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Ep: 45 Top experts answer: "What could the tech/software vendors do better to serve accountants?"
The Accounting Answers Podcast, hosted by Rob Brown, asks critical questions of the experts, leaders and influencers who shape the decision-making of accountants, CPAs and finance professionals. Today we ask:
What could the tech/software vendors do better to serve accountants?
You'll hear insightful and passionate answers from these 5 experts and influencers:
Arun Mehra | CEO of Samera Global, helping accountants build a global firm
Ashley Leeds | 15 minute guy teaching LinkedIn in 15 Minutes a Day
Becky Glover | Award winning Finance Director, board member and business leader
Ben Richmond | Chartered accountant and U.S. country manager at Xero
Blake Oliver | Founder of Earmark, where accountants earn CPE for podcasts
Tune into more on this daily show for short, sharp episodes that keep you informed of what's happening in the accounting world and the whole ecosystem of consultants, organizations, vendors and advisors who serve them.
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Brought to you by Rightworks, the ACCOUNTING ANSWERS PODCAST is hosted by Rob Brown, co-founder of the Accounting Influencers Roundtable (AIR).
On this weekly show with short, sharp episodes, Rob asks 110 experts and influencers the critical questions shaping the accounting profession. It keeps you informed of what's happening in the accounting world and the whole ecosystem of consultants, organizations, vendors and advisors who serve them.
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Host Rob Brown is a renowned presenter, facilitator and chair of high-level conferences, panels and events globally for the accounting and fintech profession. He is retained by many professional networks, alliances, associations, practices and vendors to chair their events and provide high-level interview content for their communities. He is a dynamic speaker and accomplished expert on trust, reputation, employer brand, talent, career development, succession, gen z/generations, employee advocacy and executive presence. https://www.linkedin.com/in/therobbrown/
Rob is author of the bestselling book Build Your Reputation (Wiley) and his TEDx talk ‘The Personal Brand of You’ has been viewed over 300,000 times on YouTube. He is a stroke survivor, has epilepsy, is a committed Christian and has a black belt in kickboxing. He is based in Nottingham UK, home of Robin Hood, plays chess and backgammon, loves orange chocolate and is allergic to grapefruit.
https://www.linkedin.com/company/accountinginfluencers
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Rob Brown: The future of
accountant, isn't just about
numbers and financial statements.
It's about empowering businesses to make
informed decisions, navigate complex
challenges, achieve their financial goals.
And everyone recognized that Kansans
are at the heart of this and must become
trusted partners with business acumen
expertise in data analytics, storytelling,
strategic guidance, taking the clients
towards success and whatever your role
is in this ecosystem, you need to stay
ahead of the curve to stay relevant.
And that's why this accounting
answers podcast was conceived to
keep you informed and competitive.
I'm your host, Rob brown, and
I've interviewed 111 accounting
experts, leaders, advisors, vendors,
and influencers in the last few
months and collected for you the
very best and latest thinking on
what works and what is coming up.
And this week, they show 10 to 15
minutes gets you the low down on
what matters today in the rapidly
evolving accounting landscape.
And the professional is shed
in its traditional image of
number crunching, embracing a
bold new future data technology,
strategic guidance, reign Supreme.
I've asked the same five questions
throughout covering the next
generation of accountants.
The proactive advice they need to be
given the drivers have changed the
role of tech and software vendors
post the best predictions for the
next few years, let's get started and
hear what our experts have to say.
We've been focusing all
this week on the question.
What could the tech software vendors
do better to serve accountants?
The answers you hear covered?
The vendor accountant relationship and the
needs of accountants that are not being
addressed by current accounting software.
How could this software be more
user-friendly and intuitive for
accountants and their clients?
How is AI playing its part in the
evolution of the accounting role,
all these aspects and more come out.
As we check out the answers
of our resident experts.
Chairman the thoughts?
No.
Is I ruined Mira CEO of Samira global,
dedicated to Albin accountants build
and scale their films on a global scale.
With strategic advice and insights
into international markets.
Arun Mehra: Yeah, that's a difficult one.
I think we're, we're thrown so much
tech us over the last few years, every
week, there's a new bit of tech and a
new provider of something or another.
And hands off.
I'm guilty of kind of being one of
those people who are guinea pig.
We all try the new thing and then
realize, Oh my God, what am I doing?
I'm just creating more
headaches for myself.
So I think the tech vendors
have to ease the information
out and a more managed manner.
I think at the same time.
They have to, communicate the
benefits of their software.
