5 Things You Should Ask Your Accountant

In an ideal situation, you and your accountant would be more than just "boss" and "client"

With your combined expertise, skills, and shared mission, you're more like strategic partners.

Strong communication is key in any partnership. At your next meeting, be sure to ask your accountant these five questions:

1. How would you assess our financial performance this month/quarter/year?

It's a part of your accountant's job to keep your financial information & reporting current. This includes the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and a Statement of Cash Flows.

Some business owners, especially those who lack a financial background/skills - may only want to know the basics and in the most simple terms. It's important to let your accountant know that you would like a more thorough breakdown and analysis of your books. Maybe even setting up monthly or quarterly financial anaylsis calls if that's not something you're already doing.

Ask for KPI's(Key performance indicators) relevant to your industry and important key ratios such as: Debt to Equity, Profit margin, and Quick Ratio. In addition, asking for financial data in a monthly comparison format is also helpful. These will help to draw comparisons with your past performance and with competitors in your industry.

Having these thorough financial conversations also usually leads to interesting & creative ideas for businesses.

2. Have you noticed any opportunities for cost savings?

Your accountant enters the transactional data, get's that data in a reportable format, and analyzes your monthly, quarterly, or annual financials. Therefore, other than you, they're the leading experts on your expenses

You might have a subscription that is no longer used or there might be a cheaper service that you could be using for the same value. Unless you're looking at the details consistently, it's tough to notice those types of cost opportunities.

Asking your accountant if there is room for cost savings could be a smart move for your business.

3. How can you assist me with growing my business?

As your accounting professional and partner, your accountant should be able to offer up growth advice for your business.

Scaling a business is tough because it requires keeping current clients/customers at a similar level of service while growing and adapting to bring in a larger volume of customers by bringing on new staff and/or new systems.

Your financial management process & software might need an upgrade as your business grows. This is a part of the business lifecycle for many businesses. This can mean hiring additional finance and accounting help and/or upgrading to a larger enterprise system.

Ask your accountant how you can work together to best facilitate pain-free, smooth growth with minimal distruption to your operations. It also makes sense to also ask for tips on how to scale based on their experience with other similar sized clients.

4. What are some things your other successful clients are doing?

If you're outsourcing your accounting, chances are your accountant serves a number of different clients. Therefore, likely knowing the processes & inner workings for both thriving and struggling companies.

If you're not asking your accountant about client success strories you could be missing out on some good opportunities for your business. Even if the business is in a different industry completely, there's a lot of value in learning what yielded such impressive results.

Alternatively, it might also be a good idea to ask your accountant what other client's have faced similar challenges to your own so that they might help you brainstorm some solutions.

5. Are there any applications or software that could make our jobs easier?

Like most fields over the last decade, accounting has rapidly become more and more efficient and automated.

Good accountants are up-to-date on the newest technologies & processes for their clients and could be a great resource for implementing positive technological change

Ask your accountant if they see any room for improvement in your tech stack. There is an app for everything these days.

Final Thoughts

Your accountant can be an incredibly valuable resource to your business & not just at tax time. It's important to set up at least quarterly financial check-in's so that you're making informed business decisions & moving your business in the right direction. Ask your accountant these important 5 questions at your next meeting.

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