Who's Really the BOSS?

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Rachel Dillon: This is Who's really the boss. A podcast for accounting firm leaders who want to grow with intention and lead with purpose. I'm Rachel Dolan, and along with my husband, Marcus Dillon, we share real stories from our accounting firm, Practical firm growth strategies, and the tools you need to lead your clients, your team, and your life well. Welcome back to another [00:00:30] episode of Who's Really the Boss podcast.

Marcus Dillon: Hey, thanks for having me back.

Rachel Dillon: We have a special guest with us, actually, a returning guest, Fletcher Wimbush. Fletcher. Welcome.

Fletcher Wimbush: Thanks for having me, guys.

Rachel Dillon: And Fletcher, we have known you for quite a few years. We have worked with you over the years. Will you give a brief intro and let listeners know who you are and what you do if they haven't had a chance to meet you yet?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, well thank you. It's always great to see you guys and have a conversation. [00:01:00] Um, uh, my name is Fletcher Winbush. Uh, if you don't know me, I've been working in the small CPA world helping them solve their hiring and talent acquisition challenges for maybe ten plus years now at this point. And that started back in the root works days. And, you know, now is, you know, uh, moved on to wonderful group that you guys are created here with collective and, um, it's just been a really fun organic journey. [00:01:30] And, and, uh, just, I love working with, uh, all the firm owners out there that you guys do such a great job of creating community around.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah.

Marcus Dillon: I don't know, man. Like ten years. I think you're being a little bit gracious to us. I feel like, uh, it's, it's definitely a decade plus. Uh. Fletcher. Um.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, that my name's been thrown around. I mean.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, I think the first time you're on, uh, the podcast. Rachel Actually, she didn't know Fletcher [00:02:00] Winbush was a name. It sounds like, you know, a company, a corporation that. And everybody was referring to this Fletcher Winbush. And it was like, what is this? It's an actual term for a CPA.

Fletcher Wimbush: Firm.

Marcus Dillon: Right? Yeah. No, no doubt Fletcher.

Fletcher Wimbush: Or Bush.

Rachel Dillon: Or publishing company. Yeah. We originally started using your assessment during the hiring process for new team members and prospective team members. And so part of me just thought like that is the name of this assessment, not [00:02:30] the name of the guy.

Fletcher Wimbush: A real person.

Rachel Dillon: The assessment. And so it was awesome. Whenever I finally found out, no, he's a real person. It's and we have the pleasure of meeting you and knowing you so well. Yeah.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, the pleasure's all mine. I mean, you know, uh, I got to meet you guys all in person a few years ago, finally, after all these years of working remotely and before before Covid, I mean, a lot of times it was over the phone and never met anybody like saw them face to face. So [00:03:00] it once Covid came around and some of these firm owners that had worked with and even people like, like you all, they were either just like this name behind an email or it was a voice on a phone. And, uh, then, you know, Covid happened and now we get to see each other on video calls like this. And yeah. Um, and now we're meeting up live in person and you just graciously invited me to some of your events. So I like that. I like, I like in person, so it's great.

Marcus Dillon: And, and we appreciate you coming because, [00:03:30] uh, for those that don't know where you live, you live in an ideal spot, man. And so, uh, there are pretty much no bad weather days, uh, where you're at. And so it's just sunny California, right?

Fletcher Wimbush: Well, it's arguable, but, you know, it's all relative, but no, it's pretty nice. So yeah. Surf city, it's my. Yeah. Got it. Gotta enjoy the, the sunshine. But you know.

Marcus Dillon: There you go. Yeah. And I know that we've already mentioned Fletcher. Um, your name a few times, [00:04:00] but the, the company name is discover.ai that's pretty much what everybody is driven to and where they can learn more about some of some of the tools that you've got and that we've used over the years and that collective members are using within their firms. And I, I love to see when someone posts a job and it's got discover.ai attached to it, because I know that those resumes are filtering into a bigger system where there's technology in the background, [00:04:30] uh, not filtering through it the old school way. So that's great.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. Well, that was, uh, it's been a journey. Uh, you know, the company started in 1980. My father started it and I took it over 14 years ago. Um, and, uh, you know, it's always, it was a dream of mine to be able to help, you know, create a tech enabled, you know, set of best practices. And really all those are based in I o psychology, industrial occupational psychology and or academic advisors at Bowling Green [00:05:00] State University. They're recognized as top in the world for talent assessment. Right. So not, you know, not exactly doesn't have this crazy brand name, but they are literally like some of the best IOS in the world there. And, um, you know, we really lean into studying what are the things that statistically move the needle in acquiring the best talent. And so we'll talk a lot about that today. So everything I talk about is rooted in there is like peer reviewed journal science, [00:05:30] like behind everything I'm talking about because I, because I was always tired of people, you know, giving this anecdotal advice. I'm like, well, you know, based on what, like just your opinion, man. Right. Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: I love that.

