Transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio for the authoritative record.
Ed Davis (00:09):
Well, first I'd say in our industry, I think we have a great industry. There's a lot of great firms out there. And so to say what sets us apart, everybody wants to say, well, we give great client service, we do this, we do that. Most firms do that, and everybody's intentional about doing that. So it's what can you do above and beyond to make your team better so that we want to have some consistency within the service teams. We want to have consistency on how we're doing things. And what I would say, what sets us apart is a little bit is the Ascend platform that we joined because they're investing a lot in our m and a technology, our technology stack. They handle a lot of the recruiting, the hr, the accounting side of things. We can really focus on what makes us great CPAs to begin with.
(00:56):
We like client service, we like to work with our clients. And so we're able to do that and spend more time on that. And we have a great operations team that they've put together. Our new CEO Fong mayor is doing a great job. It's very strategic, very operationally driven, so she's doing a really good job, much better than I did before, and I'm doing a great job on client service. Again, it's something that I really love. So I think those things in our culture and keeping living our core values is what really drives us and keeps us apart.
(01:31):
As you grow, there's lots of pressures and the two biggest pressures I think are on the staff and the clients and the staff is going to say, oh God, we're growing. They're going to want me to work even more and this, that, and the other. And we don't really want that. We want to give opportunity. And when you grow, so if you keep your culture, you stick to your core values, you have lots of open and honest discussion with your team to service them well. Because I think as our team, as one of our constituencies that we got to serve and we want them to be in the game and all is on board looking forward to the opportunities that are coming. And then likewise with clients, you've got to be communicating with them and servicing them well so that they see what's happening with the growth. And it's not always because the question you always get is, oh God, fees are going to go up, and there's going to be a little bit of that because there's always fee pressure to go up as our costs are going up. But you want to make sure you're servicing them well so that they buy into the culture that you're bringing to the table.