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The Young CPA Success Show: Episode 7
Finding joy in accounting—is it possible? Kristen Keats, Co-founder of Cadencia, Owner of Sherwood Tax and Accounting, and Founder of Breakaway Bookkeeping and Advising, thinks so! Join Hannah and Joey as they chat with Kristen about her unique career journey from a biology major to an accountant, emphasizing the value of exploring different opportunities within the field. The conversation also covers the importance of empathy in client relationships, the complexity of managing diverse employees, and the need for open communication within firms. Kristen encourages young accountants to explore opportunities beyond traditional paths and to embrace change.
intro (00:00:00) - Welcome to the young CPA Success Show. If you're a young accounting professional, this podcast is your ultimate guide to navigating your early career. Join us as we share valuable insights, expert advice, and practical tips to help you kickstart your path to success and excel in the accounting industry. Let's embark on this exciting accounting journey together.
Hannah (00:00:22) - Joey, how are you today?
Joey (00:00:25) - I'm good. Hannah, how are you?
Hannah (00:00:26) - Good. So today on the podcast, we had Kristen Keates. She was phenomenal. We had some really great conversation around balance in our industry, finding joy in our roles. What do you think about that, Joey?
Joey (00:00:39) - Well, I don't want to give away too much, but I kind of had a therapy session there like I this is something that is really important to me, not just for the podcast, but like thinking about the journey that I've taken in accounting. And, I mean, you and I have both talked about this like we did not, like take a straight line or find the path of least resistance to where we are.
Joey (00:00:59) - Like, we kind of moved around and bounced around and tried to figure things out. And I feel like if we had had some of this perspective that we talked about and some of the things we talked about with Kristen, I feel like our paths would have been easier. We would have found our place a lot quicker and sooner. And, you know, maybe, maybe, I mean, speaking for me here, my 20s might not have been as angsty had I known some of the stuff that we were talking about.
Hannah (00:01:25) - Absolutely. I may not have chosen to leave the industry completely and do something different. If I'd have listened to a conversation like this, or had a conversation like this, or felt like I could have trust with my coleadership to facilitate the types of conversations that we talk about in this podcast. So if we in this this conversation can help one person in their 20s feel more confident about where they are and help them through that, and maybe make their path a little more straight than yours and as it looks like, then that would be phenomenal.
Hannah (00:01:55) - So I'm excited for our listeners to to hear this conversation with Kristen and hopefully can take a lot away from this, and you'll probably end up a little bit hungry at the end of it. Just forewarning you because I know that I am right now.
Joey (00:02:08) - Oh. She dropped a really great piece of advice right there at the end for those who are maybe in college or still trying to figure out kind of what they want to do in their life, like there was a really nice piece of advice right there at the end that I think is, I mean, it's still applicable to me in the middle part of my career, but especially for those who are getting started or thinking about getting started. Really phenomenal advice there at the end.
Hannah (00:02:31) - Kristen, and what made you want to pursue a career in accounting?
Kristen (00:02:36) - So I had a little bit of fits and starts in my early college life. I had actually started out as a Biology major in college, didn't know what I wanted to do.
Kristen (00:02:48) - I don't know, I just finished high school, you know, and so I actually dropped out of college for a couple of years, and I went to work for Jenny Craig weight loss centers. Right? I saw they just like closed all their centers this year. But and I worked at the front desk and I realized that I had a special talent for I'm going to date myself right now. So back then we had these literal ledgers where when folks would come in, we would write a receipt and you had to put it across and put it down. And then we had to total everything to go for a bank deposit. Right. And no one could get that thing to balance but me. And I'm like, maybe this is my special talent. And I saw that, like, this is kind of funny too. I saw that like the accountants that work for the organization, they got to be like in the office, and they didn't have to be with these cranky clients that were trying to lose weight, that were mad at all of us, and they got to just like, do their thing.
Kristen (00:03:38) - And that's all they did all day, was like what I was doing with the ledger, which was the best part of my day. And so that's when I went back to school, got my accounting degree, and even then I saw it. This is way before, you know, virtual work or anything like that. But for some reason, then I had this vision of like, oh, this could be something where if I had my own practice, I could like do tax returns, maybe even, like out of my home, maybe like I could have a home office or things like that. Like that's what I saw when I wanted my long term vision for getting an accounting degree.
Joey (00:04:11) - Okay. There's a lot to unpack there, and I think it's fantastic because I think that's. When I talk to a lot of accountants who are, you know, talking about stuff, they usually start with some iteration of I got into accounting because I was good at X, right. And X is usually something like I could make the journal entries work or it just made sense to me, or I could balance the ledger.
Joey (00:04:35) - And my mom used to say this to me all the time. She was like, accounting would be the greatest job in the world if it wasn't for in her case, it was the clients. She was like, if I didn't have to deal with the clients and I just got to do the accounting piece of it, that would be like the perfect thing for me. So it was really interesting for you to say, like, that's sort of how you got your start. And it was you had a hands on experience doing the actual work.
Kristen (00:05:01) - Yeah, yeah. And that's what and it did bring me it's like that fun. It's like doing a puzzle. Right. It's that fun thing of figuring things out. And when you get that thing to balance, like it's like, I don't know, it's the dopamine hit I guess of, like getting that thing to balance. And so like what we've tried to do then like, since, you know, fast forward a couple of decades of me, you know, having this experience in public accounting and and that's what that's why my tagline became bring joy to accounting because it was fun for all of us.
Kristen (00:05:33) - At one point. We do get that dopamine hit. We do. What is it? So how can we distill down these things, all these things that is included in public accounting, and how can we just make it? So we're doing the fun part. Obviously it can't be 100% fun, but can we still get joy and satisfaction? Even in the parts that aren't fun? We are still going to have to tell clients sometimes that they owe $70,000 with their tax return. We're going to have to. If you're an auditor, you know, sometimes you have to give that qualified opinion, like whatever these hard conversations that we have to have. But honestly, sometimes if we have good relationships with our clients and we get through those things, sometimes even that can be satisfying is like, wow, I had to do that really terrible thing, but at least I could come to it from a place of like emotional intelligence and empathy and be there with my client who appreciates me. And we got through it, you know, and I helped them work together a plan to, to fix it.