Marcus Dillon: That's really good. And so much of what we hear, you know, being talked about is technology and coming for the jobs. And then everybody I know that is involved in accounting and running small businesses or still looking for great people. Yeah. You know, it's just it's the challenge that we appear to [00:06:00] not never outgrow. Um, and maybe there's just, there's no, you know, long term viable option where technology replaces people because you still need people to maintain the technology. So you can't wait for this conversation and to, you know, dispel some of the myths that may already be out there when it relates to the accounting industry and what the talent pool looks like today.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: Well, Fletcher, yesterday I was actually in a mastermind group with people from all different industries. [00:06:30] And of the six of us that were in attendance yesterday, five of us are hiring. So, um, with that, I'm going to ask for your best piece of advice you've ever been given. It might be around hiring. Um, it might not be around hiring, but you're definitely, uh, popular, uh, in every industry currently because I don't know of any industry, um, close to me anyway, that's not hiring great people. So [00:07:00] if you will share your best piece of advice.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. Well, well, AI has not put everybody out of work, obviously, and I think we're all feeling it no matter what business you're in. Um, so I think this really relates to hiring, but, you know, it's, it's an old, the old adage measure twice, cut once. Right. Um, you know, or Ben Franklin's, you know, uh, for, uh, preparing or, um, what is it preparing to fail or, you know, not preparing is preparing to fail, you know, kind of kind [00:07:30] of adage. So yes, um, you know, all of that really plays into, uh, a factor in hiring system. And, and I think it's the place where we often make some of the biggest mistakes. And, you know, I definitely know that's true in my little woodworking exercises that I sometimes and, um, uh, undertake here and I'm like, oh man, I gotta go back to Home Depot now.

Rachel Dillon: Yes, yes, that's that is great advice. Um, as we get into, you [00:08:00] alluded to it earlier of people just kind of going on opinions or gut feelings alone. Um, but we really want to talk through some fact driven hiring strategies. Um, and we thought you would be the best person. Definitely, uh, just kind of your background as you gave it earlier, um, to have that conversation with us. So because lots of people in the accounting industry will focus more on that area for today, but would really [00:08:30] love to talk through what you think about when you say fact driven hiring for CPAs.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. Well, to me, it's all it goes back to what I was mentioning earlier. You know, I had grown up as a leader and, you know, been shared a lot of leadership books or gotten leadership advice from different people, gurus, managers and, and, you know, a lot of times this advice sounds pretty good or seems good, or it's coming from somebody [00:09:00] who you think is credible. And, and I didn't necessarily discount it, but, but I've always been like a doubter. I had like a dare to speak the truth to power, you know, bumper sticker on my car as a teenager. I'm like, you know, you know, buck the power, you know, so I, you know, I want to like, where's the evidence here? Right? And so that's where this kind of whole idea around fact driven hiring comes from. And, and so that's where I spent a lot of time, you know, studying the, the science behind it and what are, what is the actual [00:09:30] relationship between this or that strategy and actually producing a better outcome? One challenge we have in hiring, though, is we're dealing with humans. So we can colonize Mars with more exactness than we can hire our next hire. Um, and so, you know, we just want to be leaning into the things that are going to improve those odds the most, right?

Rachel Dillon: Yeah, absolutely. Um, I [00:10:00] know that you say a lot of firms don't have a job posting problem. They have a talent market access problem. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. I think one of the things I realized very early on with especially the public accounting space, and, you know, this is true for tax or audit and a little bit even for bookkeepers, because a lot of firms come and say, well, I need a bookkeeper that has experience managing multiple clients, right? Well, [00:10:30] an accountant working at Boeing is not a good fit for your small business accounting firm, probably. I mean, they could be, but so is your neighbor who you like. Like those two people are about as equally qualified for this job. You know? And so a lot of times, you know, we're looking for talent that has direct experience and can understand sort of the environment that we operate in, as well as the type of work that we're doing. And [00:11:00] unfortunately, and this is what you talk just like talk about AI here, right? Uh, you know, AI is not replacing accountants anytime soon. And, and the reason why is they don't make enough accountants, uh, they have not been producing enough accountants for the last almost 20 years now, basically. So there's an extraordinarily high, you know, extreme deficit of people who have, who are, who have experience, let alone the education but education [00:11:30] and experience doing this kind of work. So when and when you think about that, that just means there's, there's a really finite number of people. And when you're talking about in a particular market, so say, you know, the greater Metro. I live in Los Angeles, greater Metro. I mean, there there is. Maybe a few hundred people qualified for a particular job.

Fletcher Wimbush: And we [00:12:00] often post jobs on the internet. And we hope that one of those two or in many markets, by the way, this number is more like 50 people. By the way, so I live in LA, a big market, lots of people to choose from, but still only several hundred people in a market like like ours. So we post a job and we just hope that one of these couple of people relative to the population [00:12:30] of our Metro sees that ad. It happens to be looking for a job right now. Says this ad is like, amazing. I can't wait to go interview with Marcus and Rachel like they wrote this so well. This sounds so exciting compared to what I'm doing now. And, you know, hit submit on their, uh, their resume, you know, whatever platform that they're on. Like that doesn't happen. That's not, that's not what's happening. Right. And [00:13:00] so we're, we're trying to solve the problem all wrong. We've got to figure out who these people are and then just simply reach out to them. It's not that easy. But that is step kind of step one. And when we talk about facts again, I gotta hire a tax manager. I'm in Dallas, Texas. There are only so many tax managers who work for small, maybe midsize CPA firms. So [00:13:30] the facts are we need to figure out how many people fit that qualification. We need to figure out their name, their phone number, their email, their LinkedIn, their TikTok. And we need to go reach out to them.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah, I love that. And, um, I love that you have a thought behind when we start reaching out for that position. So most people start reaching out for that position when they need someone, when someone's [00:14:00] left, um, or when they brought on, let's say three new clients at the same time and realized there's no one in the office to take on this work. So the owner's trying to, you know, feverishly work on it themselves. Um, when would you suggest that we should be thinking about our next hire?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. Well, uh, today. Now yesterday. Right. You know, I mean, you know, we really got to be planning well in advance. And I think that's a lot of what you all talk about in collective, [00:14:30] right? We want to run a very intentional firm and you've got plans to grow. I mean, I think almost everybody there, I mean they're they're looking for growth, right? I mean, if you're a member of collective, you're not there just because you're just working a lifestyle business. And as you and your assistant and, you know, C class office space or something, you know, like, you know, you're looking to be, you know, the best and grow your firms and grow your client base and create great quality of life for your family and the people in your teams [00:15:00] family. Right? So, you know, that's our mindset. Then we need to be cultivating those relationships today because any experienced talent can, can literally take a year or longer to acquire. And this is a, for anybody who maybe as old as me, but top grading was a was really notorious for like saying, talking about let's build a talent bench. And [00:15:30] that's what we're talking about here. And that talent bench needs to be like 6 to 20 people, right, of relationships that you're cultivating over a long period of time. Um, and that's relatively manageable, right? Like that's not an unmanageable thing to do.

