How to Found the Firm You Want

Today, our guest is Al-Nesha Jones. Al-Nesha is her firm’s founder. She has been listed on CPA Practice Advisor’s 40 under 40. In 2022, she won the NJCPA Ovation award, which, she’ll let us know what that was about. She is—actually, we met as members of the Intuit Tax Council, which has been a lot of fun to get to know her that way. She is, I know, very active with Intuit in other ways, which we’ll probably talk about. I’m going to say this because she is an accounting instructor—adjunct accounting instructor—and I just found out yesterday, she’s hoping maybe someday to be a professor. So that’ll be exciting, but, Al-Nesha, welcome to The Unique CPA.

Thank you for having me, Randy, Unique CPA audience. I appreciate it.

Yeah, no. I’ve been looking forward to this. You’re one of the highlights of being on that Intuit Tax Council.

Oh, thank you! I feel the same about you.

So I appreciate it. We’re just going to have a lovefest here. We’ll just go back and forth and say good things about each other. 

I know. We had a near death experience together. We’re bonded for life.

Oh, you know what? You know, we’re going to have to tell that story in a minute. Before we do that, I wanted you to expand on a couple of these things: the NJ CPA award, the Ovation award. What was that about?

Sure. So I’m based in Jersey and the NJCPA, every year, acknowledges professionals who are doing outstanding things in their firms, in their communities, and I specifically won the award for my diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. I currently run an all female team. We all work from home. We work a four day workweek. It just allows people to have more balance between work and life. We happen to all be moms, which now that I’m saying it all out loud, kind of sounds less diverse, because we have lots of similarities. But the fact that we’ve been able to create an inclusive environment where people feel like, “I’m welcome here,” it really inspires our clients to be more inclusive in their environments, to try new things, to consider remote work for their teams—because it can be done. It’s not impossible, especially not in this day and age.

Yeah. Well, that’s great. And we’re going to want to talk about a lot of what you just said, and expand on that as we go today because I found this very interesting, the things that you’ve done.

Thank you.

Before we do that, let’s talk about this near death experience we had. I didn’t even think about that. But this is pretty cool. You want to tell the story?

So I’ll start, but I have a terrible memory so you can interject at any point. So we were in Hilton Head Island, for an intuit in-person event. And we had flights that were departing, similar times, so we take an Uber together, and it’s not even that early in the morning, I don’t think it was.

No, I don’t think so.

No. Not too early. And, We get into the Uber. It’s a minivan. And the car starts to, like, veer. And luckily, you’re paying attention because I didn’t exactly pick up on it, and you’re like, the guy is falling asleep. And now we’re like, oh god, like, do we get out the Uber? Do we scare him? And we see him, like, his eyes are dropping, we see him, like, more than once, and we’re texting. Right? Now we have to let other people know just in case this is our last day on earth and we die together. Let people know what’s going on. But now we’re like, we have to start talking to him.

So Randy being the trooper he is starts bringing up interesting things. We’ve got the guy engaged. We’re waking him up. I’m watching his eyes in the rearview mirror, to get us to the airport. And then he gets us close, I mean, like, thank god, we get there safely, but we literally were responsible for, like, keeping this guy up.

Oh, yeah.

For like 20 minutes!

Oh, it was at least 20 minutes, I think, because we were—I think we were close to 50 minutes away.

It was far.

Because we had to go from Hilton Head to, what was the airport? Oh, man.

I know. Oh gosh. What was close? Savannah. 

Yeah, no. I think you’re right. Savannah.

Oh gosh.

I think it’s Savannah.

I don’t even remember! I don’t remember where we flew into. It’s escaping me at the moment, but I just know it was far.

Yep. Yep. It was far. But so, yeah, so we were keeping—I remember this I have a app on my phone that, like, creates signs, you know, like, people hold up at the airport when your driver’s there. And I have my sign that I think I put on there and held it up to you, “ He’s falling asleep!”

I was just like, oh my gosh. That’s the first time I’ve ever experienced that in Uber. Ever. Wild.

