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In the Hidden Money podcast, you'll learn how you can legally use the tax code to your financial advantage. There’s wealth inside the tax code. Taxes aren’t the enemy.
Most people hate taxes (and pay more than they should). But when you view taxes only as an evil expense, you miss out on legal ways to grow your wealth. Unlock the secrets to saving tax and building wealth with the Hidden Money Podcast! 🎧💰 Hosted by Mike Pine and Kevin Schneider.
Mike Pine: People were leaving
at these firms I was at
for, like, a 5% or 8% raise.
And you know why?
Because that's the only
way they get raises.
And then our firms would go and
replace them with someone new that
couldn't hit the ground running.
They were net negative capacity-wise for
at least six months, if not a whole year.
And our firms would pay
more for those new people
Than they would pay the people who left.
And my thought was like, "Well, why
didn't you just pay them that much?"
And I would bring that up to the partners,
and they would look at me and just laugh.
Kevin Schneider: Welcome to this
episode of the Hidden Money Podcast.
Hopefully, you had a good Fourth
of July celebration, 250 years
as a country, and what a better
way to celebrate than talk tax.
But today we're not gonna
be talking your normal tax.
We're actually going to be talking
about what it's like working at Revo and
why we are looking for good, talented
CPAs, and not your just average CPA.
We're gonna get into what we're
looking for specifically, but we
just wanna talk about our firm as a
whole and what we're looking for, so-
Mike Pine: But a great segue to
this is we just celebrated our
250th anniversary as a country.
Do you know when we started off,
there was no such thing as income tax?
No.
Did you know in the original United States
Constitution, which wasn't adopted in July
4, 1776, it was actually adopted in 1789.
Did you know that it said it
was illegal and unconstitutional
to levy taxes on income?
Hmm.
Kevin Schneider: This is almost
like the whole reason why we kind
of went away from the European
Mike Pine: countries.
It is.
We didn't like the idea of- Revolt
⦠taxation without representation,
so we fought a revolution over that
Kevin Schneider: Like a revo?
Sh- It's short, you can call it a revo.
Mike Pine: We did.
We fought a rev over that, and we won.
Um, and England, um, lost Yes And
they tried to beat us again in the
War of 1812, and well, they did
burn the White House down a little
bit, but we still-- we're standing.
And somehow the mindset of it being
okay to tax incomes, which happened
in 1913, so that would be a lot
of years, 150 years afterwards.
So we were the constitutional
republic that we wanted to be and
our founders wanted without taxing
income for nearly 150 years So
Kevin Schneider: is-
But now here
Mike Pine: we are And, and I
think that speaks to what is
different about Revo, right?
Like, we're trying to
revolutionize the way you see tax.
We can't get rid of the income tax,
although if we could, we would.
Um, there's so many better ways to do it.
Um, we can't do that, but we can
utilize the tax code and teach you to
have a revolutionary concept and idea
of the tax code because it can be a
great asset, a wealth-building tool.
Um, and we're looking for
people like that to join
Kevin Schneider: to join our firm.
And we've, we've had time and time
again, when, uh, we get feedback from
clients, they're like, "This is stuff
I should have known 20 years ago.
You know, I am, I am in my 60s.
I could have been implementing
these things for 20 years
and been so much far along."
Um, but we need people.
So because there's such a need in the
marketplace, like, we are working hard
to find talent, and we have interviewed
and interviewed, and we areâ¦
We have like a f- three, four
process interview because we
do not just wanna hire somebody
who's, "Hey, I just got laid off.
Here's my resume."
Hired, stamp.
That is not what we're looking for.
We are looking for people
who are like-minded.
We have a core value system internally
and, you know, most corporations have
core value, and it's corporate speak.
And I've always thought that until
you actually own your own business.
You're like, "Wow, we really do
need a set of core values," 'cause
everything is governed through this,
this vision of Revo is our core values.
R-E-V-O, relationship.
That is number one,
relationship with the client.
If you are out there and you
love communicating, if you
love working with peopleâ¦
Now, taxes are a desk job, you're not
gonna be out and about, you know, every
day out into the marketplace doing, you
know, communicating with the open public.
But having a client list saying,
"Here's your 100 clients.
I want them to f- each one
of these clients to feel like
they're your only client."
