True accounting firm transformation isn’t just about the numbers; it’s about a fundamental shift in your mindset and how you operate, which is exactly what Debbie Snelling experienced. In this revealing case study, we hear from Debbie, the owner of North Georgia Tax Solutions and a former tax director for a publicly traded company, as she shares her powerful journey. Debbie candidly discusses how she moved from resenting her business and struggling with burnout to experiencing significant financial growth and a newfound joy in her work. She opens up about overcoming skepticism, addressing her anger, and implementing practical strategies like raising prices, improving her sales process, and setting crucial boundaries. This led to a remarkable turnaround, adding over $50,000 in revenue and creating a more fulfilling work environment. If you’re an accounting, tax, or bookkeeping firm owner feeling overwhelmed and ready for a real change—one that addresses both your business and your well-being—Debbie’s story will offer valuable insights and inspiration.
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Listen to the podcast here
Episode 161 | Case Study | From Resentful To Life-Changing: How Debbie Snelling Let Go Of Anger And Added $50K In Revenue
From Skeptic To Superstar: Debbie’s Journey Into Tax Solutions
Welcome to the show. We have a very special guest, and our special guest is a client of ours here at the show who is a former tax director for a publicly traded company. She brings a deep understanding of the tax code and complexities and opportunities to her clients and her strategic approach to tax planning has consistently generated significant savings for our clients, saving them tens of thousands of dollars annually. Beyond her technical expertise, she values innovation and creativity in business, and her creativity shines in problem-solving and finding unique ways to enhance clients’ financial success.
She’s also a visionary who helps clients navigate challenges to achieve their goals. Before we welcome our special guests to the show, if you are an accounting, tax, or bookkeeping firm owner and you are drowning in low-value work or dreading another busy season because it means long nights, endless emails, and barely any time for your family. Maybe you’re just constantly stressed, exhausted, and wondering if this is just how things are supposed to be. The truth is, none of that is the problem.
The real problem is you don’t have a system to convert clients, the ideal ones, maximize revenue, and gain back your time and freedom. Here at the show, I’ll show you the exact system that’s helped hundreds of firm owners not only double their revenue, but eliminate AR and finally enjoy their firm again without working longer hours or chasing clients for paperwork. If you’re ready to stop trading time for dollars, go to TheAbundantCall.com and book your free strategy call. We’ll look at your current setup, uncover your biggest revenue blockers, and lay out a roadmap to create the firm you’ve always dreamt of.
If we vibe, great. We can talk about how to implement what we’re talking about and the possibilities of working together. If not, we’ll part as friends, and maybe you can send us a few referrals on our way. Win-win. You have nothing to lose. The only thing is that you’ve got something to gain to make a change. Head on over to TheAbundantCall.com and grab your spot before it’s gone. Now let’s welcome our very special guest, Debbie Snelling, to the show.
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Welcome, Debbie, to the show.
Excited to be here.
I am so excited for you to be here because 3 to 6 times a year, I love to have superstar clients like you come to the show and share about your experience of what it’s been working with us, how maybe your life has changed and shifted, maybe about your mindset and other things to help other firm owners know that transformation and change is possible.
I’m very excited for you to be here because I think I’ve helped you gain above probably $50,000 of where you were about a year ago. You have calmed a lot down. You love touchy-feely stuff. Everyone’s out there with skepticism about what’s happening probably in the world, the country, the economy, their business, or even just coaches like me. I think maybe you were even a little skeptical in the beginning. Skepticism’s great. It definitely can be a hiding place.
Hopefully, for those listening, by the end of our conversation, you’ll quickly realize how you can grow your firm, just like Debbie has, and make these changes to the key principles that I truly believe are the foundation of having a successful firm. We have our technical skills, but Debbie, we consider these more of our soft skills. First off, let me tell you about Debbie. I think it’d be more fun, Debbie, if you share a little bit about yourself, real quick, and where your firm’s located and what you focus on in your firm.
We are in North Georgia. The firm name is North Georgia Tax Solutions. We have three locations and starting in the metro Atlanta area. About 20 miles north of metro Atlanta. We have an office in Woodstock, and then about 40 miles north of there. Another office in Jasper, and then about 60 miles north of there. An office in Blairsville that’s known, maybe 15 to 20 minutes from the North Carolina border. Our technology requires us to have to be able to work remotely, no matter where you are. Each member of our staff is able to work from home or in the office. Most of them work in the office unless where they’re sick.
We have a big policy. Don’t come to work if you’re sick, because then you’re all sick. My background is 40 years of accounting and tax. Started in accounting. I’m actually backwards from every other accountant. Got out of university knowing I didn’t belong in public accounting. Got a job in the oil and gas industry as an international accountant. I did an internal audit and then moved to Atlanta, where I had a business that was my first entrepreneurial venture that failed, and I had to go take a job in public accounting.
Where you didn’t belong.
It’s a small firm with big clients. Hooters America and Eastern Foods are naturally fresh. That’s when I first started doing taxes, and then went out on my own again because I am an entrepreneur, and then had a family member move in with us. I started doing corporate contracting work and became the director of tax for a publicly traded company, and spent another ten years or so in corporate, and then went back out on my own again. I am an entrepreneur at heart. This is where I belong. I absolutely did not believe in coaches until, frankly, you.