Kristen (00:06:23) - So I'm really trying to to change the focus and the lens, especially for the younger CPAs, especially for those who are just starting out their career in public accounting, is that it doesn't have to be terrible. There's lots of things that make it terrible, but I'm a firm owner and there's a lot of us out there. There's a lot of us firm owners that are trying to not make it terrible, that are trying to not kill everybody with the billable hours and the and the billing by the hour and all the things that make it really soul sucking.
Hannah (00:06:55) - As a firm owner, what are you doing within your firm to keep a pulse on whether your employees are finding joy in what they're doing? Because Joey and I had a conversation earlier today about management's role in that and how important we genuinely think it is. So I'd love to hear from you what you're doing to facilitate that.
Kristen (00:07:17) - You know, it 100% is is critical because isn't that they say the number one people, people reason people quit is because they have a bad boss or they don't feel like they're being heard.
Kristen (00:07:26) - And so I try to. So here it's your attacks. We have a daily meeting. So we're literally seeing each other's faces every day. It's a zoom meeting because half our team is in Guadalajara, Mexico, and half of us are in the US and scattered a little bit. So but we're talking every day. We have a spreadsheet that we keep every week as like, how was your weekend? What do you want to accomplish this week? How can we help you accomplish what you need to this week? So we're doing these check ins on a very regular basis. Now having said that, I have had people quit, I have had turnover, and it's so super frustrating to me because I will tell you, I'm still working on this thing of like being the boss, because I want to also be folks friend, because we I feel like we are in the trenches together and we're getting through all that, and I feel like I have a really great team, but yet I'm there still kind of this barrier of like, they won't tell me everything sometimes.
Kristen (00:08:23) - And that's hard for me because I even wish even if they do want to leave, I wish they would even talk to me about that, because I feel like I've been in this business a long time. Like I could counsel them. I could even if I know they don't want to stay. I get emotionally invested in people and I would want to help them to the next leg of their journey.
Joey (00:08:43) - Yeah, it's really interesting that you said that because I can't remember which one. We've I've said this on, but I've said this on a podcast before. Like one of my big regrets being a young accountant is I left a couple of jobs that maybe I shouldn't have left because I just didn't see the big picture. And what I didn't trust in myself was my ability to go to my boss and say, hey man, like, I'm really struggling with this, or I'm really struggling with that. Like, I didn't feel like I could even have that conversation and it wasn't a them issue.
Joey (00:09:11) - It was a me issue. I didn't have the emotional intelligence to understand that. Like bosses or people too. We're just, you know, if you're in a management position, you're just trying to figure it out, just like everybody else is. That's half the conversation.
Kristen (00:09:25) - Yeah, 100%. And I agree with myself in the same way, even looking back, even in my later adult years, I thought, wow, could that have been something that could have been solved? Yeah, through a conversation and maybe not. You know, maybe they're like, no, this is just how it's going to go. And that would be it. But at least then you would feel like you did everything that you could to make it work.
Joey (00:09:50) - So I think there's there's a really interesting thing that I kind of want to explore for a few minutes, if that's okay. Um, you mentioned something earlier about being a firm owner and kind of listening to people and talking to people, and one thing Hannah and I talk about a ton, just not just between ourselves with other coworkers, as well as just how many opportunities there are in accounting that aren't just tax and audit.
Joey (00:10:17) - I feel like there's a thing when and I felt this, especially when I was in school, I don't think it's gotten any better. I think it's still a big misnomer that there are two career paths, but there's a whole world for accountants outside of tax and audit. What are some of the things you're doing in your firm to help young accountants kind of explore where they feel like they fit, and help them find a career path for themselves with your firm, rather than doing what inevitably happens, which is the career path themselves.
Kristen (00:10:49) - Yeah, that's a really good that's a really good point. And I'm glad that you brought it up because and I think you can kind of, throughout your career kind of dabble in these different areas and go back like it's not always a straight trajectory. Right. Like it's not like, oh, I'm going to be an audit staff, then senior, then manager, then partner, and then I'll die, you know. So it's like, yes, you can do these different things.
Kristen (00:11:12) - So and we actually have so I'm a founder of a few different companies. So in 2019 we founded Breakaway Bookkeeping and Advising which is Outsource bookkeeping CFO and controller work. So that's all that they do. And then a year later I purchased Sherwin Tax and Accounting. So this is mainly the tax. This is your more traditional firm just tax and bookkeeping and tax advisory work. And then we have Kodansha which is our outsourced staffing agency based in Guadalajara, Mexico. And so yes, I always try to tell people like, not only do we have this kind of ecosystem that we've created by our, you know, core companies, but. Right, you could you could potentially what I would love to see what the next thing I would love to nurture is folks that really love technology, like go explore all those apps and really like that. There should be really a technologist or a technology savvy person in every single firm that really geeks out over what that next app is still having an understanding of the tax or the audit or the bookkeeping or whatever the functions are that we're doing.
Kristen (00:12:17) - Like that's a hugely valuable role, in my opinion, to to just be because a lot of folks shy away from that, because a lot of folks are change averse. They don't like trying new things. So if you can find that person that is interested in it, like that would be super cool. But yeah, there's so many things that can be done with our skill set that isn't just grinding out the tax returns, doing the audit checklist and those those things. Yes, I know that.
Hannah (00:12:43) - If I could have gone back and told my 20 something year old self that there were so many other options other than just audit or tax, because I worked as an audit intern, one of my very first accounting jobs, and I was like, this is not the life for me. Like I do not want this for myself. It does not bring me joy. And I beat myself up about that because I was like, should I be finding joy in this? If this is what I've chosen and what I want to do? Like, should I find joy in this? I don't, and I wish I could go back and tell my 20 something year old self that.