Marcus Dillon: No, it's really good. And it kind of all the analogies, right? Like the best time to plant a tree was yesterday or ten years ago or today. And I think it's no different in your, [00:16:00] your talent, um, acquisition and your bench that you are building out. Um, so I love, love that. So as far as first steps, a lot of it's internal, right? Like determining what the path of your business is going to be, what your needs could be. Um, not just shooting off the hip and trying to go hire that next tax manager. And even like hiring for a tax manager is probably better than saying, hey, we want to replace [00:16:30] Molly because that's how a lot of people think about it, right? They, they have the avatar of the person that they want to duplicate or replace. It would be nice to have this person. Well, there's only one of those people in the whole world, right? You know, and so realistic, not realistic. So the first the first part is just even developing a role, a job description, a scorecard. What does success look like? And, um, I think that's the hard work that people don't understand.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. That's the [00:17:00] measure twice cut once problem, right? And that's the beginning of the, the focus part of a fact driven hiring system. Yeah. You're nailing it there. And you know, it doesn't with AI, it's amazing. It doesn't actually take that much effort. But we're busy and, you know, look, it's not our day job to write job descriptions, right? But it is our day job as leaders to create plans and understand what good looks like in our business. And to set [00:17:30] those definitions. I mean that as a as a leader that I mean, if we and many of us even it's taken me a long time to sometimes figure that out, and it's an ever growing thing, but it takes a while to figure out how to define what good looks like. And, and we have to do that in clear and measurable terms. And that's a lot of times you talk to people say, hey, I need to hire whatever tax manager or bookkeeper, and you get a lot of very qualitative responses [00:18:00] coming out of our minds. You know, it's a very fuzzy description. If you think about it, it's like, how will you know when you've met this person?

Marcus Dillon: No, that's that's that's nail on the head and over your decade plus, right? And, um, not aging ourselves fully. Yeah. Have you seen just evolutions of what makes a great hire as far as like some of the skill sets of the people that are now in the [00:18:30] market or some of the skills that employers are now looking for that they weren't in the past? Or is it always been? We just want to find good people. And showing up is half the battle, right? Um, I think the industries don't vary too much and it just comes back to just good people is what we hear time and time again.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. I mean, in my signature of my email, I've got a quote, the one of the famous Warren Buffett quotes, you know, I hire for integrity, motivation [00:19:00] and intelligence. And if they lack the first thing, the other two will kill you. You know, really smart, motivated people will will find a way to, you know, get one over on you basically some way or another. And so, or they're very problematic. So, I mean, I think that it really does come down to that. I mean, we so we talked, we talked a little bit about, okay, some of the experience talent and building a bench. Well, that might be building relationships with experienced people. But if ideally, [00:19:30] we're planning ahead in a different way and we're hiring more junior talent and we're developing those people because again, now I can hire for integrity, motivation, and intelligence. And that's where I was even saying earlier, like, your neighbor might be the best hire, even better than the proven, you know, staff accountant coming from this glorious, you know, big name company. Like sometimes we get enamored by that. It's like, oh, they worked for meta or for wherever Google or something. You're like, wow, they must be great. They [00:20:00] probably are great, but they, but they're actually in a different league than what we're looking for. And that's actually a step back. Sometimes if we, you know, we get enamored with that. The rose colored glasses about things like that where our neighbor that, you know, stay at home mom who's now coming back into the workforce, who's just really high integrity, super motivated. I mean, if they can manage a kid or two, you know, or more than that, then I mean, they're like super people like, you know, um, uh, [00:20:30] those people could actually be some of the best hires ever if you're willing to develop them. Right?

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And speaking from our experience, um, like those, those are the people that say yes to anything. You know, you, you give them, uh, like, you know, will you call this client back or will you go do collections? Uh, you know, it's just, it's, they can manage it. So I agree completely with you on that assessment.

Fletcher Wimbush: Folks that are, you know, a little bit older, you know, uh, [00:21:00] moms coming back in the workforce or, you know, these people are often just frankly discriminated against, you know, for various, you know, various reasons. And they're so often overlooked. And if you're willing to give them a chance, they're actually, I mean, many of them are super, super talented. I mean, and, um, boy, you know, just investing in their learning your business, learning your processes, they'll figure it out. They'll, they're going to pick it up. And, and, and because of that, because they've faced such [00:21:30] a hard challenge in getting good employment. They tend to be very like, very engaged and very like willing to go above and beyond. Um, and generally because they're just good people too, right?