If that is something you're
passionate about, people, then
Mike Pine: And having the relationship
where you care about them, and you
want to help change their lives
'cause we get to do that at Revo.
Yeah.
I mean, most CPA firms,
you do t- you do taxes.
You sit behind a desk.
We have clients, and check out
our, our, um, Google reviews.
Check out, we had some, a, a
couple clients we've interviewed
recently in some of the podcasts.
We can help change people's
life for the better.
Um, and that's relationship.
And if you're someone who wants that
out of your vocation, it's not boring.
I mean, there's boring
parts But you can love this.
You can have a passion for it.
We want people to have a passion for it.
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
In relationships, what sets us apart
too, 'cause a lot of CPAs are, are just
paper pushers who prep tax returns,
and that's one of the most common
things we hear from our clients.
They come in, they're like, "I just
can't even get ahold of my CPA.
He doesn't talk to me.
I have no idea."
And man, let's just talk.
And we have specific plans for our
clients that are on that and believe that.
Mm-hmm.
But we need people who are willing to
step into that and pick up a phone.
Zoom.
Well, most everything's done by Zoom
these days just because it's recorded,
you can transcribe it, all that stuff.
So if that is you, and you are open
to having more of a relationship with
your clients and not just, you know,
a spouse married with kids on a page
that you just see their name every
year, actually get to know them, then
Reva could be a great place for you.
The second, the second core
value we have is excellence.
Mm.
So excellence just says we wanna
be the best at what we do, and
that is why it's the second one,
is we want to beat our competition.
We want to see when we review
clients' prior returns, we're not
just reviewing for compliance.
Like, yeah, you're in compliance.
You filed, everything's appears right.
What are they missing?
Mm-hmm.
How do you excel at tax planning?
How do you excel at doing
something differently?
And that'sâ¦
If that's resonates
with you too, this could
Mike Pine: be a good firm.
Absolutely.
So Revo, we got through the
R, we went through the E.
V is a big, big part for us, values.
Um, it goes along with all the other,
uh, ones that we're discussing.
So values is important.
We do this for the right reason.
We do this because we care,
but we don't break the rule.
We'll- We don't do anything
immoral or illegal.
Um, sometimes there's rules meant
to be broken, and as long as we
can find a legal avenue to do
it, we ought to talk about it.
But values is super important.
It's not just values that we
show towards our clients, it's
values that we show towards each
other as a team member, right?
We're family.
We, we, we need to work together.
We need to enjoy working together.
And if we're not enjoying it and we're
not feeding off of each other and,
and helping impassion each other to,
to serve our clients well, to work
with evelent- excellence, to, to have
relationships, and if we're not having
relationships with each other with
high values, it's not gonna work.
But values is super important.
And a big value of Revo is helping clients
take back what is rightfully theirs.
Taxpayers pay too much in
taxes more often than not.
Yeah.
Our value is stop that.
Our value is get back to the revolution
of 1776 and the original Constitution
of 1789 and not pay income taxes.
Well, we have to pay
now, but don't overpay
Kevin Schneider: That's right.
Pack your musket down, go to work.
So it's good stuff.
And we just hired two people, um, you
know, and these are organic hires, growth.
It's just growth.
We haven't had anyone leave, um, in
probably two years, so our team is happy.
We have a really good foundation of
a team here, and now we're re- ready
to dump fuel on that 'cause we have
our processes, we got our management
team, we got everything in place.
Now we just need, we
just need more soldiers.
And that's why, you know, our interview
process was extensive for these people
that we hired, but we had at least
three rounds of interviews and then
we're like, "Okay, we're gonnaâ¦
You're gonna come in office and
you're gonna have lunch with us."
'Cause, uh, youâ¦
Twice a week, we have lunch in
our office together as a team.
We just stop work for an hour, hour
and a half, um, and we sit and eat.
How's your fa- you know, we just talk.
It's relationship with your
team and your coworkers.
Um, and they just join lunch,
and do they jive with the team?
We do not want a disruptor coming in
and being this, you know, disruptor
to the team and ruining our culture.
We have a super unique
culture that I've never seen.
So, um, yeah.
And that's all, all of us
rowing in the same direction.
We all see the target that we're aiming
at, and we're all going to that direction.
So, um, yeah, values is very important.
But fourth, I know this is myâ¦
I already see you smirking.
Take number four.
What is
Mike Pine: O of Revo?