So what I mean by that, like, I know
certain software providers, they're
always evolving their technology, but
half the things I'm not even aware about.
So they need to be doing more
training to, to their accountants.
It's all well and good
watching a YouTube video, but.
That's all well and good, but there's,
there's not enough input and we don't
really, I know in my firm, I'm sure
we're only using like 30 percent of
the power of the software that's there.
So I think they need
to do that much better.
because a lot of the software is all
comparable now, and I think their
challenge will be, they've spent all
these development costs and they obviously
want to charge for this on a monthly fee,
but there are always other vendors out
there who are going to undercut them.
So.
I think the real benefit, the
ones that will succeed will be the
ones that train their clients, i.
e.
ourselves, train the accountants much,
much better, and they provide that as
part of their whole package, and it's,
just makes them, stands them out in
a different, amongst everyone else.
I think that's, the real difference.
Next we welcome.
Ashley leads known as the 15
minute guy teaching professionals.
How to leverage LinkedIn effectively
in just 15 minutes a day to grow their
network and business opportunities.
Ashley Leeds: This is a great question.
It's all about education.
It's all about showing the
masses of what can be achieved.
I think the thing is with accountants,
um, I can say this because I've been
working with them for over 16 years.
They know what they know,
they like what they like, and
it's very difficult to change.
out of out of the habit that you've got
into because your practice is working.
But if we don't change, we're
going to become dinosaurs.
We've got to move with the times.
We've got to adopt all these things.
And I think because we're in the position
of seeing what's going on, we're seeing
the cream, we're seeing the technology.
Lovers move faster and do things.
And I think it's, down to, us and
the vendors and everybody else in
the industry to start educating and
helping them, giving them some guidance,
pointing them in the right direction
and just, you know, helping them.
And I think the software vendors
need to be talking a lot more to
each other and opening up their APIs
so that we can make things just.
Move together and start thinking
of coming up with communities.
there's some great software vendors out
there that have got a lovely community
and people are going into Facebook groups
and, and talking to the, the owners, the
developers of the software to actually
say, look, this is where we want it to go.
And all these different ideas are coming
up, you know, in this big think tank
that years ago that never happened.
And I worked for a software
company, back in 2007.
And, We just did what we thought we
weren't listening to our customers and
today the opportunities are great for
those software vendors to actually open up
and let people tell them what they want.
And the benefit of all of this means that
we're going to have accountants doing
better things, getting better clients,
getting staff to come and work for them
because they're working in an environment
that is exciting and cutting edge.
And it just makes it
a little bit more fun.
And at the end of the day, the clients are
going to be served an awful lot better.
And I don't think accountants are
going to be hating December anymore
or January for that matter, because
they're going to have the team and the.
The success that all of the
software is going to give them
Next we hear the perspective of
Becky Glover and a woodwind and
finance director, board member, and
business leader, renowned for her
strategic financial leadership and
commitment to driving business success.
Becky Glover: Yeah, so something
that really gets to me is
technology can do a lot of data.
So it's a lot of data, it's
all stored in one place.
Yes, that's amazing.
What I really want, and it's
coming but it's not there yet,
is more beautiful visualizations.
Because a lot of the things that
accountants do, yes, it's data,
it's collecting it, But then it's
having to translate that data to
the CEO, for example, and say,
this is what I'm seeing now.
This is what's happened, and this
is where I think we're going to go.
So these are the projections.
But if we can do that with beautiful
graphs, or it might be any kind
of visualization, it makes things
a lot easier for people that
aren't financially trained to see.
So I think that's something that
tech really needs to work on is
just a push of a button or a drag
and a drop, something really easy.
So you can manipulate that data
and make it beautiful for lots of
different people to view it in.
I think it's a, it's a big problem
because a lot of the technologies
are like, you know, we're plug and
play just put us in and then all
of your problems will be solved.
And it seems like there's
a lot of softwares that
seemingly do the same thing.
So why should I pick
this one over this one?
and I think there's a lot of training
for accountants for the debits and the
credits and the IFRSs, but there's
very minimal training that comes with
here's how to use your new software.
So yeah, and I think that does roll
into again, if you're talking about
technology, AI, automation, those
sort of bigger picture stuff, we're
not having enough training on how
to use them and how to prompt them.
So again, if we can get better
training there, it will make the
outputs hell of a lot better.
Next please welcome Ben Richmond, a
chartered accountant and us country
manager at zero, where he leads
initiatives to empower small businesses
and accountants with innovative
cloud-based accounting software.
