Steve Metzenthin, CPA, CFP, CFE, CVA
The baby-boomer generation, of which I am a member, has a love/hate relationship with technology. Many of those at the older end decided mid-career that learning about it was more trouble than it was worth, while the younger boomers (now in their mid 40’s) tend to be pretty savvy. Many of them visit websites such as www.40tech.com whose tag line is “over forty but not over the hill.” That’s annoying, but it’s a good read and source.
In my particular case, I practiced for years with no staff, so I decided early on that I had to know how to use the tools to produce the work product. I learned to do that even though I didn’t understand much of it. We’re not talking about anything fancy here – letters, spreadsheets, and tax returns and windows based filing systems so they could be found.
Recently several of us from Null Lairson attended a CCH (www.cch.com) User Conference in Orlando. The conference was truly over the top, and I mean in a good way – great sessions, wine and food. CCH is a vendor to the accounting industry. I thought that what they do is sell tax preparation software, but what I learned they really do is much more interesting.
The theme of the conference was collaboration and assisting firms achieve client satisfaction through leveraging of technology platforms including something called “full service through self service”. The idea here is that the second generation of internet sites, the Web 2.0 applications, has created an environment in which many of our clients can get answers for themselves. And here’s the really interesting part – CCH has commissioned studies that show that they enjoy doing it. Think about this in the context of a client waiting three days for a return call from a partner who then assigns the project to staff who takes three days to complete it. The alternative to a client might be to google the word.
The challenge to accounting firms is to organize work flow and to communicate results in a manner that benefits the client. The ultimate objective is to provide them information wherever and whenever they want it. Internet based applications and data stored in the “clouds” will make information available 24/7 to the client.
It seems like the pure techie stuff is being pushed out to the internet. We will spend less time hooking up printers and scanners, dealing with internal network issues, and buying powerful laptops. Our vendors will provide products and services that will facilitate collaboration and communication with clients – we can focus on what our clients want and need and take care to timely deliver it. This seems to represent a functional merging of technology with client service. We collaborate with clients through the use of technology, instead of using technology to prepare a work product in the back office which we then mail on to the client.
So I have finally decided to get serious about technology, because now it really is more about client service and less about computers. And this baby-boomer can understand that!!
