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Sep 19, 2024: Xero to acquire Syft to enhance reporting and insights capability Following the acquisition, we plan that Syft will continue to be available as a …
Sep 6, 2024: Maryland will allow free federal tax filing in 2025 for 700K taxpayers The IRS is expanding its program first piloted last year - Happy to see this …
Sep 4, 2024: Xero announces new features at the recent Xerocon Nashville conference, including: More direct bank feeds Bank feed monitoring notifications Accept …
Aug 24, 2024: The new rules around buying & selling real estate just took effect, namely: Commissions can no longer be published, & Buyers will need a …
Jul 24, 2024: I really like how Kirby Ferguson has broken down the creative process into 4 phases, what he calls The Remix Method. For example, one important …
Jul 23, 2024: “The D.C. Office Market Is in Trouble” via WSJ “A Government Accountability Office review of 24 federal agencies last year …
Jul 16, 2024: Xero’s been hard at work updating their invoicing module – new features include: Ability to invoice for partial payments (like deposits) …
Jul 11, 2024: Federal Judge Sides With Maryland in Digital Ad Tax Dispute The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and three trade associations argued the tax violates First …
Jul 11, 2024: As the Maryland budget crunch becomes an increasingly reality, Gov. Moore proposes cutting $150m from budget already enacted for this year. He …
Jul 10, 2024: Although our company doesn’t specialize in non-profits anymore, we do come across tools & tips unique to non-profits that we can share: One …
Jul 1, 2024: In the ongoing unfolding of interpretations around the federal Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), the Maryland AG weighed in on 8 May 2024 to say that …
Jun 27, 2024: Folks coming over from X/Twitter may be interested to know I’ve exported my Tweet history on that platform (Oct 2010 - Jun 2024) into a …
Jun 27, 2024: IRS' National Taxpayer Advocate (IRS watchdog) reported that identity theft cases are taking 22 months to resolve & have a backlog of 500,000 …
Jun 25, 2024: There’s a balance between having good tools and tool overload that’s not always easily navigated. I think I’m seeing Confluence …
May 13, 2019: How to Get Started with Value Pricing I was pleased be quoted and share value pricing tips in the April 2019 AICPA Journal of Accountancy newsletter. The article was put together by Liz …
Mar 16, 2019: Beta Alpha Psi Career Panel I had a lot of fun at Beta Alpha Psi’s (BAP) 2019 Atlantic Coast Regional Meeting today as a panel member on “Explore Your Career …
Sep 26, 2018: Live Xero Certification Excited to be teaching a live Xero Advisor Certification course on October 23 at the beautiful Hamilton Hotel in Washington, DC. Time is 9 a.m. to 5 …
Jul 6, 2018: MSATP: Security & Your Practice Happy to announce I’ll be appearing as the practitioner on a “Security & Your Practice” panel at the MSATP Solo/Small Firm …
Jun 13, 2018: Karbon Academy 102 I’m pleased to be re-joining the Faculty of Karbon Academy for their “102 course” semester starting late this August. Karbon Academy …
Jun 13, 2018:
The Role of the Entrepreneur
You’ve seen those car commercials: the sleek, sporty car expertly threading through rural roads as it speeds its way towards bliss. And along the …
Dec 13, 2017: Referring link: The Role of the Entrepreneur Happy to announce my first post to the VeraSage blog, entitled: “The Role of the Entrepreneur”. My aim is to give courage to entrepreneurs …
Nov 11, 2017: VeraSage Symposium 2017 I was pleased to give a DET Talk at the VeraSage Symposium 2017 hosted in Allen, Texas, and chose two topics to focus on: “Variations on The …
Nov 10, 2017: The Soul of Enterprise: 2017 VeraSage Symposium It’s always a treat to gather with other Fellows and Founders at the bi-annual VeraSage Symposium for good wine (in the true spirit of a …
Oct 23, 2017: Live Xero Advisor Certification My colleague and friend Barrett Young and I taught the first non-Xero sponsored Live Advisor Certification on October 23 in Columbia, MD under the …
Oct 3, 2017: Apps for Accounting & Tax Practices On October 3, 2017, I gave a presentation in Columbia, MD for the Maryland Society of Accounting & Tax Professionals entitled “Apps for …
Jun 2, 2017: Soul of Enterprise: On Value Two of my great mentors are Ron Baker and Ed Kless, from whom I’ve learned so much about how to think about business (not to mention …
Nov 28, 2016: Thrivecast: Deeper Weekend 2016 At the annual Thriveal Deeper Weekend conference, hosts Jason Blumer and Greg Kyte record a live version of the great accounting podcast: the …
Jan 4, 2016: Referring Link: Lab Experiment 2 Launched - Value Accounting Model After the successful completion of the first Thriveal Lab experiment, we were ready to launch #2 – one based on the hypothesis that “there …
Nov 10, 2015: Art of Value: Making the Transition to Value Pricing It was great to spend some time with fellow VeraSage Fellow (say that ten times fast) Kirk Bowman on the podcast for his organization Art of Value. …