Yeah, oh, it was crazy. It was crazy. But we made it and you’re right, we were texting other council members that were friends that we were there with, and they were making sure, they were checking up on us, making sure we were still safe, so.

Yep. Good times. Good times.

I think in hindsight.

In hindsight. For sure. 

Alright. Well, good. I’m glad we got that story.

Yes.

So now, there’s no segue from that story to what we want to talk about next. But we’ll just make one up. So we talked a little ahead of time about some things we want to discuss. And I think your story is so cool and so interesting, because it’s a thing I talk about a lot—you came from Big Four.

Yes.

And, you know, Big Four has a reputation of churning and burning through people, and putting in a lot of hours, you know, expecting a lot. Do you recall, were you required to work so many hours, or is that more of a myth? 

No, oh gosh.

That was a thing?

It was such a thing. I worked a lot of hours. I traveled—not too much, luckily—I was not into a ton of travel, but I did travel a lot. I drove a lot. I remember commuting to a client that was in Philadelphia, and I was driving back and forth every day. We were not staying in a hotel. But I have worked past midnight. I had worked Saturdays, Sundays, and it wasn’t just, like, January to April, because I was on clients that had December 31st year ends, June 30 year ends, September 30 year ends. So it was like, busy season wasn’t just a four month period—it was all year. 

And I went into it knowing that, but I think you don’t really know what to expect until you’re in it. And I was down for it. I remember they recorded this, like, “Day in the life of Al-Nisha” video, because I was on a partner track. I really did think I was going to stick around to partner. And then I realized the partner is here with us too—this is not going to get better. Like, this will be my life. It’s not like I’ll get to some level, and now I’ll get this flexibility and this freedom—I’m always going to work like this. And that’s when I knew it wasn’t going to be long term for me. 

And I ended up leaving when I—I’ll never forget. I asked the partner to leave early on a Sunday. I was in on a Sunday, I wanted to go to an open house, and I was in the process of buying my first home, and he told me that I needed to think about my priorities.

Wow.

And that’s when I knew I was done.

Alright. Yeah. So I’m going to tell a story because you just reminded me something—because I had a similar—maybe, I don’t know if it’s similar, but somewhat similar, I think, experience.

Yeah.

And I don’t think I’ve ever told this on the show. I think I was 2 years into public accounting. And had just changed jobs and went to a small firm in Chicago in the city, and was out on an audit—and I am not an auditor. I do not like audit. Audit is just…

It’s tough.

Yeah. But I was out there, and I was with the managing partner. We’re a small firm. And we were five blocks, maybe, from our office. We finished, it was 6 o’clock at night, we’re going to go back to the office work longer that night. Yep. I wanted a little fresh air. So I decided I’m going to walk back to the office. He gets in a cab, he looks at me and says, what are you doing? I said, I’m going to walk back. And he just went crazy: “Get in this ‘effing’ cab right now! We need to get back to the office!”

And I was like, whoa, what just happened here? And there was red flags before that—a lot of red flags. I probably shouldn’t tell this story because I don’t want anybody else to get this idea. But—but—I went back to the office, did my work. Next morning, I went in, I organized all my files. I put notes on all my files, said where I was, I went for lunch. I called one of the other partners, and I told them, sorry, I can’t deal with X, the managing partner. I’m leaving. And I think they understood why, but it was like, I’m not putting up with this. This is not. And so in my mind, that was one of the things that when I started my firm, which was just, like, a year later, was like, okay—I gotta make sure that, and I would never do that, but that I keep that in my mind, that I know how to treat people. And so alright.

I agree!

This is the Al-Nesha show, not the Randy show.

No. This is our show, Randy! And I agree. I think those experiences, that’s what shapes what we ultimately create. We learn from those experiences.

Yep. I shouldn’t tell you what month this was that I walked out, but,

I know it was January.

It was January. Yeah.

You did what you had to do, Randy. I don’t fault you.