Ben Richmond: Yeah, this is a
great question for me, obviously,
coming from my position at Xero.
Um, but it's one I take very seriously.
Look, and I've been critical of ourselves,
and I've been critical of others as well.
You've got to meet.
Accountants and bookkeepers and
small business where they are today.
So as the technology's gotten
faster, it feels like every vendor,
and we at Xero being guilty of this
as well, we're trying to portray
ourselves as the most innovative.
We're trying to paint the, the next,
the next future thing, you know,
and we've got to take it back to.
Let's make sure we help them put
wheels on their suitcase before
we put them on the plane to Mars.
because we're often scaring them,
you know, like driving change
through fear is not the right way.
And so what I really encourage
people for the vendors to do,
including us, take a step back.
Realize what's needed at the time.
Realize, you know, be consultative
with your partners, be strategic and
excite them with what those imminent
possibilities are, break it down to how
they're going to do it and you show them
what's further down the line, but bring
that back to like where they're at today
and how you take them on that journey.
And I think the other thing is
to remember, like we love growth
and lots of people love growth.
But not every accountant or
bookkeeper you're working with
is going to be growth obsessed.
So what's important to them is a timeout
with their family, being able to work
from the beach for the long weekend.
And actually technology
is going to enable that.
And so I think us really understanding
what's important to them, what are
they trying to drive and bringing what
you can do in alongside that journey.
So show them the way, don't scare them and
excite them versus driving through fear.
Diving into the conversation now is Blake
Oliver, founder of EMR, where accounted
10 CPE for listening to podcasts.
Blended education with entertainment
to support the accounting
professions, continuous learning.
Blake Oliver: So when it comes to
vendors in the accounting space,
the biggest challenge is just lack
of integration, interoperability.
It's really hard to connect apps and
to automate the flow of data when.
You have when you don't even have APIs,
when you don't have a way to move the data
around, AI is going to help with that.
I think we're going to get
more and more of these macro
type tools inside of windows.
third party add ons that will be
able to move the mouse and click
around and type on the keyboard.
We've called this robotic
process automation.
It's only been available to enterprises,
big companies for a long time.
And I think AI is going to help
bring that to more and more
small and mid sized businesses.
but.
We really still need vendors to build
connections at the very least, build
a connection to Zapier or some similar
API tool so that we can then connect
whatever your app does to thousands
of other apps that we may be using.
that's the biggest barrier,
especially in the world of tax.
It just shocks me how.
Old school these apps are, and how
there's no way to connect, say my
proposal management software to my
tax software to say, create a new
engagement or to get that data out of
the previous year into something where I
can populate a client organizer online.
Like this is, this is
really basic and it just.
It's kind of a shame, honestly, that
the vendors have been so complacent in
that space that they haven't done it.
So, I, I really encourage them to do
that because I think those that do will
have a huge advantage in the future.
and vendors that don't make this change,
I think will be at risk of disruption.
And this is something that we've seen.
Over the decades, uh, since
the computer revolution is that
companies get really complacent.
Uh, just look at Google, for
instance, Google's an amazing company.
80 percent of their revenue or more
is still from traditional search.
And that is all being disrupted by AI.
And now they are playing catch
up because they got complacent.
They, they owned the market, and the same
thing could happen to these other vendors
in the accounting space, just because
you've got most of the market for tax
prep now doesn't mean that in five years
you will, because some disruption could
come along, and AI could enable a startup
to create a very sophisticated tax prep
program that would have taken hundreds
of millions of dollars to do before.
So those barriers are coming down and,
and these vendors need to wake up.
Microphone (TONOR TC30 Audio Device)-2:
So they have five grand
answer to the question.
What could the tech and software vendors
do better to serve accountants each
work in depth that week, Monday through
Friday, we give you the insights of five
top influencers in the accounting world.
On this critical area of the
tech providers, software vendors
and how they serve accountants.
That's 25 valuable perspectives,
viewpoints and best thinking every week.
And with each fresh week comes a
fresh question and more thoughts
from the best accounting leaders
and influences we can find.
Thanks for listening to this brand
new accounting answers podcast.
And sharing the show with your friends.
If you want to join the conversation,
you can plug into our community of
implementers@accountinginfluencers.com
and check out our virtual
speed networking events.
These happen every few months
for the north American region
and the UK Europe region.
The great opportunities to raise your
profile, build valuable connections and
share your thoughts with influential
peers until next time, this is your host.
Rob brown, saying stay informed,
stay relevant and stay connected.