Accounting Firm Transformation: Sports are a great way for children to learn about goals, teamwork, and the importance of working together. They learn how each team member plays a part in an organization, how to focus on a common goal, and how to motivate each other to accomplish it.
Sure, other firm owners are thinking the exact same thing. They all say the same thing, or they all promise the moon and the stars and the sky and the sun, and like, what’s different between all these coaches? I know you were a little different because you were an athlete. Tell us about those coaches.
In my youth, I was a pretty good athlete, and the coaches there were focused on goal setting. Each of the individual steps that it takes to get to a goal, and how the team has to work together to achieve that goal. Sports are honest to goodness. If you’ve got children, frankly, it’s a great way for your children to learn about goals and to learn about how each team member plays a part in an organization or on a team and the importance of being able to work together and focus on the common goal at hand and how to motivate each of those people to accomplish that goal. My soft skills, however, aren’t good.
Crushing Dormant Skills: Unlocking The Power Of Soft Skills
You thought they weren’t good, but they’re actually really good because when we met, you didn’t have a sales process. You were quoting fees. You tell me you can close, but you were failing to do so, and you had all these outstanding leads, and you thought that you just needed to replace yourself because you weren’t good at it. Fast forward a little bit, and I think that maybe now you realize that you are good at these soft skills. We needed to wake them up. They were dormant. They were sleeping. We just infused a little spice and woke them up. What do you think?
I think more than that. I think more than I had crushed them to the ground.
There you go.
The way that my mind works is very much about these are facts and based on the facts, we make decisions. As is true for me, pretty much in everything else in the universe, I am not like other people. Other people make decisions based upon emotion. I knew that people made decisions based upon fear, but I didn’t want to sell fear. Now I’m not selling fear. Now I’m telling people these are the problems that we help solve. We can make the fear go away. We can make you feel comfortable. We can make you feel happy. We can make you feel relaxed. You can go to bed at night and not worry about this. You can be at peace at one with the world. At one with the world.
When you first reached out to me, Debbie. Did you have anything else to say, though, about coaches? You weren’t really into coaching, getting a coach for your business?
Every coach I had ever met wasn’t so well, they all did promise the world, but truthfully, they didn’t have any real experience. They were just people who can do and those who cannot teach. They were teachers who didn’t have any real-life experience. Frankly, that’s part of where you excel is that you do have real-life experience and running your own business. It’s not about the theory. Theoretically, I know how to do open heart surgery, but practically speaking, you don’t want me anywhere near you.
I cannot do the technical side of your business, but I can sell any of your services, and I’ve done it for other firm owners. I had to prove it to myself. I was just doing another podcast on this exact topic, that with your clients, too, you want to be able to do and advise clients based on how you do for yourself. I coach you as I coach myself, and have proven to myself that I’ve done it. If you want to have a million-dollar business or more, yes, I can show you how to do that. I’ve already done that for myself. What you do for your clients, from the accounting and your 40-plus years of experience it’s different. I wasn’t one of those coaches where I cannot do so I’m going to teach it. This is what I actually can do, and I’m going to teach it. I’m glad you saw that.
It’s the gigantic difference. It’s the tweaks. It’s, “I’m doing this right and I’m doing that wrong.” You also requiring that we do the work ourselves, and then you tweak the work rather than saying, “Here’s how it’s done. Now you try.”
We have to create and learn a new skillset when it comes to enrollment. Maybe we’re jumping a little ahead because maybe we can share, and you can answer. What did you feel you were struggling with in your firm when we first met?
Breaking The Cash Flow Cycle: Raising Prices & Reaping Rewards
Cash flow is a gigantic problem. I knew what I needed to do. I knew what we were missing, and I couldn’t get there. The first thing I needed was additional revenue. Boom, we raised the prices. What a game changer that was.
Were you terrified, though, when you did that? I would say most firm owners like you’ve been in business so long, are scared to go through that process. We supported you and we helped you, and we walked through all the stuff that we talked about. You executed, and it worked. Maybe share a little bit more about that experience. Also, when you say you’re struggling with cash flow, from what I understand, you had to dip into lines of credit before, where this year you didn’t have to.
Establish boundaries with your clients and communicate those boundaries. Share on XThis was the first time in three years that I didn’t have to borrow money to get through December and January. We now have six figures in the bank for the first time ever. Now we know that there are going to be some slow months coming up, but we also know that with what you’ve taught that we’re going to have additional revenue streams coming in. Intellectually, I absolutely knew that I needed to raise prices. Intellectually, I absolutely knew that I could double my prices, lose half my business, and keep the same amount and make the same amount of revenue. Emotionally, as we go back to the stupid emotions.
Emotionally, I still had a mortgage to pay and I still had a payroll to make and I still had lots of other financial obligations, and it scared the bejeezy out of me to make that giant leap. It was a gigantic game-changer to raise prices. When we did so, we lost two clients. Who cares? Not that every client is not important, but you lost two. It’s why we have money in the bank. Frankly, it’s why I’ve now been able to hire a director of accounting who will completely get me out of operations, and I’ll be doing sales. Our next manager or next hire will be a salesperson. I’ll be completely C-suite. I’ll be completely chief executive officer, doing strategy or being the puppeteer pulling the strings.
