I hope you enjoyed last week’s conversation about re-booting your practice. Yes, sometimes it’s easier to work with what you have rather than invest the time and effort into starting over. But is that your long-term solution?

On to this week. I get a ton of questions asking what it’s like to be a sole practitioner. Couple that with the fact that our profession requires us to always assess risk. So, is it less risky to be practicing solo or to be part of a firm? Here’s my take, which focuses on one factor – your skills.

And if you’re new here, welcome aboard. This is what we do!

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Recently, I listened to a podcast interview with Daniel Pink. Among his many credits (aid to Labor Secretary Robert Reich, speechwriter for Vice President Al Gore, five times New York Times best-selling author), Pink wrote the iconical “Free Agent Nation” article that appeared in the January 1998 issue of Fast Company. His article was teed up for success by Tom Peter’s article, “A Brand Called You,” which appeared five months earlier in the same magazine.

With the rise concurrent of the Internet, one could argue these two articles really set off the trend in self-employment. I mean, for those who remember, being self-employed before that time was often code for “recently laid off or fired – and looking for a job.”

But what Pink’s interview makes abundantly clear is that, today, self-employment is mostly a privilege for the talented.

Meaning, do we have skills (BVFLS or otherwise) that are in demand? Talents that are valued by our marketplace? If yes, we have a choice about being a W-2 employee or a 1099 free agent. If no, we don’t. It’s that simple. Here’s why.

If we have valuable skills, why would we want to attach our fortunes to an employer when we could spread our risk among multiple clients and customers? Yes, we’re out there … on our own. But with our in-demand skills, we have the talent and drive to be successful.

If we don’t have valuable skills … we’re in a world of hurt. There is no W-2/1099 choice. We’ll need to stay W-2 employees to mitigate the risk that we likely wouldn’t survive (long) as a free agent. We’ll need a company to take care of us for as long it’s willing. Or able.

Here is an acid test to assess our skills. How confident are we – REALLY – in our talents? Do we – REALLY – have the discipline for life-long learning? Then, long-term, who do we – REALLY – want to shoulder the risk of our work (gainful employment) and life (retirement plans) … ourselves or an employer?

I’ve had the privilege of interviewing 20+ professionals in my Practicing Solo column for NACVA’s The Value Examiner. For what it’s worth, most felt that their only regret about going solo was not doing it sooner. Certainly, something to think about.

So what

We love to talk about risk – risk management, risk-adjusted returns, holding period risk, risk this, risk that. But it’s always in the context of someone else’s risk … the risk belonging to that ephemeral “subject company” or “subject interest.” What about in the context of our own personal risk?

In real life

I think the lesson here is to be motivated to continually “sharpen the saw,” as Stephen Covey said. It’s a call to action to make sure we always have skills that are in demand whether we’re solos now or want to be prepared for that possibility in the future … just in case.

Cheers!

 

 

 

Action Items:

– If you like what I write about, tell a colleague.

– If something resonates and you want to reach out directly, email me.

– If you think we share common interests, connect with me on LinkedIn.

– If you want a sense of how well your practice is working for you, take this Practice Self Assessment.

I hope you enjoyed last week’s conversation about grooming your practice for the little details that make you look like you care about how you present yourself. I got quite a bit of email feedback, mostly from people asking me how to make more radical changes. Like starting over.

So onto this week. Maybe your practice needs more than just a little grooming. Maybe a mulligan, a full-on do-over, is in order. What if you need to start over? How do you go about that? Will it hurt?

And if you’re new here, welcome aboard. This is what we do!

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My first thought for the people who reached out to me about starting over is simply this: Do you need to? Or do you need to do a better job of executing your current business plan? If that is the case, please call me. I can help.

Assuming that is not the case, read on.

If you wanted to … needed to … HAD TO start your practice over, what would you do? Well, start by visualizing this: If you had the ability to redesign your practice what it would look like?

I am running into this as we speak, because of my own self-imposed reboot from a gift/estate tax valuation practice to a transition planning practice. Yep, I’m jumping on THAT bandwagon.

So, first question: If you wanted to start your practice over, pivot, what would you do differently?

And, second question: Since you likely know the answer to the first question, why aren’t you doing it?

I can probably guess at the reasons: There would be so much work to do. You’d have to plan. Make decisions. Invest time and money. And you’ve already invested so much time and money.

Or what if you did scrap everything that you worked so hard to build only to later realize it was all a big mistake? That you made the wrong choice and should have stuck with what you had? Crap!

Start over? Forget it … even if your current practice and service offerings aren’t generating the kind of clients and amount of revenues you were hoping for. It’s easier to tread the familiar path you’ve been on rather than blaze a new trail.

These are rational thoughts. Trust me, I was thinking the same things when I started planning my practice makeover. But as I thought about the reasons I called “bullshit” on myself when I realized I was just making excuses. My first tangible step in the new direction was to create a new website (www.rodburkert.com).

So, indulge me.

Imagine, after reading this email, that you close your office door and begin the process of outlining what your new practice would look like.

First, realize that you would not be starting from scratch. You’ve got experience. You’ve seen how other people created and marketed their practices. You’ve got your own ideas stirring in your mind about what you would do … if or when. So no one is really starting from scratch.

Imagine, then, that your goal is to build the 2.0 version of what your practice would look like. What does success look like to you?

It’s gonna be personal – what you do, how we do it, why you do it (and, as it is for me, even where we do it). Because there really is no one “best” practice. Just the one that is best for you. Jeez, when you look at it in these terms, starting over sounds like something you should want to do, right?

Imagine that your only job for the next few weeks is to think about giving your practice a completely fresh start. What would you do if you could do anything you pleased?

Is your firm a flourishing boutique practice or a growing, diversified regional practice? Who are your aspirational clients, the kind you want to work for and with? Do you see yourself in a different role? More of a technician or more in business development? Can you create a practice around your life, rather than a life around your practice?

So what

You can start over. It’s possible. You don’t have to, of course, and starting over might not be the right idea for some people. But there’s no good reason why you can’t. There’s no rule that says you have to stick with what you have.

If you’re always tinkering away at a practice that isn’t working as well as you hoped, starting over may be a good idea. Think of the reason it would give you to reach out to all of your current and potential prospects, client, and referral sources to announce the change.

In real life

If you have a long list of to-dos and changes you’ve always wanted to make, but never seem to get around to it, maybe this is the right choice. If you haven’t made a change in five years, maybe now is the time. When we were kids, we called it a do-over. And no one cared.

If you’ve been wishing for months that you could just … well, start over (but not really from scratch) … maybe this is the day you do. You could set aside the time to do this. You could map out a new and improved version. You could begin anew.

Nike probably has the best answer: Just Do It.

The question is … will you?

Cheers!

 

 

 

Action Items:

– If you like what I write about, tell a colleague.

– If something resonates and you want to reach out directly, email me.

– If you think we share common interests, connect with me on LinkedIn.

– If you want a sense of how well your practice is working for you, take this Practice Self Assessment.