Adrian G. Simmons

“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 all, if I put in time, I can make money. It doesn’t get much more simple than that, right?

But is it really the time that’s making me money? Or is it what I do in that time? And if it’s the latter, why am I tracking and selling time? What should I be tracking and selling instead? What should I conclude when I spend a lot of time, but don’t make a lot of money?

I have a theory: time is merely a tracker of value. And as the definition of value shifts, time can become a less and less accurate tracker of that value.

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The problem of our age is too much choice.

Endless possibilities are endless. Technology lifts limits, but provides no direction. The land of opportunity is all potential.

The result: dissipated energy.

“A large part of the beauty of a picture arises from the struggle which an artist wages with his limited medium.” -Henri Matisse

Maybe limitations aren’t something to be removed, but something to be embraced. Perhaps, the more external barriers are removed from around us, the more we should be establishing internal barriers to reinforce us. When’s the last time you made a list of the things you won’t budge on? You know, those things from life experience, that you’ve come to realize are really important to you, or that you don’t want to let happen. Maybe stop and do that now. Or start thinking about them, and make a list later today or this week. See them in black and white. Test them over a couple weeks, and find out how strongly you really feel about them. And then after you’re fairly comfortable with them, make a note of them somewhere you’ll remember.

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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 faster than it used to, and these questions have increasingly grown in significance. Many of you also recognize The Firm of the Future as the title of the landmark book by Ronald Baker and Paul Dunn, where they lay out an argument and a plan for professional firms that shifts focus intensely to identifying and pricing for value. Another highly recommended title and a companion volume: Implementing Value Pricing.

Like many Thrivealists, I am fascinated by the concept of the firm of the future – it’s so core to who we are, and runs as a common thread through our Manifesto. The more I thought about it though, the more I came to think that “the firm of the future” was somewhat of a misnomer. I had a chance to actually chat about it once with Ron Baker, and he readily agreed. He wasn’t fully comfortable with the term, but he hadn’t found one he liked better just yet. More recently you’ll often find him, and other members of the VeraSage think-tank, using the phrase “timeless firms,” which I find much more apt.

Language affects thought, which in turn affects belief, which then impacts action. The problem in my mind with “the firm of the future,” is that it is both singular, and static.

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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 contract now, for a set amount of energy (say, fuel) in the future. It’s what gave Southwest Airlines the leg up in the early 2000’s and allowed them to keep their prices so low for so long – energy futures, a good thing (potentially).

In a converse, but no less elusive, way, the same holds true for the actual future: it’s made up of the energy from today. The energy you expend today is shaping your tomorrow. Which means that to change your tomorrows, you have to change your todays. The future isn’t powered by, “Well I’d like to do that one day.” It’s powered by, “I’ll do this now, for my later.”

That’s all well and good of course, and perhaps we’ve all heard it before, but how do I actually change my todays? Habits have a way of staying, well, habitual. Never, never underestimate the power of inertia (something I have to continually re-learn). Inertia can be broken by a massive redirection, or by small shifts in weighting. Circumstances probably dictate which is better: the latter being preferred as less painful, but the former being required when it’s a matter of survival. But both require energy, and here is the crux of my argument: to change your future, stop managing time, and start managing energy.

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We want to see our customers treated fairly — it’s in our CPA DNA. Somewhere between learning debits and credits, independence, objectivity, and integrity seep into our subconcious. I’m not quite sure how it happens, but I think it’s what leads to CPA’s being consistently ranked among the most trusted advisors, ahead of doctors, lawyers, and bankers. To be honest, it’s one of the things that attracted me to the profession.

That desire for upright honesty and fairness surfaces in a variety of different ways: the services we provide, the counsel we give, the interactions we have with third-parties on behalf of our customers…and, in our approach to pricing.

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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 the states issue the licenses. But is this what defines us? Is our identity basically defined by regulatory statute?

“Bringing integrity to information.” That’s sorta what an auditor does – makes the financial information believable, adds credibility. And even if we don’t perform audits, the public turns to us when it wants an honest opinion: when it needs to be objective and independent.

“Making sense of a changing and complex world.” That’s what the CPA Vision Project proposes. I have very deep respect for the folks involved in the project, though this statement sorta leaves me wanting for more. “Making sense of a changing and complex world” feels a little vague, and lacking in a sense of direction to me. I sorta feel like it’s a definition for being “human”: we’re all just trying to make sense of the changing and complex world we live in. But what makes the CPA unique? What do they bring to the table that others don’t?

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