Yep. So alright. We might need to cut that out of the show. Alright, we’ll leave it in. Alright. So now let’s get back to your story.

Okay.

After that commercial break where Randy shares his story, now we’re going to get back to Al-Nesha Jones, and we’ll see what she has to say. Alright. So how long were you at this Big Four firm?

Four years, almost to the day. I started looking for other positions—I wanted to go back to school, I wanted to get my master’s degree. And right around that time, I bought my condo in May of 2010. I left in September of 2010. So I bought the condo, but I knew I wasn’t going to stick around after that situation with the partner. 

Yep. 

And one of my good friends who also worked at the firm, her boyfriend at the time passed away. So they had just bought a house. And within, like, two weeks, he passed away. And then I started to think, like, life is just so short and so unpredictable, and this is probably somebody’s dream, but this is really not mine. And as prestigious as it was—my family was really proud of me for working at this firm—I just was not happy. So I started in September, I left in September, and I went to Prudential, the life insurance company.

Okay. So you didn’t start your firm immediately after leaving. 

No.

And then how long were you at Prudential?

I was at Prudential for six years.

Oh, wow. You spent a long time there. So let’s get into it, because I think that this, the whole story of your firm, I find really cool. But let’s talk about that then. When did this idea of starting your own firm come? Was that while you were still at Big Four, or it just afterwards?

Not at all. So I think I’m unique in the fact that I didn’t really want to be an entrepreneur. 

Okay.

Like, people told me, like, they could see me owning my own business, but I didn’t. Like, I love taking lunch breaks. I loved having vacation time. I did not hate a 9 to 5, right? But in my six years at Prudential, I had all three of my kids. Three of my kids are two years apart. So I went in 2010, I had my son in 2011, and after the 3rd child, I said, I never want to feel what I felt—returning to work sooner than I was ready. And I didn’t like that feeling, and I did not like that I was losing the flexibility that I previously had. They were moving into, like, a shared services model, and I was able to leave at 2:30 to pick my kids up from daycare and finish my work at home. And they were moving to this shared services model where everyone needed to be in the office 10 to 4. So you could work 8 to 4, 9 to 5, 10 to 6. That was your flexibility. But leaving at 2:30 would have required, like, special permission, and they weren’t able to grant that. 

So on that last maternity leave, I talked to my husband and I said, listen, one of us needs to stay home. And he said, I work three jobs, before you leave me home with three kids. I don’t know if I could do that. And I appreciated his honesty. 

Yep. 

And I said, then going to try it. I’m not going to leave you to pay all the bills alone, but I’m going to try this entrepreneur thing. And I was not starting the accounting firm, because I thought I was done with the accounting.

Oh, wow.

I started a small business support company. I was going to hire some virtual assistants, and we were going to provide small business support. And then once I got in and I told people, oh, yeah, I am a CPA, they’d be like, what? I need help with bookkeeping. I need help with taxes. And in less than a year, I was right back to it, but that’s when I figured out, I did not hate accounting. I hated the way I was working. I hated that I felt like I was helping these big companies, but what I did really didn’t make an impact. I did not like that I was being told the way to do it, when I knew there were better ways. And that’s how I found myself into entrepreneurship, but it was not, like, a lifelong dream. I wish I had that fairy tale, but that’s not even my story.

So you’re an almost an accidental accounting firm owner.

A hundred percent. It was the one thing I said I wasn’t doing, and I did it.

And you did it. Alright. So, you know, being this accidental firm owner—I’m being facetious there—but well, I guess you were kinda.

I was.

Before you even started, you were like, you had these ideas: I don’t want this to happen. I don’t want to do what I did before. I don’t want to. And so what I find often is people think that—they’re at Big Four wherever they are, and they have these ideas. I’m going to do it different. I’m going to be different. I’m going to work less. I’m going to have better work-life balance. I’m going to you know, bill more, workless, be more profitable, all these things. And then too often, they find themselves just in the same trap of what they were doing before: working 60, 70, 80 hours a week, you know, during tax season that they’re, you know, billing by the hour again, and they’re doing all these things they said they wouldn’t. But you didn’t. You went and you said from the beginning, I want to be with my kids, I want to have freedom, I want to be able to take vacations.