Out of the box.
Get out of the box.
Get to the outside of the box thinking.
This was my greatest detriment and
hindrance earlier in my career.
You show up at PricewaterhouseCoopers
as an intern in 2000 and you wanna
think outside the box, you're gonna get
slammed right back in the box or let go.
I mean, you're supposed
to think inside the box.
Just about every other CPA firm I worked
for, even up through the ranks of manager
and senior manager, I would get in
trouble for doing things differently,
for challenging the way we did things
if it didn't make sense, um, for
challenging the way we were interpreting
tax law because it's been done that
way for years and years and years.
That's not who we're looking
for, and that's hard to find in
CPAs and in, in tax specialists.
I mean, I think that's why when
we're hiring, I think we look atâ¦
We'd have to ask Pippa, but, like,
something like 300 or 400 resumes before
we actually hire one person, and a
whole bunch of interviews before we get
narrowed down to that one person to hire.
Um, because we need tax people that
love tax, that understand tax, that
are good at tax, but they can think
outside of the box, and that's just
not how schools print them out.
That's not how the CPA exam tests you.
You're supposed to get in the
box to get out of school, right?
Yeah.
Um, so one thing I was thinking,
maybe we ought to start looking
for college transcripts that
shows people barely at the 3.0
instead of the 4.0s
because they're, like, struggling
of getting inside the box.
But then we could get some
Kevin Schneider: Then you never know.
But yeah, very rarely
I think do those 4.0s,
4+ GPAs really, they were
really kind of rule followers.
Or they weren't busy in college, you
know, they just studied and didn't work.
You need that mix.
I was a 4.
I was a 3.1
or 3.2
Mike Pine: Yeah
GPA, so
I was a low threes.
I was a 2.87
in high school, 2.88
in undergrad, 3.8
Kevin Schneider: Oh, you
Mike Pine: bumped it up.
But that's 'cause I figured out how to
utilize the tax code and have fun with
it and make a difference in people's
lives, and I was like, "Oh yeah, I can do
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, that's awesome.
And, um, you know, our firm, we-
we're based out in Grapevine, Texas,
so a lot of this hiring that we're
doing is we're looking at in person.
We
Mike Pine: tried the remote hire-
Wait a second.
So if you, if you Google us right
now, you'll see that our office is
still in Roanoke, but just three weeks
ago, June 15th, we closed on our, our
new home base building in Grapevine.
Yeah.
Beautiful
Kevin Schneider: So we are, Mike and
I purchased our first big commercial
property, 'cause we're setting up roots.
We're like, "All right, Revo is it.
This is what it is."
And we have a nice office.
We're, we have a foundation
of where, where to build.
It's central to the DFW, uh, metroplex,
right off 114 in Texan Trail.
Mike Pine: So right by-
Right off of 114,
Kevin Schneider: Lodge.
114 and 121, 635.
Airport.
Yeah.
Five minutes from DFW Airport.
Yeah.
Mike Pine: Airport.
Yeah.
So,
Kevin Schneider: um, but we are
currently looking for in-person people
because there is a major difference.
And we have remote people,
but they were local at first.
Yeah.
But the remote staff, it's hard.
E- there's a gap in the, the buy-in,
the relationship, the training.
The, the people who were remote
were not growing as quickly.
We're like, "Man, the people in office are
Mike Pine: people in office
are shooting way above-" But
don't get us wrong.
It's not like we're stuffy and we
think you should be in the office.
We want, and, and all of us work
hybrid at the office, just about.
There's a few people that
insist on coming in the office.
Um, we hired a big group of
people four years ago, all remote.
They- Like five in the room,
like five- Six, I think.
Six?
Six.
And we couldn't get them trained up
because we don't-- At most CPA firms,
the way that you get, you learn and
you get trained and built is they
put you on simple, easy tax returns
where, and the same kind of tax return.
Like at PricewaterhouseCoopers,
my first internship, it was
investment partnerships, big
private equity partnerships, and
allocations, and you just did the
same thing over and over again.
In two months, I was
awesome at just doing that.
That's how you get trained.
But I could only do that.
I didn't know anything about 1040s.
At other smaller firms or regional
firms, they put you on the easy 1040s,
where you're just taking W-2s and 1099s.
Well, when we bring people into our firm,
we don't do those kind of easy stuff.
We do hard returns.