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. Very loyal.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: Fletcher. You described our story of looking at candidates that are, um, CPA credentialed and have worked in these very large organizations with very big titles and thinking, oh, this will [00:22:00] be an amazing hire. And it is such a long road of training for them because it does not correlate to what we do on a daily basis. They have done, you know, one piece of one little part of all of that, or they had eight people under them who did all of the things that our team members do on a daily basis. Yeah. And so it just didn't fit perfectly.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. And then they want to make more than we're often willing to pay. You know, they're [00:22:30] again, they're in a different league. You know, it's they're they're super talented people there. And sometimes they'll have integrity and they're motivated and they're smart too. But again, that's just a mismatch.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: I like your approach, Fletcher, because you like to systemize things as we also like to systemize things. Um, you've put together what you call the winning system. Will you go through that, uh, with us and with our listeners?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. So I [00:23:00] mean, we'll go back to the, you know, kind of fact driven hiring system is kind of that winning system. So we talked about focus. We really want to get clear on what good looks like and clear and measurable terms. So that's a 30 minute introspective thing that you do. I think I'm sharing a bunch of resources with you all. So these are going to be, you know, great documents to support some of the things I talk about here in the call. But, um, what we need to hire somebody, we want to get clear about what kind of work that they're doing. And [00:23:30] so I. So when you hire that next person, how many tax returns will they prepare? What kinds of tax returns? And I always ask firm owners like, well, is this mostly 1099 with kind of middle income, you know, families? Is this like low income, you know, 1099 people, single income making less than $100,000 a year? Is it small businesses with, you know, [00:24:00] few hundred thousand dollars in revenue or a few hundred million in revenue? Uh, so we want to get really clear about what is it, the work that they're going to do because there's so much, so many different type types of projects or different types of clients out there. And just to assume that somebody has a title and they're coming from another firm, and that's going to be a good match for us is not accurate. Right? We fool ourselves. It kind of goes to that. Well, I hired the big four person and they're not a fit, but that actually happens at [00:24:30] at all, at any even if they come, this person comes from a small firm and you're a small firm, like there's still those mismatches.

Fletcher Wimbush: So, you know, that first part is really preparing, getting crystal clear on what this person going to do, how much work, what describe the work in that level of granular detail, and then having a great system for attracting that talent. And so job boards are obviously one place, but many times, because of the type of talent we're looking for, we need to take a much more proactive approach. [00:25:00] And that means identifying every person in the market who is qualified to do this job. And, um, so this is, this will save everybody a ton of money. Um, if you are willing to do the work and it's not that much work, but when once you figure out exactly who you're looking for, because you've really taken the time to define what that work is work's all about, then You just simply Google or go to Claude or [00:25:30] ChatGPT and be like, give me every tax firm in my market, right? It's going to give you the name of every single one of them. Go to LinkedIn. Put the name of that firm in LinkedIn, and then go to the people page for that firm. And then it will list most of, if not all, of the people who work at that firm and their job title. And then you can simply click, click, connect, send them a polite note. [00:26:00] Hey, Marcus, I saw your profile. Looks like you're doing some amazing work over there at ABC firm.

Fletcher Wimbush: I would love to just start a conversation. I always like to network with smart, you know, tax professionals. Would you be open to having a cup of coffee or having a quick chat and just beginning a conversation with a, you know, starting to get to know each other? So pretty soft sell right there. You could do that in ten, 15 minutes a day. You go in the last podcast, we're talking about atomic habits. So [00:26:30] this is an atomic habit. If I'm a CPA firm owner. And if you do this and this is what we do for a client, so they pay us to do this for them. Yeah, fine. You know, look, I get, you know, sometimes trading your, your, your money for time and expertise is I mean, that's why we hire tax professionals and bookkeepers, right? But, um, if you're not in that position and you don't want to do that, or you want to build this muscle, it's, it's really as simple as that. But that's what we [00:27:00] do because we're going directly to the source. We identify exactly who the people are in the talent pool, and we're making a direct connection. Even then. It's not that's it's not as simple as that, right? It's we have to keep talking, keep reaching out, keep trying to engage with those people. And maybe ideally, you also take some other, uh, communication channels, like calling them or texting them or sending them an email. And, um, but those are your two biggest [00:27:30] sources. And the third source actually that I shouldn't overlook is, um, employee referrals.

Marcus Dillon: Um.

Fletcher Wimbush: So you all have great people working for you and it doesn't matter what level, like I'm sure you guys have some mid or low early career people that have worked at maybe at other firms, I assume. Right. Mhm. Yeah. So if you went to them and said, hey, when you worked at that last firm, who was the best tax professional [00:28:00] or bookkeeper you worked with while you were working there, they're probably going to have a name, right? They're going to be like, yeah, Jane, you know, or so.

Marcus Dillon: If they don't say themselves, right.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, yeah. Well, no, you say aside from you, I mean, we love you. You're great, you know, but aside from you, who was the very best person, right? Yeah. Um, and they'll be like, oh, yeah. You know, Jane was awesome. She trained me, you know? She was so good and I really liked working with her. I miss her, she's like, great. Would you be open to calling her and just, you [00:28:30] know, inviting her to lunch with me and you and, and see. You know, I love to just get to know her better and pick her brain and start building a relationship. And your, your people will unlock that door to conversations with other really, really great people.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, that's really good. And yeah, I.