So when you accidentally started this firm, did you have a list of things? These are my dos and don’ts? How did, what was your mindset or this just evolved over time?

It literally evolved over time. I am running a firm that first solved my own problems—I needed to solve my own problems—and it then became what are the customer issues, and that’s probably backwards. I’ve never written a business plan or anything like that. I literally said I need to do something to earn income, it has to be flexible because I have 3 children—my youngest was two months old, still nursing, still with me every day. So I needed something that allowed me to work remotely as needed, and I made a lot of mistakes. I charged too little. 

Yep.

So I did get myself into a position where I worked way too much. I created a job for myself not realizing that at some point, I’ll need to hire people, and I’ll need processes in place. So I’ve definitely made mistakes along the way. But I knew what I wanted it to look like—I knew that I wanted it to be something that I could still take my kids to the park, just because it was sunny outside at 3:30, and it wasn’t going to be a problem for anyone. I knew I needed to be able to work from home, or from the library, or from an office. And I always knew I was going to run a firm that operated in that manner. My biggest mistake was probably, and not even a mistake, but I took on everybody in the beginning, just trying to figure out what it is that I like.

Common thing.

And what I don’t like. Did that. Yep. I underpriced.

Common as well.

Because I felt “less than.” I felt like, you know, hey, I’m here, but I’m also a mom, and there’s a two month old sitting next to my desk—I don’t deserve to charge what another CPA who doesn’t have those other things is charging. So I charged too little. And it was very difficult to get clients to say, “Oh, you’ve already done all these things for me at that price. Why would I start paying you more now?” So, I mean, I’ve had to start over multiple times, because it’s hard to break what clients are used to.

Yep. So let’s talk about those things, then, that you had to evolve, that you had to change, that you had to—I really am intrigued with this whole journey. Because in the the final version of it—or there’s not a final, the current version of it. 

The current, yes.

…is really what you started it for. The moms, the working moms, and how you do this. And now you’re working four days a week and all this. So let’s talk about that journey then from the mistakes you made, and how you identify them and then what are these processes and efficiencies you put in place that created the firm you have today?

Yep. So I started, all along, cloud-based software. Always use QuickBooks online. Always use ProConnect. I’ve never used other software, and I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but I feel good about the selections that I’ve made there. 

Yeah, that’s good.

The very business I started with, the virtual office, virtual assistance business, I knew in 2018 it had to go. So I started in 2016—by 2018, I knew both cannot exist. One takes a lot more energy than the other. I had to start to wind that down tremendously. A lot of the clients that I had gotten, and I don’t know if you’ve ever used Thumbtack. Huge mistake on my part.

I haven’t. Is that where you hire somebody to do work or what’s Thumbtack?

No. I’m trying to remember their exact model, but you get leads and you pay, like, pay per lead. So someone will go to Thumbtack and say, “I need a tax accountant.”

Okay. Yes.

And you’ll submit a proposal. And in the beginning, it was like, wow, so many leads. And then I realized I’m competing on price. 

Right.

And that is not where I wanted to be. That is never a good place. So I let go of almost all of those clients. I realized I was never going to be what they needed unless I could do their tax return for pennies on the dollar. So I had to unwind that. I realized in 2020, my processes were terrible—because COVID hit, both of my parents got sick very early in the pandemic. My mom was in a coma, my dad was at home fighting, and my children were at home doing virtual learning, and mentally, I was overwhelmed. I just sort of imploded. I couldn’t be available for anyone.

Yep.

And my team, I realized, they don’t know what to do without me. Not long term. Short term, they did, but long term, they didn’t know enough about what I did. And they didn’t know enough about how to keep their days going without me. And that’s when I realized the processes can’t all live in my head. Even the ones I do do not belong in my head.

Right.