It's complicated because that's
where we're adding value.
So we brought in all these people,
um, completely remote, and they didn't
develop a relationship with their peers.
They weren't asking people questions.
We couldn't figure out
how to make that work.
We- They were silent ⦠we
invested so much in communications.
Team, I mean, did so many try to--
We had remember the online happy
hours that we had- Yes ⦠like
every week, and it just, we couldn't
figure out how to make it work.
So we have realized for people to
come and hit the ground running in
our firm, we need them in office.
And then like you said, we
have a few people now that
are fully remote, but that's
Kevin Schneider: Because they're part
Mike Pine: our culture now.
Yeah.
And- They did their normal
process ⦠and they had a good reason.
Kevin Schneider: And they know that.
Yes Yeah, and so, like, I mean, you
work from home probably three days a
week, four days a week in the summer.
Yeah.
And so same for me.
In the summer, you know, I'm gonna be
in office a little bit more with this
new kickoff of the commercial, so I'm
there making sure everything's working.
But I'm, I'm in office two
to three days a week, too.
And we just require our current seniors
who are up and running on our processes,
hitting their goals, hitting their
targets, they can be in two- twice a week.
Yeah.
Whatâ¦
I mean, we're super flexible, but to
start, it's like there is a massive
difference of you being in office, bonding
with your peers and teammates- Yeah
and getting to know us,
and getting to knowâ¦
You know, that's why we have lunches,
and, I mean, there's so much just, uhâ¦
I mean, that's why holidays
are done around food.
Like Christmas and Thanksgiving, it's
like, "What do you do with your family?
Let's get around food.
Let's sit around a table
and get to know each other."
And that's why our culture calls
for that, is let's just sit around.
Let's just take a break.
What's going on?
And, you
Mike Pine: know, just-
And- ⦠that,
developing that relationship.
And there's something
magical about free food.
And sitting over and enjoying free
food and talking with each other.
Free to them.
You, you, you and I pay
for it, but it's magic.
I mean, it's true.
Like, if, if you, if you sit down and
someone's having a, or providing you
a meal, you just, you're able to build
Kevin Schneider: You don't have
to think about, you know, you're
not, "What are we ordering?
What, you
Mike Pine: what am I
Kevin Schneider: for lunch?"
It's like two days a week, we got you.
Yes.
Um, you just show up and eat and have fun.
And we do that in tax season for dinners.
In tax season, we even do three
to four days sometimes just
because tax season's longer hours.
We wanna also, you know, the
more decisions making we take off
your plate administratively, the
Mike Pine: more clearer you're able
to think for your clients, too.
Which, which is another interesting
point, and then I want to get into
our whole staffing philosophy, um,
and why you actually joined us.
How long time ago?
I can'tâ¦
What year?
Eight years probably it is
Kevin Schneider: like 2018?
'17.
Mike Pine: was before I had Eli,
so it would've been 17, right?
Well, I didn't have a baby
when-- We didn't have a kid.
Yeah.
So 17 or 16.
So a long-- almost 10 years maybe.
Um, but before we get to that, we have,
and for a while this really bothered
Kevin 'cause he's our financial guy, he
makes sure that we pay our bills, and we
have a budget, and we're cash flowing.
Um, we have h- the highest administrative
to tax professional count, I think, of
any tax or CPA firm out there, right?
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
It's, like, super crazy.
Easy.
But that's because we've got tax
professionals that are awesome with tax
that shouldn't be spending time scanning
documents or chasing down clients orâ¦
I mean, our admin team is
Kevin Schneider: busy as heck.
It's not like they're sitting
around twiddling their thumbs.
But get this, we have a project meeting
every week, and our seniors come
to that meeting, 'cause the seniors
really hold the client book, right?
And so the seniors are sitting there.
Our admin team is asking the seniors,
"Hey, what are you missing on this?
What are you missing on this?"
And they're not governing you.
What they're doing is saying,
"Hey, if you're missing five
items, send me those five items.
It's off your plate."
Admin is now asking the client
on your behalf, "Hey, we need
this, this, this, and this."
And they are gonna stay on top of
it 'cause it's admin's job to make
sure these projects are moving.
Project management.
We have a project manager who's that--
her, her job is making sure your s- you as
a senior are supported in that you canâ¦
You don't have to spend your
time checking in on clients.