Hannah (00:13:11) - So if you could go back and tell your 20 something year old self a piece of advice specifically around finding joy in your career, what would you tell yourself?
Kristen (00:13:24) - Well, one of the things I would tell myself is that there's a bigger picture, right? So yeah, when you're doing these tasks as a staff person, it's the grunt work they're giving as an intern or a staff person. They're giving you all the all the lowest level stuff. But keep an eye on what the seniors and the managers are doing. And I would also my partner Martin gave a really good piece of advice once, and he said that every single time he met with a client, he pulled in a staff person. Even just like a random staff person, they didn't have to speak, they didn't have to do anything, but they got to just see how that client conversation went. And I've been following that advice. So I would say as a staff person, maybe ask your senior manager if you know that they're having a client meeting, hey, can I be involved in that? Because I think it helps so much to see that bigger picture.
Kristen (00:14:13) - It just sheds light on these on that audit checklist. Right? Because you're doing that thing, you're like, I don't what am I doing? Why am I doing this? And so I think if you can get that broader perspective that would be helpful. And also just note just soak up everything that you possibly can, because maybe you're not going to be at that firm forever, but you can certainly use it for all that it's worth, for the time that you are there to get as much training and knowledge as you possibly can to get to whatever the next thing is and find those moments of joy. Right? Like, do I like filling out that audit checklist or do I like going on these inventory observations? Because like, that's a new and exciting, like traveling, you know. So like the more you do, the more you can learn those little things. Just pay attention to how you're feeling. Learn those things that are bringing you joy, even in the midst of like, I don't want to be an auditor, but maybe I like this piece of it.
Joey (00:15:06) - Well, there's a really interesting thing that you mentioned there about getting that exposure. One of the questions that I get asked a lot by folks who are kind of wanting to get into the space, for instance, or the consulting space, and there are questions always like, how did you learn the skills to do it? And my answer is really simple. I got to sit in a room with a guy for over 200 hours. Sorry. Not over. No, not over 200 over 200 meetings which were all day. So almost a full year's worth of. Just sitting and listening to someone give that type of high level advice. Now it didn't all just like magically like osmosis into my brain. Like, you know, there's some active listening skills and other things that you can bring to the table to, to do it. But to your point, as managers, it's our job to expose. And if we get, you know, somebody who decides, okay, I'm going to actively invest in this exposure, that's a beautiful, beautiful thing.
Joey (00:16:06) - Because now you are creating the system and the process to allow someone to kind of manifest something beyond where they're going. And that person is going to take a lot. Like I don't tell that individual enough how appreciative I am of the work, although I did get an opportunity to say that to him last year, and it was a very lovely conversation because I got to say, hey, I, I see what you were doing there and I appreciate it. Yeah. And it's so crucial.
Kristen (00:16:32) - It is. And I think you have to be a lot more intentional in a virtual environment about it especially, you know, it happens all the time because I have my calendly links. So clients will schedule me on Calendly and I'll just go and I'm like five minutes before I'd be like, oh, wait, I want Elizabeth. Elizabeth should be on this meeting because she prepared the tax return. And so I'm like, yeah, all this meeting. So you have to think ahead more because I can't just go grab her and pull her in the meeting.
Kristen (00:16:56) - She's in Guadalajara, you know, like I have to just think ahead a little bit more, but it's totally worth it to have that intention around it.
Joey (00:17:06) - One of the things, too, that I think is really important, and this is something that I didn't really learn about myself until I invested a significant amount of time in some therapy and some other things to kind of learn a little bit about. You hit on a key word for me, which is emotional intelligence. And I've talked to people about hiring and I'll say, look, I don't think you should necessarily hire for skills. Skills are important, but if you can hire for emotional intelligence, that is going to solve so many more problems than just getting the right skill person in the room. What are some things that you've noticed as a firm owner, but also as someone who's kind of clearly risen through the ranks and developed your own skill set of emotional intelligence? Hey, guess why don't we teach that more in college and be if we're not teaching it in college, how can somebody who wants to become more emotionally intelligent maybe go about doing that?
Kristen (00:18:00) - Hm.
Kristen (00:18:00) - That is a really good question. So I think of like you hit on one point earlier, which I think listening is huge, actually listening to clients or staff without necessarily thinking about what you're going to say next, I see a lot is when I was when I was younger at my previous firm, and I'd be sitting in a meeting with these partners. I would just like watch. I would watch the client's face as some of these partners just feel like they were just talking to hear themselves talk, you know, and just show how smart they were. And they had to be the smartest person in the room. And I would see the client's face, like, just kind of like, smiling and nodding. But you could tell they had no idea. And this partner is sitting there with a big smile on his face, like, so satisfied with himself. And I'd be like, did you get what he just said? Like there was a lot of words that came out there, but like, it's really important because it would be talking about, you know, stuff having to do with our taxes or things like that, that I felt like it was important for them to understand.
Kristen (00:18:57) - So think listening, watching like visual cues, facial cues, checking for understanding. And then really, you know, that empathy too, of putting yourself in that client's shoes of like, yeah. So when I have to make that call to tell the client that they owe a whole bunch of money in tax or these things like I tried to, it's not fun, but I try to anticipate what they're feeling so that because I think if you can validate folks, it's. But even if they're mad, if they're mad at me, like, why didn't you know this, what happened? And say, I totally understand why you would feel that way, and I'd be so mad if I was you. And, you know, I feel like that piece is missing now. How do you train somebody to do that? We absolutely should be training folks to do that. Um, I think having them in the meeting helps, but I, I don't know, is it one of those things that are. You have to be receptive to it for sure.