Nov 2, 2015:
The Price of Profit
I wonder if you’ll allow me a few moments for some experimental thinking — to explore with you an idea: what is the price of profit? (it may not be in …
Oct 9, 2015:
Facing Fear
“The pathway to your greatest potential is through your greatest fear.” -Craig Gristle
This is where it gets real. The blog posts are one thing. The …
Sep 8, 2015:
Business as a Moral Enterprise
Commerce. Hubbub. The noisy marketplace. The tens, hundreds, and thousands of small exchanges. In the store, online, over the phone, from an airplane. …
Aug 3, 2015:
Boiling Down An Accounting Firm
The world is a wild and wooly place. Grappling order out of chaos, or introducing chaos into order, is a messy business. Which is why neatness is not …
Jul 4, 2015:
Accounting Enters the Creative Economy
This post is adapted from a presentation I gave at Xerocon Denver 2015. In it, I talked about the progression our economy has made from agrarian, to …
Jun 2, 2015:
The Two Most Important Numbers Aren’t on Your Income Statement
I’ve suggested before that accounting is not the language of business, but that I do think CPAs bring unique abilities to the conversation of business …
May 4, 2015:
Transformative Systems
Systems are so important as enabling mechanisms. Sometimes I like to call them “structures of freedom.” I’m reminded of a quote from Tim Williams at …
Mar 2, 2015:
Brands Don’t Really Exist
Over the years, I’ve developed a skepticism of brands, a healthy one I hope. And I would venture to say you have too. One ad after another, all making …
Feb 19, 2015: JetPack Workflow: On Being an Entrepreneurial Accountant You may recognize JetPack Workflow as a provider of simple client and workflow management software. It was fun to join David Cristello in their …
Feb 2, 2015:
The Future Takes Time
It’s right before tax season, and I’m sitting here at a table in my office’s front room, typing away on my laptop. This moment has significance. We …
Jan 15, 2015: Referring Link: Three Experiments to Try in 2015 I announced the Thriveal Lab’s “3 Experiments to Try” for 2015, which included: (a) coffee coach each of your team members, (b) …
Jan 5, 2015: Referring Link: Experiment 1 Lab Report Released I’m happy and proud to release the official Lab Report for the first experiment conducted by the Thriveal Lab: Business Model Prototyping. In …
Dec 26, 2014: Thrivecast: Secret Stash Each December the Thrivecast releases its “Secret Stash” episodes, which are previously unreleased snippets from all of their guests …
Dec 17, 2014: Referring Link: Become a Thriveal Lab Partner! As the Thriveal Lab gained steam and was concluding its first experiment, we reached out to continue to build our base of supporters who were …
Dec 1, 2014:
Reflections After 3 Years of Value Pricing
I met Ron Baker in person for the first time in 2011. Before that, I had read his articles online and attended a webinar he presented. But in 2011, I …
Oct 6, 2014:
CPAs Should Own the Profit Equation
Great things can be accomplished by teams. And the best teams are made up of players who have unique roles that mesh and multiply their teammates. …
Sep 2, 2014:
Be Aware of Your Cognitive Dissonance
As a small business owner, you have one foot in the future and one foot in the the present: building your firm for the future, while serving the needs …
Aug 26, 2014: Thrivecast: Thriveal Lab My first Thrivecast appearance was to chat with two great hosts and great friends, Jason Blumer and Greg Kyte, about the newly christened Thriveal Lab …
Jul 7, 2014:
Doodle in the Margins
When I’m reading for content, I’m all about the marginalia: underlines, questions in the borders, even one sided handwritten debates with the …
Jun 10, 2014: Referring Link: Lab Experiment 1 - Business Model Prototyping Today I launched the inaugural experiment in the Thriveal Lab with thehypothesis that ‘there will be multiple successful business models for …
Jun 2, 2014: Referring link: The Phrase That Will Change Your Business's Future What is the ‘phrase that will change your business’s future?': “I’d like to try an experiment…let’s see if this works.” In this post on …
May 5, 2014:
How to not be Strategic, Strategically
There’s a balance line somewhere between having everything planned out and having no idea what’s going on. And the ideal is not ‘having it all figured …
Apr 7, 2014:
The Customer is the Product
Those of you tracking the Thriveal blog for a while may have noticed one of the themes I’ve been exploring over time through my posts is: where is the …
Mar 4, 2014:
Trough of Disillusionment
It’s coming. But somehow it helps to know it’s coming. There’s always the initial excitement, and the expansive vision of new possibilities. Then …
Feb 19, 2014: Referring Link: Bunsen Burner Chat Recap On January 29 I hosted a “Bunsen Burner Chat” with accounting firm owners from different parts of the globe to talk about experimentation …
Feb 3, 2014:
Accounting For What?