"Oh, I gotta sendâ¦
Hey, do you have that W-2?"
It's just like, "Hey, Pippa, this is what
I need from my-- these five clients."
Mike Pine: "Cool.
I'll let you know when I get it."
Yeah.
And you're like, "Okay."
Every other firm I'd ever
been at and that I hear about,
that's the professional's job.
That's the manager's job or the tax
senior's job, or even in smaller
firms, the tax partner's job.
That doesn't fit with the way we envision
our culture and keep our team happy.
So quick background story.
Every firm I was at, the
outside of the box part of my
values clashed with the firms.
Um, but I had to figureâ¦
I mean, I still had to navigate it
to learn, and I learned a lot of good
tax stuff from a lot of smart people.
But every firm I was at, we had
super high attrition because they
would-- We were all salaried, right?
And the way the firms made their
profit most of the time is work the
snot out of you during tax season,
'cause they're not paying you overtime.
Martyrs.
Martyrs.
You're billing hours.
They're not paying you overtime.
So you work inâ¦
I mean, it's not the same n- this
year, but we're working 90, 100 hour.
I got, I think, 118 hours one time
at, at PwC during the tax season,
Kevin Schneider: Tax season.
And that was expected.
That was the
way you impressed- And
Mike Pine: people.
Kevin Schneider: your salary divided by
Mike Pine: 118, how much- I was making
like- You were under minimum wage.
I was making, like, three bucks an
hour, which sucked, because as an
intern- At least ⦠I was making 25
bucks an hour, plus in California you
got, like, double time on Sundays and
time and a half after eight hours.
They were making a lot more than you.
Oh, yeah.
They a lot more than me.
I hated it.
Like, I thought I was there
when I was finally promoted and
made senior and I had a salary.
I wasn't an intern anymore, and I
was making, like, a buck an hour.
Kevin Schneider: like, "Oh, sour sucks."
Mike Pine: You're like, "I want salary."
Yeah.
But anyways, the attrition is uber
high, and you see this at every firm.
After tax season, people leave.
And when they leave, it's not just
like you're losing a colleague or, or a
tax service provider for your clients.
You're losing a lot of tribal knowledge.
You're losing experience.
You're losing someone that knows that
system, that knows that culture, that
knows the people, that have goneâ¦
that, that is a go-to resource or
go- knows how to go to the resources.
You lose that person, and these people
were leaving at, at, at these firms
I was at for, like, a 5% or 8% raise.
And you know why?
Because that's the only
way they get raises.
And then our firms would go and replace
them with someone new that couldn't hit
the ground running, that couldn't make
any, add any additional capacity forâ¦
I mean, they were net negative
capacity-wise for at least six
months, if not a whole year.
Kevin Schneider: Mm-hmm.
Mike Pine: And our firms would
pay more for those new people
than
they would pay the people who left.
It's stupid.
And, and my thought was like, "Well,
why didn't you just pay them that much?"
And I would bring that up to the
partners, and they would look at me and
just laugh like, "Oh, you don't know.
You know, you're, you smart
little young whippersnapper.
You'll see.
It's an experience thing."
And then I started thinking,
"Why are you working us so hard?"
Like, when I met, went to my next
firm, um, here, a regional firm
called Travis Wolf, there wasâ¦
We didn't have to work more than
70 or 80 hours a week at the
worst, and that was a lot better.
But that's still a lot, especially
if someone wants to have a family,
and especially when you think about
it, if you're working 70 hours
a week, those last 10, 15 hours
Kevin Schneider: you're working-
Last twenty hours
Mike Pine: sucks.
You make mistakes And you're miserable.
So I thought, okay, and we
still had the attrition.
Um, and granted some of it was pay,
and a lot of it was overworking people.
So I thought, why don't you just make
sure you have additional capacity?
Hire more people, and that will keep
you and save you so much money in
your attrition costs of having to
rehire, and it'll help capacity.
And another big part was we could
never proactively tax plan with
clients because we were always behind.
We're always losing people, we wereâ¦
We never had enough capacity.
So build excess capacity, and
I used to preach that to my
partners, my bosses, everyone.
They would just laugh at me.
So when it was time to start our firm,
um, back as a sole proprietorship,
and I started hiring people, I
came up with this beautiful idea.
We're never gonna make people work more
than 50 hours a week, um, and we're
always gonna have additional capacity.