Kristen (00:19:46) - I don't know if you necessarily have to be pre-wired for it or anything, but you have to want it. You have to want to learn those things, but it can make you better. It'll make you better with your clients. It makes you stickier with your clients if they think that you have empathy toward them. I mean, my in my mind, it makes you more successful if folks can perceive that emotional intelligence.
Hannah (00:20:09) - I think that's easier for some people than others, especially whenever it comes to client relationships, because I find a lot of joy in my client relationships. Like, I find a lot of joy in connecting with people and helping people in that way through that. That connection just adds a layer of trust that I wouldn't have otherwise, but that does bring me joy. I know not everybody's wired that way. That doesn't bring everybody joy to. So I think that's an added layer of complexity in terms of with emotional intelligence, especially as it comes to client relationships, is that that's not where everybody finds their joy.
Hannah (00:20:46) - So have you seen that with employees in your firm that you can tell, like there are people who really thrive in that environment and there's people who really don't. And how do you navigate the difference in the personality types that you deal with in that way?
Kristen (00:21:00) - Yeah, I think you do have to navigate it. And yeah, it is interesting watching folks because so there's a there's almost a line to between what you're talking about. We're really getting satisfaction out of the relationships, which is different than being a people pleaser. And you really. Right. We are.
Joey (00:21:20) - Going deep. We're going deep into Joey's therapy session.
Kristen (00:21:22) - Here we go, here we go. We because I think a lot of us are pleasers, which makes it difficult to have hard conversations. So I use this quote and it's actually from a food blogger. It's not even someone in our industry. But she said, she said I got into doing what I was, what I'm doing because I wanted to help people and wanted to make people happy.
Kristen (00:21:43) - But I have learned that you can't always do both of those things. Sometimes helping people is not making them happy, and sometimes making people happy is not helping them. And so if we really have the goal of helping our clients, and we can get them to see that we're trying to help them, I'm going through a tangle right now with a client that we've gone back and forth so many times on whether they should pay or, again, has this corporate activities tax. And it's like, anyway, we're having this whole back and forth about it. And I'm just like, I feel like shaking them sometimes and being like, I'm trying to protect you. I care like, fine, you can go get in trouble. But I feel like it's up on me to do this. They hate me right now because I'm not telling them what they want to hear. And so yeah, I think it's that building folks up to be like, yeah, it's okay if your client is upset with you with what you're saying.
Kristen (00:22:30) - If we can go back and this is again, I always come back to core values. If we come back to our core values and what is important to us, what is important is that we serve our clients and we do the right thing and we act with integrity. So if we're doing those things and they get upset, then they get upset. And that's part of adulthood, right? Is that we just have to go. I'm sorry that you're upset, but this is the right way to do things. And sometimes our license is on the line. I mean, that's the thing. What we do has ethics around. It has consequences and penalties around it. And we have to be so careful with our licenses and our reputation and our own integrity that that should prevail over any other kind of, you know, temper tantrums that clients might have about state income taxes.
Joey (00:23:14) - Well, it's such an interesting I love the way you frame that, because it's as we've been talking and, Hannahand I talk about this all the time.
Joey (00:23:22) - Everything in our industry is moving more towards advisory, right? In terms of the skills that we're looking for. And one of the things that I think about to is your comments about you have to want to do that is hitting home for me. And I think there's. I talk a lot with with my wife, who's a tax accountant as well. I talk a lot with her about the perceived notion of. I'm spacing on the word now. It's on the tip of my tongue. Ambition in terms of the way that firms, especially traditional firms, kind of want you to get into that hierarchy. And she did that. She started as an intern at her firm. She's worked her way up to manager, and one thing she's noticed is she's like, I've gotten more and more miserable at every step that I go and what I, what I'm, you know, my philosophy on that is like, look, there's nothing wrong with telling somebody that, hey, I just feel the most comfortable. I feel my most complete self when I'm just in the background doing the work.
Joey (00:24:22) - I like the work. I feel uncomfortable talking with clients, and she's afraid to have that conversation sometimes.
Joey (00:24:29) - Because she's like, well, will they look at it as a lack of ambition if I don't want to move up? And, you know, my philosophy has always been there's a role for everybody at the organization and somebody who says, I just want to sit back here and crank out this product, and I'm going to crank out phenomenal product. And you, the client facing person, can come and talk with me and I can give you all your answers. That's as valuable of a person in your organization as the person who's doing the client facing. You just have to change your mindset as a firm to frame it that way.
Kristen (00:25:02) - Yeah, I agree, I also would like if your wife was my employee, I also would want to drill down on that a little bit because I think a lot of folks like think that they don't want to be client facing because their client interactions have been not great.
Joey (00:25:18) - All negative. I'm giving all the bad news and someone's yelling at me, right?
Kristen (00:25:22) - I mean, I got yelled at a lot. And so like, I mean, one of the things that I would say, yeah. And just it's probably the, the later part of my career, you know, so I am a big believer in that 10,000 hour rule. And like, you're just the first 10,000 hours. You're just learning, learning, learning, learning. And then you kind of got this level of expertise. So I would say in my post 10,000 hours, my thing has been really like controlling those conversations and really and either if clients are nasty with me, they are not my clients anymore. If they're nasty with my staff, they're absolutely not my client anymore. So that's part of the joy, too, is that we don't let bad clients stick around. And so that that could be part of what these negative client interactions are about. But then the other thing is just controlling the conversation.
Kristen (00:26:06) - Like I was saying, like if I have to give bad news, if I do it with empathy, if I do it in the right way, if I, you know, can if I have that relationship with that client, then that, you know, that can make things easier. So I would definitely before I said, oh yeah, you're just not meant to be a client facing person. I guess I would just want to like, drill down on that a little more, because if I'm honest, like, I feel like we're going in the direction of technology is moving so fast, you know, that like, I think the cranking out the work part is going to be less of the value prop that we as human being accountants are providing. It is going to be that client service part. It's going to be that interaction that's where we're going to give the value. And so yeah, I would just caution away from just throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Joey (00:26:55) - So to follow up on that, how would you, as a firm owner, be looking for someone in your staff to come to you with that type of feedback and say, hey, I'm struggling in this role.
