I had an epiphany today!  I know that may sound stupid, but I needed to share.  It reminded me of when I was a kid, and I saw my kindergarten teacher at the grocery store.   It was weird to see her because I never envisioned her as a person with a life, but rather only as my teacher.  When I saw her in the store it was so out of context that I was taken by surprise.  Well the same thing happened today after I met with some friends, a CPA and an attorney, for lunch.  Both of them have small, individual, successful practices and are extremely capable advisers.  My epiphany came after we started talking about running a small business practice.

I realized they are just like us SBO’s, duh, with the same issues and concerns.  The attorney doesn’t have a great understanding of his financial reports prepared by an outside QB adviser, and the CPA doesn’t even have a website.  They don’t read blogs, don’t know what SEO or SEM means, and… they have little to no marketing budget.  WOW.  I had believed that when the CPA and lawyer gave advice in their “teacher-like tone of voice” to my clients about what they needed or should have done, that the advisers were actually doing it themselves.  The reality is that behind the scene,  they aren’t any better than us.  It’s like hiring a contractor to build your high-end house, but when you drive by their home, you find it in shambles.  It makes you a little nervous.  Try this one: I met with two different financial planners last month, and neither had any annual budgeting system in place nor review of their financials.  It’s amazing to find that a financial planner doesn’t even have his own Company financial budget.

I know this is not news to some of you, but I have had many clients criticized by their professional adviser.  It feels good to know that they are SBO like us.  They have good days and bad days, they have cash flow and customer issues, they don’t have an annual budget, and they don’t understand Twitter.    They’re human; behind those solid oak doors there are undocumented receipts, phone call not returned, and to-do lists that have nothing crossed off.

The point here is that we are all the same, so try not to get intimidated by talking with an Adviser.  They are SBO’s also.  They’re good at what they do, specifically trained with certain skill sets, but they are people too.  Please talk to them, listen to them, and once in a while turn the table around to ask about their business.  Lend them a shoulder to cry on and help them out.  GO SBO”s!

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This entry was posted on Monday, April 20th, 2009 at 9:05 pm and is filed under Strategic Advisors, Professional Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.