And that was a huge learning curve for me. So we spent a lot of 2020 and 2021 documenting processes, implementing project management software, so that there are step-by-step procedures for every single client on what needs to happen. Full checklist, because I’m the reviewer for returns still, but if someone else has to review, they need to know exactly what my process is. So a lot of time was spent on that. So I feel like I’m on the fifth or sixth iteration of this business, but it’s ending up exactly where I thought it could be seven years ago.

Alright! Let’s talk about some of those things that you’ve set in place because I’ve heard you talk about this. And maybe this wasn’t like this from the beginning. I’m guessing you let clients dictate how you ran your business, rather than you dictate how they interact with you. 

Yep.

But I know you’ve put things in place like now. There’s a date that they have to have information. So let’s go into things like that—you directing the client rather than the client directing you.

Exactly. We start talking to clients about tax season in November and December. We give them a calendar. So I record a video that we share with a five step, here’s what tax season will look like. We let them know that organizers go out early in January. We use Link, which is part of ProConnect.

Yep.

And the invite expires within seven days. So to avoid having to resend a bunch of invites, we send them the last week of January—because people start to get documents in late January or early February. So we let them know you’ll get your invites to the organizer after you pay your deposit. If you don’t have a deposit, what’s the point of you playing in the checklist? There’s no reason for you to be there.

Nice.

So you pay your deposit to secure your spot. We let clients know that we are preparing for a fully booked tax season. We know exactly who’s coming back, pay your deposit, get your invite into Link. If you are a business owner—we did your bookkeeping, so you don’t need to provide us with any of that. You have until February 10th to provide us with any updates, complete your organizer, sign your engagement letter. If you complete it by February 10th, we’ll get you filed by the March 15th deadline. That’s for our partnerships and our S corps. For individuals, you have until March 10th. March 10th, if you want to file by April 15th, after that, you’re going on extension. If we get to you, “that was great.” But if we don’t, we’ve already expressed to you that you will be on extension. And I find that when clients have a deadline, they’ll get it done. If you let them wait until April 10th, they’ll wait until April 10th and still expect the timely filing.

Yep. So are you opposed to extensions, or are you okay with extensions?

You know what? I am opposed to excessive extensions. I’m opposed to extensions for people who could have filed on time. Right? If you have lots of K-1s, and things like that, I’m with it. I do feel like in general, the tax deadline is too soon. If I was in charge, I’d much rather a tax deadline of May or June. 

Oh, I agree.

April is just too quick, and I don’t understand the haste there. 

There’s no reason. In my mind, there’s no reason for it. Really. I mean, and I don’t know—honestly, I should look at the revenue. Is April 15th a revenue positive for the government? Is it revenue negative? My guess is that probably—my guess. I have no idea. It’s probably pretty flat. So it’s not a revenue deadline. It’s just this arbitrary date that’s like, let’s make accountants work like crazy, and not have any work-life balance and not do it. But I should really know the stat. I don’t know the stat.

We should both look it up, because I just think it’s such a weird date. We’re supposed to get everyone’s tax returns done between February and April when most people don’t even get 1099-Bs until March? 

Right.

Like, people are still waiting for updates and corrected forms. It’s just really too quick. I don’t think we should have to file a tax return until the IRS can produce a transcript of the documents they received. So if you can’t get it by April 15th, I don’t think we should have to file tax returns by April 15th, but that’s just my tiny, tiny opinion there.

Well, I agree. I’m on board with that for sure. So let’s go then, so something you said earlier about, you know, this deposit that they need to put in, and when’s the deposit due by?

You need to pay a deposit by February 10th. No later than February 10th.

Alright. So February 10th. But, so there’s something else you do too, and this has been another journey, an evolution, is you’re talking more about advisory these days with your clients as well. And so one thing, a question I had was about how that is built. But before that, let’s just talk about this evolution of this journey into it, the advisory end of things.

For sure.

And before even that, let’s define advisory because everybody has a different definition, and just what I’m thinking, or people listening are thinking, might be different than your definition of advisory. So what’s your definition of advisory?