Rachel Dillon: Love that as a option. Um, and a reminder that if you have a team member who's working really well for you and [00:29:00] they've worked somewhere, anywhere previously, they likely have a relationship with someone who worked really well with them. So for us, those have been very, very good hires. Um, both from a production standpoint, a client service standpoint, and then also a longevity standpoint as far as they they can learn about us before they ever agree to any kind of meeting. Um, [00:29:30] and decide yes or no. And so I feel like there's a whole lot of vetting that happens without having to vet, right? Years and years of things happening. Um, just because of that connection and the ask of team members and letting them know that you're looking or open or always trying to expand the network of the firm.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. And you got to do it all the time, right? You know, on a cadence, you know, once a month we have these conversations, right? And you also want to reward the referral. [00:30:00] Like if they introduce you to their friend and it doesn't work out, or that friend's not the perfect fit, or you just didn't like them at all. I don't care what the reason is, right? You know, that doesn't match, you know. Hey, Rachel. Thank you. And in public in front of the rest of the team, like Rachel. Thank you. I met Jane, and she was nice. And, you know, it wasn't, you know, didn't quite work out, but boy, thank you, thank you. Here's. Let me take you out to lunch. Or here's a Starbucks gift card. Or just like, just thank you. Here's a gold star pat on the back. Public recognition. I [00:30:30] think too many people get caught up in putting in like, uh, employee referral bonus programs. Frankly, you don't need to do that. Like you can by all means, I mean, reward them if you want after the hire. But like that should not be the carrot, but it's not the carrot. Like you're good people just want to work with other good people. And if you ask for a referral and you do it kind of along the lines that I just demonstrated for you all, they're going to be more than happy to. And if you're, [00:31:00] uh, gracious about the effort and that, that they put forward, uh, and, you know, if I, if I came to Texas and I said, what's the best barbecue place in town? And you guys said, whatever, I don't know, you know, Texas Roadhouse and I go down to Texas Roadhouse and I eat there and I'm like, this is the worst barbecue I ever had. And you guys come back to me and you're like, how was it? I'm like, it was terrible. You know, you're like, are you ever going to recommend me to another restaurant again?

Marcus Dillon: No. [00:31:30] And if you do come to Texas and someone says, go eat at Texas Roadhouse, uh, please take another recommendation.

Rachel Dillon: As someone else.

Fletcher Wimbush: I must have pissed them off.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. There you go. Yeah. No, I love I love the fact, like, as you think through, you know, the winning system and the acronym that you build out, right? The first two are focus and attract. And I think focus is something that hopefully we're better equipped today to use tools like ChatGPT or Claude or anything [00:32:00] like that to really refine the vision load in what we actually do, who we're looking for, what the market entails. And then you've got attract, which as you mentioned, like that's the atomic habits, that's the marathon that, you know, you're on the treadmill, you're running a marathon, not a sprint because you're constantly building that talent pool of internal team, or hopefully they're going to be internally on your team. Yeah. Uh, I love that. You know, and I think, um, it just goes back [00:32:30] to it's, it's not two weeks before you need to hire somebody. Um, and you just turn on the job posting and then the right person shows up in your inbox, you have one conversation and then you ship them a laptop or welcome them to the team, whatever that looks like for you.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well that definitely, you know, that that doesn't work. Right. And a lot of times out of desperation, you know, we make hasty decisions. You know, you meet somebody for the first time. I mean, pretty much everybody puts on a pretty good first impression usually, [00:33:00] right? You know, and, uh, and I think people over rely on what they see on the resume, right? They're like, oh, wow, they did this. They were a tax manager at this firm. Again, it's so different from firm to firm. So again, if you don't know, if you can't compare, if you go through that exercise, First of all, as you said, AI will do a lot of the other work, but this is the one thing you can't skip the job. This is a job analysis. Sit down and really think through and like, this is what we're doing in a quantifiable set of terms and, and what, how [00:33:30] we define good and how we measure it. And it could be the soft stuff too, but like core values, but if your core value is not well defined, then how I define integrity and how you define integrity might be very different, you know, um, and so when you get to the candidate evaluation phase, right, you know, this is where you start to get to is this clarity of like what our ideal candidate looks like becomes so clear that when we begin to interview [00:34:00] that just naturally, you're naturally already going to start asking questions like, well, what kind of how many returns did you prepare at that firm? Marcus? Uh, what kind of returns were you doing? Uh, you know, and, you know, uh, what else did you do there? Right.

Fletcher Wimbush: You're going to be able to dig in and, and start to now you have an equal comparison. Sure. Oh, I only did C corps. We don't do any C corps. I mean all we all do S Corp. Oh okay. Wait. Maybe we start to have a little bit of a mismatch here. [00:34:30] Yeah. It doesn't mean you don't hire that person either. It just means, you know, I tell this to clients all the time. You you just want to go in eyes wide open.

Marcus Dillon: Mhm.

Fletcher Wimbush: Because I see that mistake so often. They might have hired a good person, and then they throw them in there expecting them to be able to do the work, only to find out both parties to find out is like, this work is not the same as what I was used to.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. Yeah. Whether it's a program or the actual work itself, something may delay [00:35:00] them. And, you know, we've we've been guilty of that. I've been guilty. They kick me out of the hiring process, by the way. So like I'm I'm not allowed. So maybe, maybe that's people that are listening to this too, uh, because I, I go in and I try to sell people on why they need to work here. Right? And like, um.

Fletcher Wimbush: And that's okay.