Joey (00:27:05) - And part of it to think is, is we have a tendency as accountants to promote based upon skill. And then as you move up, we forget, oh man. Like just because that person is really good at preparing tax returns and understands the process, doesn't mean that we've equipped that person with the knowledge on how to be a leader and how to be a manager. And to your point, how to have these types of client interactions. How would you be looking for somebody who maybe, maybe, like my wife feels a bit stuck in that role and wanting to have that conversation with their leadership team about how to get out of it but doesn't know how to do it.
Kristen (00:27:43) - You know, I think, if nothing else, it sounds like this is maybe like a bigger firm that maybe has more kind of structured, a more structured organization. So I would think, if nothing else in that annual review process would be a good time to bring something like this up. Now, the way I operate is that one of another one of our core values is transparency.
Kristen (00:28:05) - And so we took a lot of time last year to develop really well worded role descriptions for each function in our firm. Now I'm a small firm, so we're only eight people total. That's a pretty small firm, as opposed to a regional firm where you think that there would be more opportunity for these different types of roles. And so I think, I mean, especially now when accountants are so tough to find, like, I would think that when it's a choice between I mean, I'm speaking as a firm owner and I know not all firm owners feel this way, but if it's a choice between keeping my valued employee who does a great job and could and could still be a value to the firm versus letting them go. Oh, because they're not, you know, getting joy fulfillment out of their work. I'm going to do whatever I can. And so I think that, I mean, talk about like, things to tell your younger self. I think that would be something that I would say to the young folks is like, they want you to stay.
Kristen (00:29:02) - Your boss wants nothing more than for this to all work and for you to be happy and a satisfied employee. So I think I didn't realize that, because a lot of times it does. Like all we see are the review points. All we see are the things we're doing wrong, you know, and the negative things and being told things like, well, I couldn't give you a five because that's perfect and nobody's perfect. So I'm going to give you a four on your, you know, evaluation. We hear stuff like that all the time. We're not we're not hearing things. A lot of times they build us up. So I would just encourage that again human to human. That conversation of like, hey, I'm like you said, am really struggling with this part of the job. So I need that to get better. Or it can there be a role for me that is that is less, you know, that client? Is there a path for me at this firm? Maybe there's not.
Kristen (00:29:47) - But it's good to know and it's good to kind of get that out in the open. And I can't imagine that a reasonable person would have hard feelings about just someone being honest and transparent about where they are, especially at a manager level. I mean, that's a person who's shown commitment and ambition and value to that firm.
Joey (00:30:06) - Well, and it goes back to the fear, right? Like there's a there's still an underlying an underlying fear there of like, I just don't whether it's we haven't invested enough in the relationship to where we feel comfortable having that, that difficult conversation. I mean, that's the thing that was tough about me coming to summit, Anders, is, you know, I was with the firm for all of three weeks before Adam Hale told me that the merger was happening. I was like, oh, you couldn't have mentioned this at any point in the last three months when we were talking. But you know that when I still remember the first time I talked with Adam, my feedback was like.
Joey (00:30:39) - Dude, you're great. But you also scare me like no other person I've ever talked to because there is so much conviction there. But with that has come that underlying thing of trust, where if you're not as a firm owner or anyone in firm leadership, being super intentional about building that trust, you're not going to get that conversation. And you're so right. As someone who's been in a management role, has had team members underneath me who've left or felt unhappy, like the worst feeling is like, why didn't you come talk to me about that? Like, did you what did I do to make you feel like you couldn't talk to me about this? To where I couldn't help you solve your problem? That's the most defeating part about being a manager. So I love that you said that because that's so key.
Kristen (00:31:25) - Yeah, I agree. And you know what? I've been the other thing is like, we're a pretty tight knit team. So I've been vulnerable with my team about I mean, when this last one left, I mean, it hurt.
Kristen (00:31:36) - And I told them that it hurt and I'm like, team, so please come talk to me. I know you might be, like, worried or scared or something, but, like, I could have helped. Like I said, I could have helped her. I could have helped her as she was going through this decision, even if it didn't mean that she would stay working here. So honestly, I think it was a bad decision.
Hannah (00:31:57) - I feel like especially earlier in my career, I find so much fulfillment in my role especially and like I want and seek joy in everything that I do. That especially early in my career, whenever things didn't feel good, it was like, ooh, like I'm not finding any joy. And I feel like now, in my mid 30s and my career, I realized that there's got to be a balance. Inevitably, like we said earlier, not everything's going to feel good all the time. Not every client conversation is going to be a good one all the time, but there's got to be a balance.
Hannah (00:32:34) - Like if I look at my calendar and my schedule, like, there should be a balance of meetings that I look forward to go into and meetings that I just don't look forward to go into. And what would you say that balance looks like for, especially for your employees and for yourself? What where's the happy medium? Because I know there's got to be one. And we have to be advocates for ourselves for that. And especially, I think going back to the trust, like having trust with our leadership to be able to go to them and say, like the bads really outweighing the good here now, and how do I fix that? What does that conversation look like?
Kristen (00:33:09) - Yeah. So I mean, again, I think we're in a we're in it really sucks that there's a sort of a shortage of accountants right now. But in a way, it also lets us be very picky about who our clients are. So right now I'm my one of my admin team. God bless her. She's literally putting all of our clients in a spreadsheet, putting what we build them, the hours that we put into it, and then we go through and rate those clients and everybody goes through receptionists, staff people, everybody.
Kristen (00:33:44) - And because I really don't want I mean, when you talk about the meetings that you don't want to have, gosh. Here's the thing for me, it's hard for me to be a good advisor to someone that I don't personally like.