Yeah. I consider advisory answering the tough questions in the time in which it matters most, which is not tax season.

Yeah. Right.

Advisory is being available to your clients when they need your assistance, before they’re making decisions, as they’re considering things. And I think advisory works for individuals that are not self-employed just as well as it works for individuals who are self-employed. I don’t even know how many tax changes we’ve had in the past three or four years. How many, right?

Lots. 

And deciphering through them and how do they impact you—if you leave that up to the TikTok, you should be in jail by 2024. So you need a professional to help you. The professionals need professionals. So that’s how I consider advisory. I don’t think it’s solely focused on tax savings—I think that’s the wrong way to think about it. I really think of advisory as being an advice giver for your clients, providing that personal look into how tax laws impact them, and how to use it to their advantage legally.

Yep. I agree. So now then, you’ve done this evolution. Advisory has become a bigger part of your business. Let’s go through that journey into advisory.

So I started without really realizing I was doing advisory, because I, for a while, thought that was my job as your tax preparer, to help you with things like estimated tax payments and W-4 forms, and answering your questions as you sent them over. And my inbox was overflowing. People liked it. They liked that I was answering their questions. But I realized that there is immense value. and being able to reach out to someone and say, hey, I’d love to know how this impacts me, and someone responds with an answer you could rely on. That’s valuable. You can’t walk into a big box tax store and say, hey, could you explain to me that depreciation concept and which way I should consider using it? You can’t do that. So then I said, you know what? And I love a subscription based model. So then I said, okay, I’m going to offer this to new clients, where we will charge you a monthly fee to be available to you year round—but still very optional, right? If you think that would be helpful, then we’ll do that. 

This year, now it’s required, because they all need advice, right? The clients we work with have mixed sources of income. and they live or work in one or more states. We focus on clients in New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania. They have questions. I know because I see the inbox. So now it is not even an option. It is part of your package: You’re getting advisory. You will talk to us four times a year. I cannot be the professional you need me to be talking to you in February or March. It’s just too late.

Right. Right.

It’s too late.

And so it’s not an option for new, is it becoming not an option for existing clients as well?

Yes. 

Okay.

They’ve been warned we’ve been on this three year journey where we said you can keep your options as they are—you can keep if you’re doing it, as an add-on if you’re doing it, but if you want to continue with us as a client, you will need to go into this new package. And it is to your advantage.

And you mentioned subscription pricing on that. That’s the model that you’re going then for everybody. And there’s so can you define subscription pricing then for your firm for us?

Yes. So I like to be able to predict revenue. I don’t need large spikes of income during tax season. I love being able to say this is who we’re working with, and I love being able to predict what income will be. I like getting paid on the first of every month, and then just doing the work. I don’t want to send invoices, I want it to just process on automatic sales receipts right in QuickBooks online. So the way we consider subscription based pricing, we’re going to tell you what your fee is, which means that when you call us, when you email us, there is no one off bill, you know exactly what to expect. I think clients like no surprise billing. We are not the kind of people who are timing you on the phone. We do keep to a schedule, but we’re not timing, usually, that we can send an invoice for eight minutes of our time. Because I find that if we put those guards down, we put those barriers down, and we say just call us if you have a question, right? They’re asking a lot of the same questions.

Mmm hmm.

And then we see what they’re asking, and we write blogs about it we can share the blogs with the people who are asking after them.

Oh, wow.

But it just creates this relationship where people say, you know what? Let me call my accountant about that. And we tell clients, we want you to just get into calling us and let us tell you it’s not an issue that impacts your taxes. That’s not for you to decide. You should never show up here and tell me you sold your house last year.

Right.

I never want to hear that. I want to know, I’m thinking of selling my house, so we can look at when you purchased it, when are you looking to sell it, should we be concerned with any capital gains, so you need to start pulling out home improvement receipts? All those sorts of things.So the subscription just says you know what you’re expecting to pay. You’ll be billed that on the 1st every month, and this covers these services. Simple.