And I found out why those
partners were laughing at me.
Um- It's hard ⦠because
I couldn't get paid.
Yeah.
You're, you're working in a c- in those
days, it was a commoditized, umâ¦
It's a commodity market, right?
A tax return.
People see tax returns,
you go into H&R Block.
It's just getting a widget built.
They're not gonna pay more than you can
get it done somewhere else or much more.
Yet somehow I had to figure out and
design, and thank God you joined 'cause
you helped me design it, a way where we
could pay people enough, keep them from
having to work more than 50 hours a week
at the worst times, and most of the year
30, you know, 40 hours a week, 35, 30
billable, um, and still cashflow and us
get paid, and it took us a long time.
I- we didn't start getting thereâ¦
We didn't get there until
Kevin Schneider: till three, four
years ago Till you made Barton start
Mike Pine: running our finances actually.
Kevin Schneider: running our finances
actually But it's, uh, it'sâ¦
When we look at our f- we do a
financial meeting and just how
much overhead, uh, how much we
believe this is we spend about 50%
Mike Pine: of our margin,
Kevin Schneider: of all of our profit
Mike Pine: Or all our revenue
revenue on staff, staffing.
F- I think it was closer to
Kevin Schneider: I think
it was closer to 55.
Wages, health- Benefits ⦠um,
401match, dental, short-term,
long-term disability, life insurance.
All these are benefits that we provide
our people, plus meals and PTO.
The firm shutting, like
we're shutting the firm down
Mike Pine: the mostâ¦
I mean, you almost have over a month
Kevin Schneider: of time off.
Mike Pine: off ⦠over a month
of time off, including holidays.
Yes, and this is
Kevin Schneider: You probably
have a month, over a month of
time off including holidays.
Yes, and this is legit time
off where it's not like,
Mike Pine: "Hey, yeah,
you can take time off."
It's like, "You take
time off, you're off."
I remember at PwC we
had unlimited time off.
That was one of their big re- That's true.
I never could take time off.
I never could.
And then I remember at my next firms,
they'd give you all this huge PTO time.
They wouldn't let you carry
forward two months every year,
but you could never use it.
You- You never could ⦠you weren't
Kevin Schneider: Yeah
You didn't allow to take it, and
you had too much stuff to get done.
Yeah.
Um, so yeah.
That's where the overcapacity helps too,
is 'cause we have one, we have one of our
seniors, uh, he's in Europe for two weeks.
Where does his work go?
Well, he, he communicates with
his clients, but we're also what?
We have capacity to where
you can go out of town.
It's, it's not rocket science,
Mike Pine: but to
Kevin Schneider: point, it's
hard to bootstrap a business
with that at the start because-
Without debt ⦠without debt.
So we've organically grown.
Our firm is very healthy on the
financial side 'cause without
Mike Pine: that, but 'cause of your
Kevin Schneider: at the beginning of
this is you- Your sacrifice too ⦠you,
yeah, we, we did it together, but you
started this by leading by example ofâ¦
Mike Pine: I mean, your salary
Kevin Schneider: like 60K, if not less.
You lived on that.
Mike Pine: it was 24K.
Kevin Schneider: In July, it was 24K.
You, you lear- you learned to live on
Mike Pine: very little to
Kevin Schneider: us to
where we are today, right?
Mike Pine: And- And you
Kevin Schneider: You took a big
pay cut to come work for me.
And I took a pay cut to come work
for you 'cause I saw the vision,
and I saw, I saw your heart.
I saw where this business could go.
Mm-hmm.
And I saw that many, many years
ago, and it's holding true.
The Lord's very faithful in that.
Um, but we still hold that motto today.
It's like we don't pay ourselves.
We could go get a job at
PricewaterhouseCoopers
again and be a slave
Mike Pine: man.
Make 10X.
And make
Kevin Schneider: more, way
more than what we're making
today, but it's not the vision.
Right.
It's not the mission.
But almost all of our revenue
goes to our people, and
Mike Pine: most firms
Kevin Schneider: about 33% of
Mike Pine: their revenue-
Or less.
Or less ⦠and
they get by with 28, 30%.
Here's a standard firm model.
A third or less on your staff,
a third or less on the, uh,
overhead, and a third or more to the
Kevin Schneider: Partners.
And so half is going to our
staff, and then we have overhead
marketing and stuff like that.