Hannah (00:33:59) - Oh, yeah.
Kristen (00:34:00) - It's really hard for me to feel like I'm in a fight for you, and I'm really going to, like, do everything that I can to get your tax down. If you're kind of terrible to me, and you're rude to the receptionist when you call like, why? So then I make then it makes me think, well, then that's on me, that they shouldn't be my client. If I can't do good work for them, then they shouldn't be my client. And I think it's a very privileged place that I'm at, where I am in a spot where I can call out the lower value clients, bring on higher value clients, and I make it real clear, like I'm very quick to lay down boundaries in a nice and positive way about how we work.
Kristen (00:34:38) - This is how you get a hold of us. This is do not always send emails to Kristen because you are not going to get a response. You know, like this is how we work and the new folks are like, great. You know, some of the ones that were under the previous regime before I bought the firm, those are the hardest ones to get to, to come along on the boundary journey. But we're getting there three years in, we're getting there.
Joey (00:35:03) - So there's something that I loved about that too. And I have some trauma in terms of, you know, I used to work for a guy whose solution for getting rid of clients was like, well, just raise their fee and hope they go away. And I'm like, no, here's what's going to happen. You're going to raise their fee. They're not going to go away. You're going to do the work, you're going to hate the work, and then they're going to complain about the fee, and you're going to have dropping it back to what it was last year.
Joey (00:35:24) - Like I saw that path so clearly.
Kristen (00:35:28) - No. Yes. It is one of the questions.
Joey (00:35:32) - Of the things I'm curious about too, and this is, you know, again, sorry to to make this a bit of Joey's therapy session, but you're getting a bit of a come.
Kristen (00:35:39) - Do it.
Joey (00:35:40) - Love it into what I've spent a lot of time working on personally with me. I've always kind of had this idea in the back of my mind that, like, in order for me to find true fulfillment and happiness, I would need to be in a position like you are, where I either own my own firm or are a partner in one or something, because I've always kind of felt like I've never found a group of people that I've aligned with enough to trust them to help me find my joy. How much of do you accredit any of your ability to, to be where you are now, to the fact that you did kind of take that risk a little bit and say, I'm going to maybe take a little bit more charge of my own future and control that, as opposed to sort of waiting around and kind of, for lack of a better term, waiting for someone to create that for you.
Kristen (00:36:30) - Wow. Now is it going to be Christian therapy session now? Because like, I have my own I have my own.
Joey (00:36:38) - I've got my tea here. We're ready to go now.
Kristen (00:36:40) - Let's do it. So yes. So did I become a firm owner because I got frustrated with operating within the confines of a firm that I couldn't ultimately control. Yes. Um, so I am trying to create a firm where that is welcomed and encouraged and for folks to blossom in that way. But I realize a lot of firms aren't that way. I got very frustrated. In fact, at one of my previous firms, I was in a leadership role there and was on track to be a partner and for all intents and purposes, like I felt like I was a partner. They gave me a lot of autonomy and it was great. But one of the exercises that we were doing was creating core values. And we went through this whole process and we did it. And right at the end part of it, I was like, you know what? We're scrapping this because there was some behaviors that happened in the firms, such as, you know, clients behaving badly.
Kristen (00:37:35) - And I tried to put my foot in the ground and was like, this is not going to happen. We can't this client must be fired. And they wouldn't do it. But the revenue, like that's what I kept hearing was about the fees. And I'm like, then there's no I go, you know, I like ripped up the thing and I'm like, the core values don't mean anything if we're always going to come back to, oh, but they bring in a lot of fees then, then there's no core value. We don't have that. That doesn't.
Joey (00:37:57) - That's your core value is fee first.
Kristen (00:37:59) - Yes.
Kristen (00:38:00) - So and I wasn't interested in staying apart of that, which made me very sad. It was it felt like I was getting divorced when I left, when I left that firm, because I did feel like I had invested in the staff, had invested in the clients and a lot of that, but I had to walk away because I knew that it wasn't going to get better at that point.
Kristen (00:38:17) - So yeah, all of these, all of these, all of this trauma that's happened at various firms throughout my life has kind of informed of like, okay, that's what I don't want. What do we want to create? How do we want to create this? To really cultivate folks in that, you know, and that are of the right mindset that they can make this feel like they have control over their lives, because also, firm ownership isn't all it's cracked up to be either. There's a lot of stress that having employees is stressful. You know, taking on debt is stressful, like trying to figure out all this stuff. And so I really have two jobs because I'm running a firm and I'm doing strategy and hiring and all that kind of stuff. But I'm also doing a ton of client work. And so that's yeah, it's tough. So I'm trying to create the firm that I would have wanted to work at ten years ago.
Joey (00:39:06) - Well, I think your point there is really interesting about, you know, some of this is and I'm sure there's firm owners who might come across this, maybe someone from our firm would come across this and think it's worth bringing up the fact that, you know, as you're kind of cultivating this and creating this, like there are people in your firm who want to rise and want to grow.
Joey (00:39:28) - And we talk about this all the time. If you don't provide a path for them and let them see, like, here's what your ambitions are, here's, you know, hey, I want to be a decision maker in this firm. I'd like to have some equity. Like I have other things that I want to do, like. Be intentional about finding a way to provide that for them. And that's, you know, if you can invest in that very early in one of your staff members, you're going to have a staff member for life, maybe even a partner eventually. So I love that you're really being intentional about that and trying to create a space in an opportunity for your staff to, for lack of a better term, inform you on how they want to grow. I think that's fantastic.
Kristen (00:40:09) - Yeah. What I did in my oh, sorry. Go ahead.
Hannah (00:40:13) - Nope. Go ahead. You're good.
Kristen (00:40:14) - Well I was just going to think to your point, what I've done in the in the staff review meetings that I have, like for each person, I like to get it out in the open, what my vision is for them.