When the inevitable question comes up in social interactions: “What do you do?” one of my favored replies is, “I help people account for …
Jan 22, 2014: Referring Link: The Thriveal Lab - A Quick Sketch On December 10, 2013, Thriveal announced the creation of a laboratory for the accounting profession, and I headed up the effort as Director of the …
Jan 7, 2014:
The Power of Nothing
The four dimensions of time are: past, present, future, and nothing. Everything comes from nothing. The past is already set: it’s not going to change …
Dec 2, 2013:
Leading Our Customers
Leadership is scary business. Both for ourselves, and our customers. It means moving from where we are now, to some place new, some place unfamiliar, …
Nov 3, 2013: Pricing Power Interview Steve Major has a great podcast that’s part of his organization Pricing Power, and I was happy to join him to chat about value pricing, changing …
Nov 3, 2013:
Choosing Your Surfing Style
I have to admit: I’d love to learn how to surf. I sorta imagine it’d be something like skateboarding (which I’ve tried a couple times, and happy to …
Oct 7, 2013:
Accounting Firm Process Model
A few years ago, I was working on the interior components of our firm, and there were so many different ideas coming at me, that I had a hard time …
Sep 1, 2013:
Channeling Creativity
You know that Marvel comic book hero, Cyclops? The one that emits a powerful energy beam from his eyes? Yeah, that reminds me of accountants. Flow. …
Aug 4, 2013:
The Courage To Be Wrong
“If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” -Sir Ken Robinson
That quote is taken from this 2006 TED talk video …
Jul 1, 2013:
Accounting Is Not The Language of Business
I think we’ve been duped: you, like me, have probably been told somewhere along the line that ‘accounting is the language of business.’ It’s not. I …
Jun 3, 2013:
Be Open To Randomness, But Not Random
This past year our team undertook the effort to re-design our customer on-boarding process. We met and started brainstorming over some basic …
May 6, 2013:
Greed Is Not Good
Greed is not good. We have only to observe what happens when greed takes ahold of ourselves, to recognize that an unbalanced desire for wealth, and a …
Apr 1, 2013:
Putting the “Team” in “Teamwork”
The omniscient manager. You know: the mastermind, who has the vision, and orchestrates all the pieces in a three-dimensional chessboard, to achieve a …
Mar 4, 2013:
Time To Innovate
“Time is money.” Our profession has grown up on this concept: time is money. You hear it even today. And there’s a tempting ring of truth to it. After …
Feb 4, 2013:
Endless Limits
The problem of our age is too much choice. Endless possibilities are endless. Technology lifts limits, but provides no direction. The land of …
Jan 7, 2013:
The Firms(s) of the Future(s)
The Firm of the Future. What does the future look like? And how does one ready their firm to flourish in it? Lately, the future seems to be arriving …
Dec 3, 2012:
Energy Futures
In the financial markets, “energy futures” refer to that elusive breed of investment instruments known as derivatives. The idea is that you can buy a …
Nov 5, 2012:
Pricing Justice
We want to see our customers treated fairly — it’s in our CPA DNA. Somewhere between learning debits and credits, independence, objectivity, and …
Oct 1, 2012:
A Profession In Search of An Identity
What is a CPA? Well…we’re the only ones licensed to perform financial statement audits. The federal government requires it for public companies, and …