Yep. And is that taxes are included in that? I mean, you said it, because you’re even in out revenue throughout the year. I assume it’s just this flat, whatever number based on that client for that year. 

Yep.

Okay. So what is this done then? This advisory, you know, subscription—are you working with less clients? Are you more profitable? You have more work-life balance? What’s been the positive impacts of this for the firm, and you, and everybody that works with you?

It’s D, Randy. It’s all of the above.

Yep. That’s what I figured.

So revenue has increased because we are charging a premium for this service. I think it’s worth a premium—it is a lot more comprehensive than what you’re going to get at a firm that’s only open January through April, or a big box firm or things like that. So we are certainly seeing increases in revenue, while we’re seeing a decrease in the number of clients we’re serving. We just don’t need to serve as many clients if we have these deeper relationships with our clients that warrant a higher fee. So fewer clients, increased revenue, and then my team knows exactly what to expect. We can better prepare for the work when we know who we’re working with—it’s fewer people that we need to speak with. Those clients are all aware that we work a four day week. They’ve adjusted to it. They know exactly how we work. So I just feel like we have evened out revenue, but we’ve also evened out, like, those surprises, those random sort of like, hey, I need you, and then someone has to come back to me and say, hey, how much do we charge this person? This is what they’re in need of. It’s eliminated all of that.

Right.

Just take it all away.

Nice. And so let’s see. You just mentioned it, but let’s talk about that work-life balance then. The four day work week, what are the things that you’re doing as a firm that you feel are creating this work-life balance, or what is the work-life balance you create?

Yes. So we are all remote. I do have an office that I love to work out of. Perhaps it’s just, you know, it’s because it’s my dog and my husband in the office. So it’s a very chill environment. But I like to be in the office. I go in the office three days a week. We have a team meeting on Monday, and I believe very strongly in scheduled meetings—I don’t like surprise calls. I think it messes with your own mindset and workflow when someone’s just kinda like, hey, can we help him, call him really quick? So we have clients trained to schedule calls as well. You cannot just call and expect to reach us. But our team knows on Mondays, we level set—we have a 30 minute meeting. I have individual meetings with every team member once a week so that we still feel connected even in this remote environment.

And outside of that, schedules are pretty flexible, right? So if you need to start a bit later, you need to end a bit earlier—my focus is on making sure our work is completed. You can pick the hours that work best for you. We all take Friday off, and I think it’s helpful for us to all take the day off so that one person isn’t working and sending things to the others.

Yep.

Which is creating pressure to work. And I was guilty of that, before working a four day week, I worked very early in the morning, and very late at night sometimes. I’m an early riser. So it would not be uncommon to get an email from me at 5:30. And I never expected a response, but then I would see a response.

Yep.

And then I realized, I’m putting pressure on my team—I’m making them think that because I’m up, they need to be up, because I would forget to schedule an email or something like that. So we had to talk about that: my hours and not your hours and vice versa. There are no real emergencies in accounting. I will never need an immediate response. But it’s important that they see it from the top. So I’m asking you to take your Fridays. If I happen to work on a Friday, for whatever reason, perhaps I’m going to take another day off—I don’t send any emails. I schedule them or I send them in my drafts, because I just don’t want to put that pressure on my team. 

And It was an adjustment because we’ve all worked for very large companies. The other CP on my team comes from a mid-sized accounting firm, very used to having to constantly be on, and productivity is measured by how many hours someone sees your bubble as active. And that’s just not how we operate. I’m about efficiency—if you get your work done quicker, that’s great for you, but it’s not a loss in your pain because you got the work done quicker.

Right. Yep. And that’s what I love about, you know, so you just did part of my mental health presentation right there. So, my talk about that, the whole you know, sending a bad example by sending text messages out or Teams messages or Slack messages or emails or whatever at 8 o’clock at night or at 5 o’clock in the morning, because you want it off of your plate, but then you don’t realize what that’s setting, that expectation is setting for the person that gets it. It’s like, oh, I need to be up and working now because An-Nisha’s up and working now, or Randy’s up and working now, and he’s sending a message. 