Kristen (00:40:25) - I'm like, here's where I see you going, you know, with this, because I try to have them feel seen of what their special talents and, and gifts are that I see and where I see them going with that. But I also want to hear from them, like, what do you think about that? Like, is that something that you can see doing or not? And if so, how do we get you there? And if it's not, what what does that path look like for you.
Hannah (00:40:48) - And career path thing? I feel like it's so important in finding joy in your job too, because for me, I tend to like to see the bigger picture. I want to at least set goals for myself too, so when I'm doing the work that does not feel good, it is at least something that I could set my sights on for something that I know that this is only temporary, that I'm going to learn a lot from this. This does it feel good right now.
Hannah (00:41:09) - But this is temporary and this is not forever. And I can set that path and see what that goal is. But whenever that's not there, that makes sitting in the pieces of my job that don't bring me joy a lot more miserable. So I love that this has been a topic of of what we're talking about here, because I am so passionate about that, and especially early on in your career. And I think there's also a lot of grace to be had to if that changes. Because what my career path, what I would have thought for myself probably early in my 20s versus what it actually is today, are two totally different things. So there's got to be space for that change there, too, and openness to going back to the communication in the trust, openness to having that conversation as well with leadership.
Kristen (00:41:55) - Absolutely. Yeah. I mean when I became a parent, that was probably the major thing that and even like I knew I knew I thought my life would change becoming a parent. But what how it actually changed and what I wanted out of it was just very different.
Kristen (00:42:10) - And so I think we always have to keep people's whole selves in mind when we're having these conversations that they've got and who know, not only becoming a parent, but what about caring for an aging parent? Because I had to do that as well. Like that's a whole thing. Pets. Dear God, I just got a puppy. That's a whole thing, you know, like my child.
Hannah (00:42:31) - Yes.
Kristen (00:42:32) - Yeah.
Joey (00:42:33) - Well, and it's it's great that we're having these conversations too, because, you know, as I was not as aware of the challenges that working moms faced until I had an honest conversation with my mom about her start in her accounting career as I was being born, which, you know, in 1987 was not the I don't want to say the safest place, but it wasn't the most inclusive place for a woman who wanted to have a family. And it was. Without those types of conversations. Inadvertently, you could make a leadership decision that causes someone to have to choose between their career and their family.
Joey (00:43:09) - And yeah, I mean, I wouldn't blame someone for saying, well, I got to choose my family because I'm the only one they got.
Kristen (00:43:15) - Yep. And that's so.
Kristen (00:43:17) - Great that you're that you're having that conversation with your mom. Because I got to tell you, I think a lot of. And I'm sorry, but especially male leaders, they have wives that take care of many things in their life. And I always say, if I would have had a wife, I would have, you know, would have been twice as successful. Because if you've got someone taking care of all the home stuff, I mean, I was a single mother for most of my career. And even when I wasn't, I was the wife, you know, because he had a career and he had things. So you're always going to doing that juggling act. And so I think that there's a lot of assumptions and you're right, policies and things that go into place without putting yourself in the perspective of like, well, wait, what if I was the primary caregiver? What if I had to make sure that, you know, little Joey got to daycare in the morning? That's the whole thing.
Joey (00:44:08) - I might have that meeting at a different time, you know?
Kristen (00:44:10) - Right. There was a time in my life I would never take morning meetings because it doesn't matter what time the meeting is, some someone was going to throw up on me. Someone was going to have a tantrum, going to school. Something was going to happen and I knew that. But at least I had that flexibility to be able to say, I can't do meetings before 11, whatever it was, you know?
Joey (00:44:29) - Well, and that's again, that's why we need that perspective in the leadership rooms of every company. Because, I mean, there's, you know, and our company is better than most, but there's still some meetings that I look at the calendar and I'm like, y'all, this is a 6:30 a.m. meeting Pacific time. Like, what if we have a leader who's here and they live in California? Like, that meeting is not going to work. We have to find a better way to do this.
Joey (00:44:51) - I know we've always historically done things on East Coast time, but that's not a meeting time that's going to work for your leaders. And that's a structural issue that we can change. It doesn't have to be at this time. Right. It just always has been.
Kristen (00:45:06) - Um. There's a lot of things that always have been, I think.
Hannah (00:45:11) - And we need more voices like this in rooms where decisions are being made about employees and how and changing the culture just in general, of how we look at employees as a whole, more than just a billable hour. We need to look at them as a whole versus just how they show up at work that day. Because, like you said, like there's so much other stuff going on around us that's affecting how we show up to at home.
Joey (00:45:39) - Well Hannah, I know we've spent this. This has been great. This has been a wonderful I feel like I feel a lot lighter having gotten some of that off my chest, because these are things that we spent a lot of years working.
Joey (00:45:51) - Man. But I wanted to end on something a little bit lighter that we kind of touched on, you know, at the beginning of the show off air, that I think is just really fun to kind of learn a little bit more about people. So one of the things that we talked about loving in being a distributed firm is that I feel like I've got friends all over the country now that I could go visit and see. And for me, all vacations begin and end with food. Like I will plan vacations around where I'm going to go get the best food. So what? I would love to hear from you. First, Kristen is, you know, in your part of the country, like, what are the things that those of us who are visiting like, what's the must do on the food list?
Kristen (00:46:31) - Well, Portland is definitely a foodie city. So there's there's entire travel blogs just devoted to the food scene in Portland. But I would say if you ask Portlanders what we're famous for, it's usually the salmon.
Kristen (00:46:44) - Especially this time of year is like summer is when the salmon is fresh. And so if you when I go to a restaurant, people laugh at me because if there's salmon on the menu, I ask what kind? And if the waiter doesn't know what I mean, then forget it. I don't even want to have that conversation anymore. So there's that. So there's definitely salmon, but there's all kinds of of they're like, we're very famous for the vegan cuisine. There's a lot of vegans. I happen to be gluten free. So thank God I live in one of the best parts of the country for any kind of dietary restrictions. I don't know if you've seen Portlandia, but there's a really great episode about someone orders chicken at a restaurant and they have to know the chicken's name and where it came from. And it's not too far off from the truth about how we operate in Portland. We love the farm to table experience here.
