Keep Your Accountant in the Loop – It Will Boost Your Business!
Accounting Firms Des Moines
There are many good reasons to hire an accountant for your business. From the basic functions of bookkeeping to finance to strategic planning, an accountant or CPA keeps your business on track. You recognized that you needed their skills, talents, and experience to run your business effectively and avoid surprises. Nobody likes surprises, least of all small business owners. Yet many small business owners keep their accountants in the dark about various plans for the business. As with all business operations, communication is key to avoiding misunderstandings and surprises – and the costs attendant to them.
Why Keep The Accountant In The Loop?
The main reason to keep your accountant or CPA in the loop is because you hired them for their expertise and skills. Why not take maximum advantage of their capabilities and get the most value for your money? Beyond that, however, is the fact that the accountant can bring a needed perspective to discussions of strategy and operations that can directly benefit your bottom line. Just with any partner, employee, or associate, keeping an open line of communication with your accountant will help keep them from being surprised by your plans. It will also keep YOU from being surprised by what the accountant might tell you at that juncture. It would not be advantageous or wise to find out about tax implications or regulatory barriers after you have made extensive plans and put them in operation.
Communication
You share a wide variety of sensitive information with your accountant or CPA. Building this relationship requires a great degree of trust on your part, as well as discretion and professionalism on the part of the accountant. By leaving your accountant out of the loop, surprising them, perhaps leaving a mess for them to clean up, you are damaging a very important relationship for your business. As mentioned above, you may also miss out on opportunities to save money – or avoid losing money – by leaving them out of your discussions.
Strategic Planning
From creating your initial business plan to evaluating ongoing operations, your CPA/accountant is more than just a bookkeeper. They are a valuable adviser for your business, if you take advantage of their expertise. Many decisions have third- and fourth-order consequences, not easily evaluated, and many of those potential effects are financial. Why would you exclude your expert on financial matters from such planning? To be valuable and give you full value, your accountant must have the information necessary to be fully conversant with your financial and business plans, goals, and operations. To be effective, however, you must consult them.
There are mistakes that small businesses make every day that could be prevented by consulting their accountant or CPA. Employing a CPA or accountant on a full-time basis for your small business may be unnecessary. But there are alternatives, such as hiring a contract Des Moines CPA firm such as CustomOne CFO & Controllers, contracting for part of a CPA’s time, or using a virtual CPA to provide virtual consulting online. Whichever option you choose, getting the input of a CPA and keeping them in the loop will avoid mistakes and is something you can’t afford to ignore.
