people more than what they need, because actually you're putting pressure on it to kind of force it and I don't want to do that. But I said I wanted every single person in the business to do a charitable day as well on the company's time. So it's three days like moments, one day charity. I'm sitting here, it's the 16th of january. We kicked off 16 days ago and I'm thinking we've not done any charity stuff yet. Why don't we actually put something out to our clients today on our social media and say have you got something our team can help with? You can donate time to?

Paul Shrimpling : 1:06:50

yeah, so I'm going to do that today as a result of this podcast just just to feed into that, because I had the great privilege of going to uh into hq over in san jose a couple of times and one of the times we were there, a whole division team had downed tools. We're packing food into boxes for the homeless in San Francisco and San Jose and I just had the opportunity to speak to the project leader for that and she was saying that, yeah, we used to give out. You know, we said encourage our team to have charity days, you know, contribution days. I think they called us it matters not what they call it and and she was saying that it didn't.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:07:31

It didn't work very well, even though we give everyone the opportunity. It didn't work very well, uh, because very few actually took it up and so we took it on our shoulders to actually organize days and then drop people into them whether they wanted to or not. So no, no, no, they can opt out if they want, but within this team we've only had to opt out and that's because they're on holiday. So, okay, fine, and there was like 30 40 people packing boxes for and it's just sometimes you have to build structure into that and you know your experience. Five to three charity day is great if we don't lead and give process and structure and frameworks, it's people are just busy on they. Yeah, yeah.

Stephen Paul: 1:08:13

Steven, it's been sorry you were back say something. Sorry, I was gonna say, if we don't actually have some process, there's some system there, we'll just keep on doing what we do yeah you keep on challenging it.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:08:23

Stuck in the rut, yeah, but clearly you are not sucking in the rut. I've really enjoyed our conversation, stephen, any time I get the opportunity to unpack further that purpose and profit. You know work brilliantly together for team, for clients, for business owners and especially for who I think are the potential superstars if not some of them are superstars of the world we live in, which is accountants who can make a profound difference to their clients. If only they just slightly shifted the conversation in the direction of purpose and bringing meaning to people's lives and making it more human. So I can't thank you enough for joining us on the pod today, stephen. Thank you.

Stephen Paul: 1:09:07

Thank you very much for the opportunity. Really enjoyed it, thank you on the podcast.

Paul Shrimpling : 1:09:14

You witnessed Stephen challenging me with the question around community and connected with purpose. Well, we've worked on building a community called the accountants growth academy, where like-minded, ambitious accountants come together to work on the core strategies that enable you to achieve the goals and deliver on the purpose for your firm. If you want to find out more about the Accountants Growth Academy, go to the link, please. In the show notes You'll find more valuable discussions with the leaders of ambitious accounting firms. At humanizethenumbersonline, you can also sign up to be notified each time a new podcast is made available. You're about to hear a short excerpt from a discussion with russ and vicky of burden link, a specialist audit firm. If you like what you're hearing, please go to humanize the numbersonline or go to your favorite podcast platform. What tempted him to get involved in working with you?

Speaker 4: 1:10:23

he spoke to russ and I, but actually we then set him up to speak with Nathan and Alice and they went and had a coffee across a local cafe place and I think by him talking to them, because what he would perhaps talk to me and you about was very different to what he's spoke to Nathan and Alice about, and thankfully they're obviously very nice and it works out well I think as well it was.

Speaker 3: 1:10:49

He's a senior audit manager who's come from a mid-tier firm, so we weren't that interested in testing his technical knowledge because of where he'd come from. So for us it was about does he fit, or will he fit in the team? Is he right for the business and how will he engage with the clients? And you know we were comfortable with him. And then, as Vicky said, we asked him to come back down again from Bristol and meet up with Nathan and Alice to hear it from them.