Marcus Dillon: That's okay. Uh, but in that situation, it'd be like, well, if you understand C corporations. S corporations are going to be a breeze, right? And then you start to sell yourself on like why this candidate is [00:35:30] the perfect candidate. And you may overlook that they've had five different jobs in three years, and they don't stay longer than nine months or a season. Right? Because the seasonality of CPA firms and, you know, those are the people that are actively in the market, those are the people that are applying for every job. Have they open to work, you know, and just like feeding their resume to everything that's out there because they're, you know, they're [00:36:00] wanting to be employed and they're like going after so many different roles.

Fletcher Wimbush: That.

Marcus Dillon: It may not be the perfect one.

Fletcher Wimbush: And I'm desperate and I got to fill that role. Yeah. Looks good enough. Or, you know, you fool yourself, right?

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. You're, you know, it's, uh, I forget who says it, but the easiest person to sell is yourself, right? So it's, um, the person in the mirror is the one who knows all the tricks and tips to, to get across the finish line on that.

Fletcher Wimbush: So yeah, yeah.

Rachel Dillon: You mentioned attract [00:36:30] and I know money talks for sure. Potentially, uh, job title on, you know, a posting somewhere maybe. Um, what are some other things that candidates currently are looking for that really is a big deal for them to say, yes, I want to interview and these are good candidates, right? Like these are not the ones that are desperate for a job. Yeah. These are ones that kind of have a choice because they are very good candidates. Um, what else [00:37:00] is important?

Fletcher Wimbush: Well, these really good candidates, first of all, they won't talk for pretty much anything, right? I mean, I mean, maybe if you like wave $1 million at them, right? Like, I mean, so, you know, a small increase in pay, you know, small meaning. Five. Ten grand. 15 grand ain't enough. And that's pretty large even. Like, that's a large increase in pay, right? In many respects, none of that will will budge, will get them to budge in many cases. So usually, you know, again, they're beginning to have some discomfort [00:37:30] wherever they're at. So one of the smartest things you can do is really dig into what's most important for them. Like, you know, Rachel, what would make an opportunity clearly superior to what you're up to now and you're going to get, you're going to give me an answer and then I'm going to say what else and what else? And if you got that and you got that, anything else. Right. So because usually the first answer [00:38:00] is pretty superficial, but, um, these answers typically are things like commute, uh, work life balance really are the kind of the work life. It comes down to work life balance at the end of the day, right? So that could be lower commute, working from home or hybrid schedule, you know, something along these lines. And actually sometimes it's I want to be in the office. I'm like lonely or, you know, a lot of young talent is just not getting the attention remotely.

Fletcher Wimbush: And, and [00:38:30] I don't think that has to be that way though, by the way. But yeah, you can run a remote operation and give your young talent lots of attention, but I think it is a common trap for more remote oriented places. They just don't give the attention to their younger talent like they should. Um, so, but so it's, it's, it always comes down to work life balance and it always comes down to some sort of quality of life problem, right? Um, and quality of life could be more growth, right. You know, kind of goes [00:39:00] back to that title and pay like maybe, maybe I need to make more money. I'm not getting paid very well and I'm struggling to make ends meet making, you know, whatever I make in, whatever market I'm at. Um, but for the more experienced talent, it really tends to be work life balance. These people have families. They've been doing this for a long time. Right? They're tired of the crazy, you know, work hours and tax season. So how do we solve those problems for [00:39:30] them? And that's where I love like the teams of three and the CAS models and like that where firms are. And I talk to firms every once in a while and they're like, we don't work more than 40 hours a week during tax season.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And that matters.

Fletcher Wimbush: Paying well to top it off. Yeah. There's no discount just because you do that by the way.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. No the work's getting done. And I, I think so much of this it's it's not about the applicants. The hard work begins at the firm and the business itself. Right. And so part [00:40:00] of that's also being really comfortable with who you are as an identity and who you work well with and not trying to fit, you a square peg into a round hole. So obviously, if you don't have a path for somebody who's straight out of college or you don't support interns all that well, and you know that, right? And you're mature about that, then when that person comes across and gets referred to you, it may be, hey, here's the perfect firm [00:40:30] to go work for at your stage of life. And then after you get beat up there and you get that on your resume, like it'll, it'll be 2 to 3 years before you're looking for something new. And like that's when we come into the picture because our best team members, they filter through all the crap, right? Like they, our best team members could maybe even care less about job title compensation matters a lot, but they just want enjoyment throughout their day, right?

Fletcher Wimbush: Like [00:41:00] no headaches. They want to be.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, they want to be surrounded by a great team. They want to work on great accounts. They, you know, and it just like they don't they don't want all the obstacles that come with, you know, some of the other options that are in the market. So I think that's the other piece that you've already spoken into, is that so much of the reflection happens before the job postings even, you know, done. Like it's the self-work that that is really needing to be done.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. Yeah. Getting your firm in a position [00:41:30] so that you are becoming an employer of choice, especially as a public accounting firm, means there's a lot of different things about that. And yes, obviously being a nice place to work, having nice people, having good culture, those are really important. I just generally think actually most firms have that right. They, you know, accountants are like really nice people, right? So yeah, they don't really run into a lot of that. Obviously, you know, you can get a toxic person here or there, but get them out very quickly. If you if you if you stumble across one. But generally, [00:42:00] accountants by and large are just really great people. So it's really about the structure of the work that creates the pain for the individual in the firm. And so that's something that you have to to fire those clients, raise your fees, structure your business in a way that makes it better for everybody, right?

