Andy Jackson FRSA

Boom! Shut up and do it!

When an owner redoes a junior's work before it reaches the client, the job has two production steps and a fee priced for one. I fix the review step before the firm hires anyone else.

A firm run by consensus between three equal partners can take two weeks to decide on a new hire because no single person holds that authority. Speed needs an owner for the decision.

When the owner's calendar is the only scheduling system in a firm, each new client meeting gets booked around their availability regardless of the team's capacity.

A firm where the owner reviews every job works well up to about six people. Beyond that the owner's review queue sets the pace for everyone, and the next step is named team leads who review within their own group.

A firm can be fully booked and losing money on half its clients. With every new client I cost each fee against the hours logged, so the partners can see which clients pay.

A firm without a written complaints process handles the first complaint fine and the fifth one worse, with each one solved from scratch because there is no record of the last.

Buying a practice is buying relationships that someone else built. The first ninety days after completion decide whether those relationships transfer. We plan them before we sign.

A firm where only the owner can agree new client terms stops growing the day the owner takes a holiday. Someone else needs that authority written down and used.

A firm that doubles headcount in a year and keeps the same filing habits, the same invoicing and the same spreadsheet is growing its exposure faster than its revenue.

Count the hours in your week that only you can do. Everything else in the week is a process waiting to be written down and handed over.

A firm that says yes to a client outside its skillset is buying a problem it carries for years. The decision needs someone looking at fit before it books the work.

Two partners quoting the same job differently because they work from memory costs a firm more than a bad rate card. Pricing needs to live somewhere other than in someone's head.

The best brief for a tool built for accountants is the spreadsheet a partner made at 11pm because the thing they needed did not exist. Chivvy starts there.

Partners who meet weekly without an agenda end up discussing whoever spoke first. An operations lead sets the three items on the table before the meeting starts.

A sole practitioner who books two weeks off still has a ringing phone. Deciding who answers it belongs on the calendar before the flight is booked.

Marketing is its own Muckin seat. A practice that wants new clients needs someone whose whole role is finding them, in hours a month the practice can afford.

I am looking to speak with practice owners in England and Northern Ireland who are weighing up selling or handing over client responsibility in the next few years. Message me directly.

If you own an accountancy practice in England or Northern Ireland and you are starting to think about stepping back, message me directly. Practice Group acquisitions are my first priority.

Selling to a buyer who merges five practices into one back office changes what clients experience within a year, even if the fee stays the same. I ask owners what kind of continuity matters to them before I describe how I work.

Before I ask an owner what they want for their firm, I ask how they feel about stepping back. Owners who have settled that question make decisions faster at every later stage.