beBetter 

Recently, after hosting our partner retreat, I was exhausted after our six hour drive back home. We also had my grandson, Davis, and a friend of his with us all week so when I wasn’t leading our retreat, I was trying to keep up with two 10-year-olds who could exhaust the energizer bunny. 

Jeff Foxworthy says, “You might be a redneck if you think the styrofoam cooler is the greatest invention of all time.” Now we all know the greatest invention is the YETI. In fact, I used my wife’s YETI to keep the fish iced down from that fishing trip at Sea World featured in my Passion Cruiser blog. But seriously, I did use her YETI to ice down those speckled trout that I caught on a recent fishing trip in Louisiana with Captain Kerry Audibert. You can check out a shot of our catch on Instagram. We had a fantastic trip and caught some very nice size trout, especially considering the hot weather in August.

Recently, I was checking into the DoubleTree Downtown in Austin, TX around 9 p.m. after a long day of travel.  Now, my self-discipline is always weak between 9 and 10 p.m. when I love to start snacking. This urge to snack is tripled when I am traveling. I start rationalizing that “I deserve this” and I must say it works 99% of the time. I am really good at convincing myself how much I deserve what I don’t need.

I was floored and saddened to discover recently that a CPA friend and peer had suddenly passed at the young age of 51. Such a tragic loss. It brought back to me the importance of our dash.

“You might be a redneck if you take a fishing pole into Sea World.” Since I love to take a fishing pole most everywhere I go, Foxworthy may have nailed me on this one. I wish I had a dime for every time my wife has said, “When are you going to get those fishing poles out of your truck?”

Jeff Foxworthy has made a career out of his, “You might be a redneck if…” jokes. Besides giving rednecks more jokes than they know what to do with, these jokes reach a bigger audience because they are relatable. We see ourselves or someone we know in some aspect of these jokes. "You might be a redneck if your salad bowls have Cool Whip stamped on them." I always wondered if you were a redneck if it was only the extra guest bowls that had the cool whip stamp?  Regardless, if we look closely at some of the fun poked by Foxworthy, we might also detect a theme of complacency—always settling rather than striving to better ourselves. 

Every year, I passionately look forward to the crappie spawn (a freshwater fish also called white perch, sac-a-lait, speckled perch and even sometimes papermouth) which begins in February and usually tails off by late May or early June in the Southeast. This picture was one of my best days this year while wading on Enid Lake, MS. Wade fishing is absolutely my favorite way to fish during the crappie spawn. Every year, crappie transition from deep water to the 6-10 foot level and then they move and hold around 4-6 feet of water.  Eventually, the males head into shallow water to locate or build nests and they are quickly followed by females who might lay eggs in 12-18 inches of water!  I have seen crappie so shallow that you could see the dorsal fin on their back at times as well as the constant swirl of water. 

Anticipatory is a big word—I wish I had been more anticipatory on what to blog about this week. I had a relevant fishing story I was really excited to share, but that was shelved (next week, I promise!).  Instead, I felt compelled to share why I was participating in next week’s webcast Will Your Firm Thrive or Just Survive? The Critical Competency for Today’s Practitioner hosted by CPA.com. 

In my experience of mentoring, coaching and teaching about leadership, one of the fundamental pieces of advice that I always include is, “Make sure you are not holding up the ship!” It’s easy for our organizations to bottleneck and get slowed down when vision, roles, responsibility and authority are not well communicated and owned. 

On a recent family vacation to Perdido Key, Florida, we had dinner at Fisherman’s Corner—a hole in the wall restaurant that prepares every dish from scratch and has become our family’s favorite when we are in the area. It was hot and we had a large group so I went inside to order drinks for us while we waited. Despite being in the middle of the dinner rush, the waiter smiled at me, handed me the drinks and said, “We use the honor system here, so just simply tell your waiter when you are seated how many drinks you had.” WOW!  I realize they trust me to not take advantage of their hospitality and generosity, but our customer experience (which is always great there) just soared to an even higher level of brand loyalty. It was evident that they cared about our experience AND they trusted us. Loyalty grows when trust is extended. 

This blog is the third in the series, The Things We Think and Do Not Say: The Future of Our Business—My Very Own Jerry Maguire Blog

Last week, we defined what it means to be a true trusted advisor and the gap that currently exists between our client service level and that of a true trusted advisor. But why even confront trusted advisor? 

This blog is the second in the series, The Things We Think and Do Not Say: The Future of Our Business—My Very Own Jerry Maguire Blog

Trusted advisor sounds good. I completely understand why we want to tell clients and prospects this. And it is certainly desirable, but these two words are not reflective of how we are serving the majority of our clients. As it stands, trusted advisor has as much meaning as "on-time departure" from an airline. And much like a savvy traveler, the market is not going to believe what we say about ourselves—they will only believe what they experience and what other clients say about us.

This blog is the first in the series, The Things We Think and Do Not Say: The Future of Our Business—My Very Own Jerry Maguire Blog

The term “trusted advisor” is so overused and embellished in public accounting—to the extent that this term now breeds complacency. Our profession has taken for granted the level of client service and experience, the relevant insights and the courage necessary to proactively collaborate in fulfillment of those powerful words. We continuously label ourselves and our firms with this term meant to convey the highest level of client experience and equity relationship while our professional services are increasingly being viewed and purchased as low-value commodities. We are quickly sliding down the value slope even with many of our trusted advisor relationships.