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And I think it's also being really comfortable with your business model. And, you know, businesses have different models. And so you may have [00:42:30] just a seasonal firm that ramps up and does the work and, you know, puts in the hours. But then they, you know, they take the time off and they rest. And, and we've had friends that that's their business. And then they'll have team members that come on during those heavy months. And then they coast during the summer when kids are at home and it's a great balance. And then you have the model where it's more cas and recurring work, and it's just kind of just even throughout the year, which is good for some people, but it's still like you can't [00:43:00] disappear for two months during the summer because work still got to get done. Right. It's just the more steady eddy business. Um, so it's just what do people want? Where they're at stage of life. How can you display that and promote it? So you're attracting the right people and you're not bait and switching or selling something that you really aren't, because that's not going to work out long term for either party.

Fletcher Wimbush: An interview for these things, right? Like, you know, hey, what? You know, what's most [00:43:30] important to you from, you know, the seasonality of your life or, you know, and, and listen for the cues. I mean, people want jobs. So, you know, nobody, nobody, even people who know they shouldn't take a job wants to be told no, they shouldn't. I'm not going to get this job. Right. So yeah, candidates will almost always do everything they can to talk themselves into that job, especially candidates on the market that are actively looking. So it is our job to make sure [00:44:00] that we've assessed them correctly, to say that we think that we actually believe and can prove that they're likely to be a fit for our model. High high effort, tax season, more steady, Eddie, whatever that is, right?

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. Well, I love like up until this point we've talked about focus attract and then you've got the candidate evaluation. Yeah. The the last part of your system doesn't end at higher. Right. You know, it's there's some work that has to be done [00:44:30] even after the offer letter is signed. All that fun stuff. So what's what are those next steps that are still just as important?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah. So, uh, Lou Adler, another influencer of mine, you know, he, I like how he positions this. He says in a year from now when we're looking at each other, we are we what are we saying to each other about this decision to work together? Right. And and I'm using that language very intentionally. This is not am I? You know, both parties are thinking, [00:45:00] you know, Marcus, you're thinking like I was. I glad to hire Fletcher. And I'm thinking, am I glad to be working for Marcus? Right. Yeah. So, uh, and then we should hopefully come together and say, are we happy together? Right. You know, um, but but it really, you know, both parties are thinking that, right? So, you know, what does good look like after one year? Um, and how will we know whether or not this was a good decision for each other. Right. Mhm. And then how do we get there from starting from day one. So that's the training and [00:45:30] onboarding plan. So what is what once you start? And if we've done a great job of evaluating the candidate in the hiring process, we've identified where this person is a match and then where they need to be developed. Right? So I again, I'm not saying that you have to hire somebody who's an identical match. You probably that may not even be possible. But I know going in where you're probably strong and where I need to develop you and creating a training and onboarding plan that's very detailed, that has specific, measurable, actionable, [00:46:00] realistic, time bound, you know, type of type of descriptions around it. And we're meeting often to, to discuss, hey, are we on track or are we off track and making any adjustments to those expectations? Um, that leads up to that first year of, hey, yeah, this was a great decision. I am super happy that I made this decision. And we're super happy to have that person on the team. And, uh, [00:46:30] you know, then you begin to finish the hiring process.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, that's really good, man. I, it's, uh, there's, uh, an author, um, named Dan Sullivan out there and he's got the Dan Sullivan question, right. And I'm going to screw it up. So I'm going to read it. Uh, if we were having this discussion three years from today and you were looking back over those three years, what has to have happened in your life, both personally and professionally, for you to feel happy with your progress? Right. So it's it's a version [00:47:00] of that, you know, as somebody that's leading others, building a business with a bench, with a talent pool, hopefully delegating and elevating others. Right. That's a really good question. Um, you know, in addition to just the short term, more focused 12 month, 24 month, what does that path look like? Yeah.

Fletcher Wimbush: And having that and ask that question over and over again in different formats, what in a month from now, where do you want to be in a year from now? Three years. I mean, you can you can do that in a lot of different ways [00:47:30] and revisit that. So that's, that's what it comes down to ultimately. Right? Um, so, uh, that's it guys follow that.

Marcus Dillon: You boiled it down, man. I don't, I don't want to miss the acronym, so it's fact FACT, right? And there is a visual out there. It's great, you know, to where you can actually see that. And that's, that's what we've talked through today. So that's great.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. I'm excited. Um, Fletcher, you are going to join us for a webinar at the beginning [00:48:00] of 2027. As we talk through and really go through in detail the full process of hiring for new team members. So that will be really important and really beneficial to anyone participating. But I was just going to add that some of our best current team members, when they were candidates, they asked questions around, what does onboarding look like? What does ongoing training look like? What are [00:48:30] the opportunities available for me here as far as career development? And they let me know, um, you know, after they accepted the position, the, the fact that we had answers for those questions helped them make the decision to join our firm, because a lot of people don't have a clear answer or don't have an have an answer yet. Uh, well, you know, we'll put that together for you later or something like that. But if you have [00:49:00] a really defined process at one time, ours was just, well, you know, we have a two week schedule where you work with specific team members. We set up calendar invites for you to join, and there's a lot of shadowing and observation that happens. And then we start handing over clients that will come to you very simple, like nothing. We actually send it in a spreadsheet the week before they start. And so, um, but just having something that it seems like, you know, what you're doing in your firm, [00:49:30] some intentionality.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: So it gives a lot of comfort to, uh, very skilled, experienced team member to make a switch again, just to that attracting piece that's very attractive when they feel like the people leading the company know and have a plan for them, that's longer than we need to fill this role right now because tax returns need to get done or financial statements need to go out to clients.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, I think that it definitely does. Um, you [00:50:00] know, people can smell like kind of that you don't have your act together kind of thing, right. You know, and, and if you've and again, that, so the training and onboarding starts with the focus phase, right? When you do that job analysis, you create those expectations. All that goes right into creating the training and onboarding plan. And so you've ideally done that prep. Now you just have to do the work of actually like facilitating those actions along the way, right? And having the conversations because a lot of it's just check ins really, frankly, [00:50:30] it's like, hey, here's what I expected of you in month one. Here's the ten things. How are you doing? Where are you stuck? Where do you need help? Where are we on track? Where are we off track? How do we figure it out? And if they're not the right person, by the way, they'll just they'll go away at that point.