And then anything left over, Mike
and I have stashed for this building.
So we want to give our people a niceâ¦
We have, like, a really
Mike Pine: nice kitchen, a
kitchen table, and, like-
But we're- This is stuff that
we- Yeah ⦠wanna invest in.
But we're also trying
to attract more talent.
That is our, the only thing that
is slowing our growth, because we
have the most incredible team right
now, and we serve clients better.
Yeah.
Don't get us wrong, we're not perfect.
We keep making mistakes.
I wanna get perfect.
We're better than most.
Actually, we're probably better than all.
But we need more people, uh, and
that's the only thing that's preventing
us from growing faster and faster.
Yeah.
And the reason is, it's not
just growth that drives us.
We have a mission to save the most amount
of income taxes, of hard-earned money
that people are just losing, getting
stolen from them, in my opinion, um,
that's changing their lives, and they
don't have enough money to retire, or
they can't retire as soon as they want,
or they don't have financial freedom.
Um, they don't get to spend
times with their families.
Our culture is family first, or God
first, family second, and we can
talk about that if we have time.
I know we're running
late, um, running over.
But it's working.
Mm-hmm.
It is absolutely working.
Yeah.
But we need good people, so
that's why we moved to Grapevine.
I liked our Roanoke office.
I like being out in the middle
of nowhere, but we need to be
central for a better talent pool.
Kevin Schneider: Yeah,
and we can pull that in.
You know, going back to the family, it's
like I-- when I had a baby, um, a year
and a half ago, I worked from home for
that, for that first probably three months
I was at home the majority of the time
helping, but w- my workload was shifting
to night because I was helping in theâ¦
It was, uh, it was, you know, a
trying time in my life, but it was
Mike Pine: it was beautiful 'cause
Kevin Schneider: 'cause I, I
was like, "Man, I'm so thankful
I get to have this option."
Mike Pine: I have this option.
Like No more babies please, Gavin.
And we, we had two other people
have babies in our office.
Three.
And, and what other firms our
size have maternity leave and
paternity, paid maternity- Yeah
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
Yeah.
So I never, I've never
missed, um, a softball game.
I will never miss a baseball game,
a soccer game, an event at church.
I will never miss what's really
important because of work.
We'veâ¦
Structure your schedule.
Now, there's working hours, like
you have to work during the day.
Not many things are happening at 2:00
PM for my kids unless it's summer,
but then I just plan ahead, right?
But during the school, like I am
not working nights from 7:00 to
9:00 or s- 5:00 to 9:00 or whatâ¦
You canâ¦
You're a professional
Mike Pine: adult.
Manage your schedule, manage your family.
That's the, that's the
walk we're all working
on.
But then we do have some team
members that their, their children,
they need to be there to pick them
up from school or do something.
Yeah.
So they do take the afternoons
off, and they come in and, and
make up their work in the evenings.
Yeah.
And, and that's okay as long as
you're serving your clients well.
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
If you're getting your work done,
hitting, hitting all your goals and
targets, I mean, yeah, we, we treat youâ¦
We, we do not big brother
and ask where you've been.
Just be
Mike Pine: professional,
communicate with your team.
"Hey, I, I need to be out."
You know, whatever.
So-
And, and weâ¦
Again, I just wanna throw in more,
'cause I think your, your 50% was not
including our new, um, insurance coverage.
So we've always had incredible insurance
because we want our, we want our team
to have the same stuff I wanna have.
Kevin would be okay without insurance.
He, he doesn't like insurance.
He's like, "Let's just do
health share ministry."
And I'm like, "No, we gotta have good
insurance, um, the best insurance."
Um, but insurance rates just
skyrocketed this past year,
and- Like 40% for us ⦠40%.
And our insurance agent said, "Hey, it's
happening to everyone, most businesses."
At that time we were covering 60%
of employees' insurance, right?
And he said, "Most businesses
are just cutting back the, the
employer contribution amount."
Um, we can't do that to our people.
So what do we do?
Kevin calls me up, he's
like, "Let's increase it."
I'm like, "Heck yeah, let's do it."
Kevin Schneider: So-
Mike Pine: we, we increased.
Now we're covering 70%
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
To keep our employee cost.
We want to keep our employee costs
lower, and we bear the burden of that.
