{"id":10650,"date":"2024-01-30T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-30T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/?p=10650"},"modified":"2025-01-22T09:58:32","modified_gmt":"2025-01-22T14:58:32","slug":"become-human-firm-unlock-clients-dreams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/become-human-firm-unlock-clients-dreams\/","title":{"rendered":"Become a Human Firm and unlock your clients\u2019 hopes and dreams"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGrowth & Customers<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\tBecome a Human Firm and unlock your clients\u2019 hopes and dreams\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\t

\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\tJames Ashford<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Human Firm<\/a> is a best-selling book by Will Farnell, the founder and a director of accounting firm Farnell Clarke (he also wrote its predecessor, The Digital Firm). In this extract from the book, GoProposal founder James Ashford reveals how being a human-centric practice means you can help your clients tap into their goals and make them become a reality.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technology has elevated you into a position where you can forge deep, meaningful, long-lasting, impactful relationships with other humans (your clients), who in turn, care deeply about the work they do and the humans they interact with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you stop and think about the number of lives you touch, it\u2019s huge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just think about the number of clients you have and their partners and children, the number of staff they have and their families, the number of suppliers who serve them and the number of clients they serve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through the work you do, you touch all those people\u2019s lives in some way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Creating a Human Firm is about being aware of those human connections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through these genuine interactions you can grow and contribute and this is where you find the highest levels of fulfilment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is why you entered this profession in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

The Human Firm<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

<\/p>\n

Discover how you can turn your accountancy practice into a Human Firm by downloading our essential guide and checklist.\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDownload your free guide<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Having tough conversations and understanding fears and goals<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Accounting will always be a heart-centred profession filled with tough conversations, tears, hard work and moments of celebration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You get the great privilege of intimate access into the finances, hopes, dreams and fears of your client\u2019s businesses and the personal lives on which they build their successes, but only if you show up as humans yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Compliance distracted you from this for many years. Advisory has lit the fire again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Digitization gave you hope but then served as a distraction in its own right. You thought it was the end goal, but it was not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was the gateway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And as your firm evolves through this digital gateway, you can return to your roots and your calling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can uncouple yourself from who you were told you needed to be. You can unshackle yourself from the fears you imposed on yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally you can connect with a world full of excitement in the realm of the human.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Theologian and humanitarian Albert Schweitzer wrote: \u201cThe purpose of human life is to serve, and to show compassion and the will to help others.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You could conclude this is the purpose of the human firm \u2013 to serve clients, to show them compassion, and to assist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Highs and lows to becoming a Human Firm<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Throughout this book, Will Farnell generously shares the journey his own firm has travelled, from becoming and being a fully Digital Firm, to being a human firm, and the journey he has helped many other firms through, with his coaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Farnell Clarke was the first full cloud-based accounting firm in the world, the first through the digital gateway, and has led many other pioneering initiatives ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The learnings Will shares here have been hard won, and pressure tested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not everything has worked perfectly, which Will is quick to share so that you can avoid some of the collisions his pioneering endeavours inevitably encountered. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Collisions that are always the case with the first through the wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his first book, he showed how to create The Digital Firm, which created the gateway through that wall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this book, he paves the way for you to evolve beyond that, to become a human firm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This isn\u2019t fluffy theory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is not the soft stuff. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is hard, and comes with a sense of great urgency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The human firm isn\u2019t optional. It\u2019s inevitable, because if you act like robots, you will be replaced by them. The only protection against this is to build a human firm, now and with haste.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You will find this book challenging in parts, illuminating throughout and very actionable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And if you take those actions, maybe you will unlock tremendous value for your clients, your team and yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Understanding what your clients need, personally and professionally<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I have been in the accounting industry for the best part of a decade, helping accountants and bookkeepers<\/a> to price their services more profitably, sell them more confidently and deliver the greatest impact they possibly can to their clients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My passion to succeed in this mission is because first and foremost, I\u2019m a client of these accounting and bookkeeping services myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve run a business where I knew what I wanted, but not what I needed. That led to massively underinvesting in the finance function of that company, which failed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve also received tremendous value and benefit from accounting and bookkeeping services, which led to the successful scaling and exit of a business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the time I came to sell that business, I was investing upwards of \u00a35,000 a month into its finance function through the accounting firm we were working with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I first started working with them, I spent \u00a3750 a month. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was still three times what I was spending with my previous accountant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reason I was prepared to make that higher investment, wasn\u2019t because I understood their services better, it was because I felt they understood me better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They knew what our family\u2019s long-term financial goals were, and how much we\u2019d need to sell the business for to achieve them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They knew that my immediate goals were to take my children to school every day, move closer to their school and to get my wife out of full-time employment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the first page of every set of monthly management accounts, I was reminded of those goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The meeting would always start with…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow many times have you taken your kids to school this week?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHave you put an offer in on a house yet?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHas Bekki handed in her notice yet?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat does the business need to do to achieve those goals?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow can we help your business do that?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One year, I remember working with them to set the budget and forecast for the year and they asked how many customers we wanted to get to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I said \u201c1,000.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c1,000?\u201d They challenged; \u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell it\u2019s 1,000 isn\u2019t it?\u201d My ego said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut it doesn\u2019t mean anything,\u201d they replied. \u201cWhat do you want to achieve as a family this year? What would make life better?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat would be a great year for you?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we thought, and planned, and concluded that it would be for me personally to earn \u00a310,000 a month after tax, and to go to Lapland with the kids that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We agreed that would be a great year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And that\u2019s what happened, because we were intentional in setting business goals that primarily facilitated the life we wanted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can help your clients achieve the lives they dream of<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Accounting isn\u2019t about spreadsheets, P&L accounts, bookkeeping or tech. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Done properly, it\u2019s about enabling your clients to live the lives they want.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That only happens when you stop putting your services or the tech at the centre of what you do, and start putting your client there instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not your client as a ‘business’, but your client as a person, as a human, with fears and dreams and hopes and rough edges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You see, your commercial value in the world is directly proportional to the size of the problems you can solve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Completing my bookkeeping is a relatively low value problem to solve, but if doing so enables me to take my kids to school every day and to focus on my highest and best activities at work, then it solves a far higher value problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Producing a budget and a forecast are relatively low value problems to solve, but if doing so helps me to achieve the business goals that enables me to take my family to Lapland and meet Santa that same year, they solve a far higher value problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, you would only know that if you were to have very human conversations with the clients you serve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You would only know that if you connect the value of what you do to the problems and opportunities that show up in your client\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That, in essence, is what a human firm is all about.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Subscribe to the Sage Advice Newsletter<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

Get a roundup of our best business advice in your inbox every month.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSubscribe<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you help your clients tap into their hopes and dreams? Discover why doing so will benefit both them and your practice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1686,"featured_media":8035,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sage_video":false,"post_featured_image_hide":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[162,165,265,288],"business_type":[6],"lilypad":[],"context":[],"industry":[],"persona":[],"imagine_tag":[34,287],"coauthors":[444],"class_list":["post-10650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-growth-customers","tag-accounting-101","tag-bookkeeping","tag-how-to-grow-your-business","tag-the-human-firm","business_type-accountants"],"sage_meta":{"region":"en-ca","author_name":"James Ashford","featured_image":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1138451009.jpg","imagine_tags":{"34":"Accountants","287":"The Human Firm"}},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"Sage Advice Canada English","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1686"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/8035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"business_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/business_type?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"lilypad","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/lilypad?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"context","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/context?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"persona","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/persona?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"imagine_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/imagine_tag?post=10650"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-ca\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=10650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}