Marcus Dillon: They'll opt out.

Fletcher Wimbush: They'll opt out. Like I don't have to be mean about it. I don't have to get mad. They just like very quickly, it'll be quite apparent to both of us that this is not a match. Right. Yeah.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. Rachel, before we wrap up. Share. [00:51:00] Share your question that you've asked multiple team members in interviews about do they even really want full time? Because that's opened the door to actually, you know, some lights have gone off in candidate's mind and team members that are now on the team. So it's a great reminder to folks.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah, two, two, two kind of things that we assess. And one of them, uh, Fletcher, you just mentioned as far as alignment. So we ask ideal schedules. Yeah. Um, and that it's [00:51:30] different levels of answers that I will get based on how I know this person that I'm interviewing. So when you talk about kind of, uh, warming up your bench and getting some people there, that's, um, also very helpful. Uh, but I ask, what is your ideal schedule? Are there certain days of the week that you can work? Are there certain times of the day? Do you want. Do you need full time? Do you want to work full time? Would a flexible or part time schedule work better? So [00:52:00] then we can get what I've gotten from answers. Ideally, it would be a four day a week schedule, but I didn't know if this was a part time position or I didn't think a part time position was available for this title. Um, and so they didn't even think to ask. But what we try to figure out is what we're remote with a little bit of flexibility in how our team members work.

Rachel Dillon: And so what we're trying to figure out is what [00:52:30] if this is a great person to hire? What is the schedule look like? Do we start as part time and move up to full time, or are they ready to go full time? They're going from full time. They need full time. They want full time, those types of questions. Um, so that is something that's been very helpful to ask because even though people have applied for a full time position, we have found that 30 hours works better for them [00:53:00] to start out, or 28 or 26 hours works better for them to start out, and we'd much rather know that ahead of time versus them taking a remote job, thinking they can skate by at that level. Um, and just doing the full time because they thought that was the only option. Um, same with future plans of where do you kind of the question of where do you see yourself in five years? Um, but like, how would you like to grow in [00:53:30] your career?

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah.

Rachel Dillon: We're trying to figure out, do you want to be a partner? Do you want to open your own business one day? Do you want to learn how to do tax returns if you're not already doing tax returns, what are the things that you want so that we can see if that opportunity is available? Because even if they're a great person, if those things don't align. We don't want to bring them into the team temporarily if they can find that opportunity somewhere else. So trying not to be super selfish on our side [00:54:00] and just hire them because they're great and try to make it work, but trying to outline all of those things ahead of putting together an offer and then starting and then realizing it doesn't work, we found it's just better for everybody to know as much as we can on the front end.

Fletcher Wimbush: Yeah, no, I think that's those are really clever. And remote hiring is definitely its own little animal, has its own little nuances like that. So I like, that's a pretty clever way to kind of suss out like, [00:54:30] what's the reality here? Um, um, a lot of times I look at what they liked about their current or their past, current and past opportunities, what they liked and they dislike the most. That can be a very, another telling way to kind of get people's preferences out of them. Right? Um, and you could do something similar with that schedule. Like what was your schedule and how did that work for you? Right at your last job, right?

Marcus Dillon: No, that's really good. Um, Fletcher, appreciate your time, man, and all the wisdom. Uh, we are looking [00:55:00] forward to the webinar that will, you know, do together here in a few months. Uh, but before we wrap up today, any final words of recommendation or well wishes to people who are entering the hiring process?

Fletcher Wimbush: Well, definitely, I wish everybody the, the best. And I mean, again, I think 15 minutes a day, I, you know, just do the do those little bit of tasks, you know, I gave you, I gave everybody a really good nugget there. And I would just encourage everybody [00:55:30] to do the work. I know it's overwhelming. You know, you'll feel uncomfortable doing that stuff, those those activities. Because again, these are things that most of us do every day. Right? So, but, uh, I promise you, you'll be okay. It will work and you'll be better for it. So, Um, I, that's all I, I mean, that's my number one piece of advice, right? You know, when people come to me and, you know, I tell you how to solve your problem, it's it's not really that complicated, but are you willing to do it? And it doesn't take [00:56:00] that much effort. Right.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. No, it's a lot of truth bombs, man. So appreciate your time. Recommendations from atomic habits to it's a marathon. You know, just put the hard work in and it'll come back around. So, uh, appreciate you being here today. Um, and we look forward to the next man.

Fletcher Wimbush: Awesome. Thank you guys.

Marcus Dillon: All right. Thanks, man.

Rachel Dillon: Thanks for listening to this episode. If you enjoyed the conversation and want to learn more, be sure to visit collective [00:56:30] dot CPA. You can schedule a meeting directly with me, Rachel, by clicking on the Contact Us page. Be sure to subscribe, like, and share so you don't miss any future episodes. We look forward to connecting with you soon.