And I’ve been personally trying to avoid that I’ve finally got to the point where I’m scheduling emails. Because for me, it’s just I want it out of my head. Or I tell Siri to remind me, hey, at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning, remind me to email this person, or send a message to this person. So I think that’s so important. The other thing you just said that I think is extremely important is, you know, if you get it done faster, great. Because the old model of selling hours what does that do? That puts an incentive on you to work more because if I work more, I bill more, I bill more, I make more, and that’s how I’m going to advance. and that’s something we have to get rid of. That’s something that has to change.

Agreed. Agreed.

So everything that you’ve said is things that I say, this is what you need to that people have to listen to me, but this is things you need to do, you know? I’m not going to set anybody’s expectations that they have to listen to me. 

I love listening to you, Randy.

Oh, thank you. Thank you. But what you’re saying is that you’ve built the firm now that I think everybody should strive for, at least in my opinion, and this is awesome. But before I go to two final things, any bow you want to wrap around the discussion we had there, to to wrap that up?

I mean, in summary, and I like to tell people this all the time: One, burnout does not equal success. I don’t know what success is for everybody—we all have to define our own success journey—but burned out for accountants does not necessarily mean successful accountants. If you’ve ever, like, been falling asleep and talking on the phone—and this happened to me a lot when I was younger. When I’m tired, I start to say, like, weird things, right? Imagine that person doing your taxes.

Yeah. Right.

Imagine the person that’s, like, doing that jumbled talk, doing your taxes. You don’t want someone exhausted being the person that is providing you with financial advice. So, burnout and success do not go together. 

And then I think, especially in this industry, Pivoting is okay. In life, pivoting is okay. And in this industry, pivoting is okay. There are so many avenues—you don’t have to stick to something just because it’s the way you’ve always done it, or the way you’ve been taught. If it doesn’t work, just change it. Just change it. And that’s perfectly fine. You don’t owe anyone an explanation for deciding that you’re not going that avenue. We’re all going up the mountain. Doesn’t matter if you go another route. So pivot accordingly.

That’s awesome. I appreciate that. So, before we wrap up then, two final questions: First, we just talked about how you build the best accounting firm in the world. At least that’s how I heard it. 

Thank you!

But that is not who you are. Who you are is not your firm. So what are your outside of work passions? What do you enjoy doing when it’s not running the firm?

I’m a dancing queen. Love to dance. Love loud music—in the car, at home. Love that. I love taking walks. I love audiobooks. I love kickboxing. That was today, Friday’s kickboxing class at the gym. I love kickboxing. And I love watching funny movies and entertaining friends and family. In my real life, I’m a little bit of a loner, but if you let me out, I’m a good time. So I love enjoying time with my friends and family. And I keep a journal. I like to put a note, like, I think writing and reflecting is so important, and I’ve kept a daily gratitude journal for ten years now, since 2013.

Really! 

Yep. 

That’s why you have such a great outlook on life. That’s amazing.

Oh, thank you.

I am not a dancer. I kind of in the back of my mind think, why don’t I dance? Just do it. Who cares what I look like?

Exactly.

And I can’t get that out of my mind, and I’m probably getting too old to change.

We’ll change it.

Oh! Let’s change it. And then final question, if anybody wants to find out more about Al-Nisha, about your firm, about what you’re doing, you know, where would they look?

Great place to find me on LinkedIn. I’m on LinkedIn. It’s just LinkedIn.com/in/AlNeshaJones. So definitely find me on LinkedIn. You can also check me out on our website, ASEGroupOffices.com. That is also our Instagram name. I’m terrible with Twitter, so don’t look for me there. You will not find me.

Alright. LinkedIn, website. Got it.

Yes.

Well, Al-Nesha, I’ve been looking forward to this. I really appreciate you being on the show. I enjoyed every second of it today.

Thank you. Ditto. I’ll see you soon, Randy.