by Rob Pillans | Dec 10, 2019 | Articles
I love the end of a calendar year. It is a time for family Christmas celebrations. It’s summer and there are some extra holidays to be had. There is generally a positive vibe in the community. These are all good things, but perhaps the thing I like most about the end...
by Rob Pillans | Oct 29, 2019 | Articles
I graduated from the Company Directors course in 2007 when I was the General Manager of Pitcher Partners Sydney. It helped me quite a bit in my role which had significant interaction with the 18 directors of the firm. In keeping with my life long learning ethos, I...
by Rob Pillans | Oct 29, 2019 | Articles, Leadership
I recently watched a video of Ken Blanchard and Simon Sinek on stage together talking about leadership. They were primarily answering questions from the local audience and I thought there were a few gems in their answers. For those not familiar with these two...
by Rob Pillans | Oct 29, 2019 | Accounting Firm Management, Articles, Business Strategy
I was listening to a podcast from the USA which was an interview of the founder of a successful small firm in the USA. One of the things this firm does is weekly billing for its virtual CFO service clients. This is the first time I have heard of weekly billing but as...
by Rob Pillans | Sep 24, 2019 | Articles, Book Reviews
As part of building my time management (managing yourself and your priorities) workshops I spent over 100 hours researching best practice. One of the many books, articles and research papers I read was a book by American computer science Professor Cal Newport. His...
by Rob Pillans | Sep 24, 2019 | Articles, Payroll
I was prompted to think more about this by a report that a few weeks out from the deadline for the adoption of Single Touch Payroll 50% of businesses are yet to register! Some firms have been providing payroll services to clients for many years. Some have concluded it...
by Rob Pillans | Sep 24, 2019 | Articles, Events
I attended the two days of Xero’s annual conference on 4 and 5 September. I did not make it to the wrap party so can’t comment on that. There was less hype this year compared to last year. It seemed a bit calmer and reflects, I believe, the growing maturity of Xero as...
by Rob Pillans | Sep 11, 2019 | Accounting Firm Management, Articles, Leadership
As an accounting firm coach, mentor and consultant I am in and out of firms pretty much every day. One of the things I have observed is the critical role of the manager in successful firms. Here are nine skills I reckon great managers inside accounting and advisory...
by Rob Pillans | Jul 22, 2019 | Articles, Training
As an accounting firm coach, mentor and consultant I get to see inside a lot of accounting firms. I get to see a lot of stuff that works and a lot that does not. In the area of learning and development, or training as some may call it, I’ve concluded that there are...
by Rob Pillans | Jul 22, 2019 | Articles, Business Strategy
I attended the AICPA Engage conference in Las Vegas from Monday 10 June to Thursday 13 June. The conference offered hundreds of sessions across technical and non-technical topics and was attended by about 4,000 accountants, mostly from the USA. I attended two sessions...
