It can't be easy, can it, to grow a firm from one person to 18 in just three years and to take your client numbers from 50 to 700 within the same time frame? Well, that's exactly what Rachel Harris of the accountancy firm striveX has achieved. And one of the reasons for the success of that journey is down to Rachel's 'team first' approach. Even though she's gone from 50 to 700 clients, the focus is 'team first'. And she unpacks on this Humanise the Numbers podcast the five strategies, the five processes, that make her firm, striveX, a 'team first' business that's delivered the growth and the results that she's now experiencing. I hope you enjoy this conversation with arguably one of the most vocal people on social media, Rachel Harris. You will see the depth in the way she manages and leads her business around her team. Scroll down this episode page for the contact information for Rachel and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast. |
The Solution:
I grew up in practices that were 'client first' and that's why I left.
Every single team member of ours has the ability to red-flag a client.
We've built a custom toggle field in our CRM software which is a red flag - anyone can turn that on and write a description about why they want to red-flag a client.
Then, every single month in the manager's meetings, we go through the red flags and decide which clients to disengage with.
SHOW NOTES
Connect with Rachel
Connect with Paul
Resources relating to this podcast:
During this conversation, you hear Paul and Rachel discuss the importance of her core values and her firm's culture to her team's success and to the strength of their relationships with each other and with their clients.
As Rachel and James have done at StriveX, when you take responsibility for creating a healthy working culture and invest in and influence all of the small, everyday moments of human interaction (or touchpoints, as Rachel calls them), you build authentic relationships within your team and with your clients as well.
The health of your workplace culture depends on the standards of behaviour, beliefs and values that you, your people and your firm live by.
Click the button below to read a Business Breakthrough report on the importance of a healthy workplace in building the future success of your firm, and start thinking about how you, like Rachel and her team, can build your core values into everything you do.
Here is a QR code link to all Rachel's social media:
Rachel talks about the importance of the core values of her firm and how everyone in her team lives them and brings them to life.
She discusses the process of how she arrived at her 5 core values and believes that, if you are panicking about not having any, be assured that you do - you have just not written them down yet.
The process she goes on to explain in the podcast is brilliant, but a key help to her along the way was a book called Traction - Get a Grip On Your Business, by Gino Wickman.
Click the image below to read this book:
Rachel also discusses the importance of coaching in her business. If you want to surround yourself with great people, they have to be coachable. It’s one of the key elements she looks for when recruiting new team members - are they coachable?
She recommends a book to help with this: Disrupt Yourself: Master Relentless Change and Speed Up Your Learning Curve, by Whitney Johnson. Click the image below to read the book:
During their conversation, Paul also briefly mentions a book called Fish! A Proven Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results, by Harry Paul, Stephen C Lundin and John Christenson. This book considers the importance of prioritising fun, making someone's day, being there when it matters and choosing your attitude.
Click the image below to read the book:
