CPA BEST PRACTICES NETWORK™
The CPA Best Practices Network,™ (Network) is a ground-breaking resource for CPA firms to reach a higher level of performance. Focusing on performance will not only lead to better client service, and more income, but also a better environment--happier employees and partners, and greater growth and recruiting opportunities. You may already be a good firm--how about becoming a great firm?
The Network features the CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool™, the CPA Best Practices Survey,™ and the Best Practices Webinars Program.
CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool™
- A compendium of generally accepted best practices employed in the critical areas of the business of CPA firms. Each best practice is accompanied by a description of its fundamentals.
- Shows firms how to rate their performance. They submit their ratings to the Network, which periodically publishes survey results for firms to compare themselves with their peers.
- Why is the CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool valuable?
- Informs you of the best practices in which the best CPA firms engage.
- Reveals weaknesses that must be addressed to improve.
- You may be a good firm, and you may want to be a better firm, maybe a great firm! Addressing these areas is an essential step in achieving that goal.
- The soon-to-come survey will provide the opportunity to compare your strengths with firms your size in performing best practices.
Volume I - the following Critical Areas:
Leadership and Management
- Client Service (7 Best Practices)
- Growth (8 Best Practices)
- People Development (10 Best Practices)
- Partner Performance (11 Best Practices)
- Financial Metrics (7 Best Practices)
Merger Readiness
- Managing the M&A Process (4 Best Practices)
- Identifying Merger Candidates (3 Best Practices)
- Packaging Our Firm as an Ideal Solution (4 Best Practices)
- Assessing the Value of Candidate Firms and Structuring Deals (5 Best Practices)
- Understanding Culture (3 Best Practices)
- Planning the Implementation of a Merger (4 Best Practices)
- Assessing Upstream Merger Opportunities (7 Best Practices)
Marketing and Business Development
- Marketing (19 Best Practices)
- Business Development (11 Best Practices)
Partner Admission, Transition, and Buyout
- Partner Admission and Buyout (19 Best Practices)
- Partner Transition (8 Best Practices)
Volume II - the following Critical Areas
- Goals and Objectives
- Advisory Services
- Partner Compensation
- Technology
The CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool™ includes a rating page for each segment and shows you how to rate your effectiveness in implementing best practices using the following rating scale:
The Rating Scale
3 Great
2 Good
1 Poor
0 Not Doing It
The CPA Best Practices Survey™
This survey asks firms to review the best practices recommended by the Panel of Advisors and indicate whether they are engaged in each best practice, and if they are, the level of performance, for each one. The rating scale is the same as above for the CPA Best Practice Assessment Tool. We will scrupulously maintain the anonymity of the respondents. They will be categorized by firm size:
Less than $3 Million, $3 Million to $7 Million, and More than $7 Million.
Why is the CPA Best Practices Survey Valuable?
- Advises you of the best practices in which the best CPA firms engage.
- Gives you the opportunity to compare your level of performance of best practices with firms your size.
- Helps you determine priorities--you cannot engage in all the best practices
- You may be a good firm, and you may want to be a better firm, maybe a great firm! Addressing these areas is an essential step in achieving that goal.
The Best Practices Webinars Program
Online sessions that help you prioritize and work on best practices. They describe how to perform the fundamentals of each best practice at a high level. Each session focuses in depth on as many best practices as possible. They are 50 or 100 minutes in length depending on the number of best practices to be discussed.
- High level performance of best practices
- How to determine which best practices are your highest priorities
- The experiences of other member firms.
The Three Step Growth Process
Growth means moving the firm to a higher level of performance.
Step 1 Each year the Network sets a deadline for submitting ratings in the critical areas to be surveyed. The firm reviews the best practices in the CPA Best Practice Assessment Tool.™ Starting with the Leadership and Management- critical area, the firm begins the process of rating how well it performs each best practice.
The CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool™ uses the rating scale presented above. Best practices in which the firm is not engaged are rated 0, this means nonperformance, not poor performance.
Repeat the rating process for the remaining critical areas in the CPA Best Practices Assessment Tool.™
Step 2 The firm creates a plan for the improvement of each of the best practices identified as needing attention. A committee of partners can work on this plan. The Best Practices Webinars for each critical area help with the creation and implementation of the plan. View the CPA Leadership Institute Webinar Catalog here, includes Best Practices Webinars. The Webinars are complimentary for members of CPA Leadership Institute.
Step 3 Repeat the self-assessment process every year focusing on the new critical areas added.
Click to Join CPA Leadership Institute
(includes The CPA Best Practices Network™)
Questions? Send an email to [email protected].