Joey (00:47:35) - Hannah, what about you?
Hannah (00:47:37) - Oh, man. So when I go home and home for me, I live in Tupelo, Mississippi.
Hannah (00:47:41) - Home for me is south Alabama. Um, there's a restaurant called David's Catfish, and they have the best coleslaw and cheese grits. And I feel like there's a big misconception. People think they've had grits, but really they've had polenta. And it is not they are not the same. So cheese grits and coleslaw from David's catfish is where I'm going and where will take anybody that came home. And, and sweet tea is one of those things for me too that like it's very regional and it tastes different other places. So here in the South we do it right. I mean, I'm a little biased, but we do it right here.
Joey (00:48:21) - As someone who is south adjacent. Your analysis is correct. I've never had sweet tea like I've had in the South like it is. And, you know, like here in New Mexico sometimes, like my wife who's from Texas, will sit there and say, hey, do y'all have sweet tea? And they're like, well, we've got tea with sweetener in it.
Joey (00:48:36) - And she's like, that's not the same thing, not the.
Hannah (00:48:38) - Same not order.
Hannah (00:48:39) - Not the same.
Joey (00:48:39) - One of these things is not like the other.
Hannah (00:48:41) - Yes, I'm like you, Kristen, when I'm asking about the same. And if somebody says that about tea, I'm like, say yes, never mind. Yes. No, no.
Kristen (00:48:48) - I was born in Louisiana, so I get you right. There you go.
Hannah (00:48:51) - There you go. Exactly what about you, Joey?
Joey (00:48:54) - So I think.
Joey (00:48:54) - The thing that's funny about New Mexico is, like, we really kind of walled ourselves off culinary. We have two really big regional kind of superpowers and food. So, like, New Mexico is an old state, like the conquistadors came up in the 1500s and they brought a lot of stuff from Mexico. But there was also a very large indigenous population that was living here, and they kind of merged everything together in this super like regional cuisine that doesn't really exist anywhere else. Like if you go to Texas, if you go to Texas, Tex-Mex, it's very different than the Mexican food.
Joey (00:49:25) - Tex-Mex in Mexico have slightly different foods in Mexico and New Mexico have very different foods in Mexico and Arizona very different as well. And so there's really some stuff where whenever I tell people to come here, the first thing I say is, as much as I love living in Albuquerque because of, you know, I have a lot of history here. Santa Fe is a really, really great food town. Although Albuquerque is getting better, we have a number of places here that would like to go, but my wife and I often butt heads about my favorite restaurant, she says. It's just a place where I have nostalgia. But any time you can come, especially in the fall when the harvest is fresh, like this is the best time of year to come to New Mexico in September and October. Because all the chili is roasting, it's all fresh off the vine. And whenever I tell someone, come here, go to a place that, you know, maybe doesn't look like a lot sometimes, like barbecue.
Joey (00:50:17) - The best New Mexicans made in somebody's backyard. So find a good local restaurant that's not a chain. The pantry in Santa Fe is one of our favorites. But go and get something there and get the red and the green. Try both of them. Try them together. Try one versus the other because it's the same plant, just in the different stages of maturity. But that's a uniquely New Mexican flavor. That you don't really get anywhere else. Also, we make our enchiladas flat, which my wife says is like not the thing. But I'm like, oh man, he gets me some blue corn enchiladas stacked with a fried egg on top with a little runny yolk.
Kristen (00:50:52) - Oh, they're not rolled. You're saying they just like a casserole?
Joey (00:50:55) - Stack them.
Kristen (00:50:56) - Okay.
Joey (00:50:57) - In certain places. Some some places don't do it anymore. But like, because it's a little harder to make if you stack them rolling, you can stick a bunch in the, in the pan and just kind of go with it. But like the places that do the stacked with blue corn instead of the traditional corn.
Joey (00:51:11) - So like very again, very new Mexican, stack them red and green cheese and a fried egg on top. Like that's my happy place.
Kristen (00:51:19) - Oh my God. Feel like we need to have a potluck?
Joey (00:51:22) - We do, let's do.
Kristen (00:51:24) - I'm getting hungry talking about all this.
Joey (00:51:28) - Well Kristen, thank you so much for for joining us. That was a really great conversation. And I'd like to end real quick with just I'm sure we've got you know, I'm hoping that young people who listen to this are a intrigued by by you and your firm and what you're doing. And hopefully this means we can help find some folks for you who maybe want to work for you in the future. Where can folks who want to learn more about you and your team and what you're doing? Where can we go find information about you?
Kristen (00:51:52) - Sure.
Kristen (00:51:53) - Well, you can find me on LinkedIn. My name is Kristen Keates. Okay. I'm also on Twitter at Kristen Keat, CPA. You can go to our website sherwoodtax.com
Kristen (00:52:05) - My breakaway website is breakawayba.com breakaway badasses.com. And if you're interested in learning about outsourced staffing it is cadenza.io is the website for that. But yeah reach out to me. I love to talk to other professionals and yeah, especially young accountants. I just have one message is like, don't give up. And there's a whole world of public accounting beyond the big four and the big firms and just, yeah, reach out and don't listen to the Reddit streams because that's just a dumpster fire and just yeah, let's meet up on Twitter, LinkedIn. And I'm happy to continue to share experiences.
Hannah (00:52:46) - Awesome. Thank you. Kristen.
Kristen (00:52:48) - Thank you.
Kristen (00:52:48) - This was fun.
Outro (00:52:50) - If you're a young CPA looking to develop in their careers, we're always looking for great people. Visit our website for remote work opportunities with Summit Virtual CFO, or find all our open positions at Anders CPAs and advisors.
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