How CPA Firms Waste Time
Source: Partner Insights
The following is reprinted in its entirety, with permission, from Partner Insights.
If you want to find out the key time wasters at your firm, do the following. At the next staff and partners meeting, divide the firm into teams of 3 to 4 people. Then ask each team to develop a list of time wasters. After 10 minutes, ask the teams to name one of the main time wasters on their list.
Record the time wasters on a flipchart. Continue doing this until you have a list of 10 to 12 time wasters.
Here are some of the time wasters that usually appear on the list…
- People coming to meetings without preparing
- Waiting to see a partner
- Too many meetings
- Lack of planning by superiors
- Wasting time trying to satisfy customers
- Inability to say “No”
- Problems in locating files
- Wasting time on trivial matters
- Partners changing their minds
- Too many committees
Once your have your list of top time wasters, ask the teams to select the worst time waster. Explain that you are looking for an item that everyone will see as wasting the most time in the firm. Ask the players to review the items in the common list and select, with the other members of their team, the worst time wasters. These are the ones that you will want to work on in 2008.
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From Partner Insights, Aquila Global Advisors, LLC, February 12, 2008, www.aquilaadvisors.com.
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