And that's why we're good partners,
is like, we are, we are, we are
servant-minded first of our people.
Like, I think you and I do a really
good job of thinking of other people.
Like, how, how would
it feel to work for us?
'Cause we're gonna be held to
account of how we treat our people.
Yeah.
And if we, if I die and I stand
Mike Pine: before God, and he's
like, "You know, you gave too much
to your employees," I'm like, "Okay."
Yeah,
I mean, there's some altruism
there, but it's also wise business.
It's thinking outside of the box, right?
Like, if we treat our people right,
and we have the right people, which
it's hard to find the right people.
Yes.
Um, but once we have the right
people, if we don't treat them
right, they should go somewhere else.
Everyone deserves to be treated well and
Kevin Schneider: We've even, uh,
testimony, we had someone leave our
firm and then come back six monthâ¦
They're like, "The grass I thought
was greener because of these things
that we needed in that season."
And then they came back, they're
like, "No, I'm coming back."
And so like it happens.
Like recruiters are out there
and money gets flown around.
I mean, that's how people, like you
mentioned in PwC, that's how you
get pay raise, you job, job hop.
Mike Pine: Well, we don't do
that with our employees, I think
Kevin Schneider: Well, we
Mike Pine: Well above market
Kevin Schneider: don't
do that with our firm.
No.
It's like I would rather pay, you know,
we pay above market of-- well above market
for, uh, the line of work that we're in.
So, um, 'cause we do -- Every year we
look at map studies, we look at CPA
firms and our s- like we're probably 20,
Mike Pine: let's call it twenty employees.
We're paying people like
they're in a regional
firm-
Kevin Schneider: the 70.
Better.
Better.
Working the 70, 80.
Mike Pine: of the huge firms.
Yes.
Um- And you're
Kevin Schneider: a smaller f-
smaller firm environment with-
Mike Pine: You're never required
to work more than fifty hours
Kevin Schneider: work 150 hours in a
week during And we want-- And we're
tr- fighting to get that lower.
No guarantees on
Mike Pine: that, but
Kevin Schneider: but Mike and I always
Mike Pine: ideas
were having a conversation.
We're like, "Man, how
cool would it be to have
Kevin Schneider: overtime of 45
Mike Pine: Yes.
No more than forty-five.
We work one hour extra a day.
No guarantees, but we're
gonna try to get there.
That's ourâ¦
That's what we're going for.
Yeah.
And if, if you are not your typical
accountant, if you are someone out there
in the trenches doing tax work, um,
and you know it can be done better, if
you feel like if you had more time that
you could focus on serving your clients
and unpeeling that onion and figuring
out ways to save them more money, or
you're not getting support from your
managers or your partners on helping
your clients save more money, and you're
just churning, you're, you're, you're,
you're building widgets to make your
employers money and not serving your
clients, please consider coming to us.
'Cause if we get enough of you guys out
there, then we can drop it to forty-five.
And gals.
That's right.
Um, let's not, let's not
forget the gals areâ¦
We- the- That's the majority of our
team ⦠we-- And they run our firm.
Yeah.
We have Brooke is running the,
the tax firm side of the firm.
Pippa runs the office,
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
And we just- We just
show up ⦠we show up.
Mike Pine: show up.
Well, yeah.
Kevin Schneider: Well,
yeah, thanks for joining.
If you, if this sounds interesting,
go to Revo Taxpayer/careers.
Uh, you'll see our open positions there.
You can apply directly on our website
and we'll have a conversation.
Mike Pine: we'll have a conversation.
Um,
Kevin Schneider: but yeah, please like,
comment, and subscribe, and we'll see you
next time on the Hidden Money Podcast.
Thank you.
Thank you for listening to this episode.
Revo Taxpayer Advocacy LLC is not licensed
or registered as a CPA firm with the
Texas State Board of Public Accountancy.
I'm a CPA, Kevin's a CPA.
We have a lot of CPAs on staff that are
licensed and held to the same standards.
However, when we decided to be
revolutionary and change our
name to Revell Taxpayer Advocacy,
the state board would not allow
that and let us remain licensed.
They say we have to have one
of our names in the firm for
us to be licensed as a firm.
And guess what?
It's not us that's important.
It's revolutionizing the way you feel
about taxes and saving you money.
We are advocates for you, so we were
willing to drop our firm license even
though we're still individually licensed.