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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 09/04/2008
Barely a week goes by without at least 2 or 3 people asking me how best they can develop relationships with accountants. Some are new to the market place, some have struggled to get it 'right' and some have simply recognised how well connected accountants are to their target audience. Others simply have a service or product that is well suited to the accountanct marketplace. Before sharting some of...
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Chanel News Asia (Free subscription) | 09/04/2008
SINGAPORE: Prison inmates and ex-offenders will take the stage this Saturday, alongside local celebrities like Dick Lee, Tan Kheng Hua and Mark Lee for the annual Yellow Ribbon Concert. Taiwanese singer Emil Chau will also be joining them.
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/24/2008
Most professional service firms are justly proud of their partners' technical skills. It is also common to find that firms undervalue the importance of ensuring that partners and prospective partners have all the business skills they require to be profitable in the short-term and valuable in the longer-term. At best only lip-service is paid to the development of partners' non-technical skills. And...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/21/2008
I can appreciate and enjoy a clever marketing campaign as much as the next man. On the other hand I hate those adverts that intentionally mislead and imply all sorts of promises that cannot be met. Such adverts often target our deepest desires and catch out many innocent trusting people. I recently became aware of yet another tax book aimed at the small business owner and being promoted through a series...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/20/2008
I've heard plenty of stories about great accountants in the past and quite a few horror stories. Whilst I can't promise an award for the best worst story I will gladly send all contributors a free copy of my Insiders guide to Finding and Choosing Accountants and Tax Advisers . Just add the word FACATA to your post. Ok - let's have your stories and anecdotes please - what have you got to get off your...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/18/2008
Over the last couple of years I must have received dozens of invitations to join different online 'social' networks, business networks and online communities. Some I join, some I don't. Some appear to have already gained a degree of momentum, others are newer and have yet to engage large numbers of members. They each have one or two distinguishing features. Some purport to have a real business networking...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/12/2008
According to recent research, the most valued service required from accountants is 'tax planning'. In my experience what most clients want is to be confident that their accountant has paid for themselves and reduced the tax bills otherwise payable. It's also important for accountants to provide clients with peace of mind and to inspire trust and confidence so that clients don't have to worry about...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/07/2008
Many accountants (but not all) know a great deal about tax. Most are well experienced in dealing with all of the day to day issues that affect their clients. I must stress though that you should not expect any one accountant to know everything about our complex and rapidly expanding tax system. Having said that, most accountants can advise on a wide range of the tax issues that clients raise with them....
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 08/05/2008
I was recently asked if I was the same Mark Lee who asserted that there were four essential elements to service excellence: consistency, attentiveness, recoverability and continuous evaluation. Now this may confuse the search engines but that Mark Lee (no relation) is a past President of Singapore Airlines. He is reported to have conducted an exhaustive study in the early 90s to determine the factors...
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Christian Music Fan (Free subscription) | 07/29/2008
If you didn’t catch it the first time we talked about it, tonight is the night that Third Day will be performing and promoting their new album “Revelation” which released today. Cool stuff for the guys in the band, their fans and Christian Music in general. Mark Lee is blogging about the experience on the [...]
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 07/23/2008
I'm updating an ebook I wrote a couple of years ago to help people find and choose an accountant. Earlier today this prompted me to post a separate blog: Two BIG misconceptions about accountants I thought I'd just be updating the original copy and adding in the results of some research. But you know what it's like. New ideas flow and I've been adding them in quite happily. One section lists all of...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 07/23/2008
I'm updating an ebook I wrote a couple of years ago to help people find and choose an accountant. I've just added the following to the introduction as I think both points are worth clarifying at the outset. 1 - Anyone can call themselves an accountant. That's right. Anyone. It's not like Solicitor, Doctor, Veterinary Surgeon or any of the other professions where the law restricts who can use the term....
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 07/21/2008
I posted the original version of this item on my blog for ambitious accountants . When looking for this week's posting for Ecademy I thought I'd adapt it for wider interest. In some respects it is a natural follow up to last week's posting here: "It's more important to be different than to be better" , which sparked a lively debate. I finished that post with a question: Can you express the REAL differences...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 07/14/2008
Recently I spoke at the CIMA members in practice annual conference about 'Making more profits from your tax work - without fancy tax schemes '. One of the other speakers was addressing related issues and stated that: "It's more important to be different than it is to be better" It struck me that this reinforces a similar point I have been making in various posts on my blog recently: Is the way you...
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Ecademy: user blogs (Free subscription) | 07/08/2008
At the recent CIMA members in practice annual conference at which I spoke recently I heard about a survey in which a group of accountants were asked what they thought their clients most wanted from their accountant. The top three answers from the accountants were: Quality, Reputation and Expertise Clients of these same accountants were then apparently asked what they cared about. Their answers were:...