I think that’s great. I know intellectually you did not sell at the right price before. I actually wrote that and circled it when we first spoke. Am I right? Do you remember that?
You’re absolutely right. Honestly, on every call, you say that to almost everybody. Everybody in our industry tends to undervalue what we do.
The Tipping Point: Finding Joy And Reclaiming Time
You have a mortgage, you have bills to pay, and to make a change and to do a change is terrifying. You didn’t make any changes for a few years. What was the tipping point for you to take that next step, enroll in our eight-week sales mastery course, and trust a coach? You’re skeptical about coaches and stuff like that before anyway. What was the tipping point?
Honestly, it was a personal thing. My husband had been caring for a family member and living with that family member, and that person had passed. He was back home, and I desperately wanted to go spend time with my husband, who is just so much fun. There I sat in a job that I honestly had started to resent a little bit because it was keeping me from doing the thing that I wanted to do. I had to look to go, “How do I get out of this rut? How do I get out of this?”
I cannot leave the firm the way it is. I didn’t want to sell it. My exit strategy is to leave it to one of my employees and continue to have him pay me forever. He was not going to be able to do that the way it was. This has been what? Only 4 months, maybe 5 months with you. In that timeframe, all of that has turned upside down. All of that has turned into, “I’ve now hired this person. She’s going to start. I’m going to be completely strategy and completely sales. I’ve got a vision for the future. I see how I can do none of the stuff that I don’t want to do and all of the stuff that I do want to do.”
My staff is happier, and my staff comments on what a difference it makes that we’ve put processes in place across the board and that we’re having regular accountability checks with them, and they know what’s expected of them. Communicating the same thing to our clients. Frankly, you don’t know this yet, but this year we started doing extensions on April 1st. By April 10th, everybody was extended on April 14th, we had a loss of internet. We couldn’t work at any of the locations on April 14th for about three hours. On April 15th, one of the offices had a power outage, and it just didn’t matter to us because we had already put everything in place.
You were being proactive about this whole process versus reactive and doing things at the last minute, too. Implementing some of the things that we talk about when we increase prices and yes, boundaries, but we won’t get into those details, but it paid off because you didn’t even stress. Anyone who does taxes knows that this is the most stressful time of year, around April of every single year. How much longer for a firm owner, do you want to be frustrated or not do those things that you want to do? For you, it is spending time with your husband and being able to have enough revenue. Two months’ side of the year, you don’t have to stress about it and just have all this cash in your bank account. That took courage to make that change. CEOs make decisions.
I’m a good decision maker. I can make a good decision. I can make a quick decision, but I know you don’t want to get into boundaries, but part of what you say is to establish boundaries with your clients and communicate those boundaries to your clients. I expounded upon that and went established boundaries with your staff and communicate those with your staff, communicate what your expectations are. As we’re looking to onboard new clients, could you set up for us a pre-screening process? We don’t talk to any Tom, Dick or Harry who calls in anymore. We talk to the people who can afford us and who will appreciate us.
The CEO’s Decision: Investing In Coaching & Overcoming Fear
I love that, Debbie. Okay. Question for you, because you are a CEO, you can make quick decisions. You’re very smart. You thought you had to get rid of yourself, but now you realize that you’re going to be the rainmaker. You decided to invest in me here at the Abundant Accountant, you invested in the solution, which is the eight-week sales mastery course. Instead of doing it by yourself, you realized that this was an important decision for you and the future of the firm.
I know you shared a little bit about it earlier, but what was it about myself, my team, the program that you said, “I am going to do this? I’m going to set every fear to the side. I’m going to set my logistical brain to the side, even though I know I have my mortgage to pay.” What was the thing that was about me, the program, what you read about me, what you heard, LinkedIn, our podcast, whatever, that said, “I’m going to really try this,” especially when the economy’s tightening up, finances are tight. As you said, you have a mortgage to pay, you have a team to pay, you have payroll. Share with us a little bit about that process of the decision-making.
Some of it was the been-there-done-that entrepreneur in you. It wasn’t that “I’m a coach, I can show you how to do these things.” It was not just that you had been an entrepreneur and that you had been successful and that you had been unsuccessful. Truthfully, the unsuccessful was telling. As we talk about sports, that’s part of what your kids are going to learn from sports as well, is you don’t win every time.
Accounting Firm Transformation: Sometimes, you just need to be reminded that you need to toe the line.
What do you do when you don’t win? You go back and you go back and you watch videos and you look at strategy and you look at what you did right and you look at what you did wrong and you fix it. You had done that. Not only had you done that, but you had done that for a number of accounting firms. A number of accounting firms who I didn’t anticipate that we would have the turnaround that we’ve had in as quickly as we’ve had it. Also, you have a no-nonsense approach to it. You deliver messages. This is going to be a touchy-feely thing.
You let me know when I need to tow the line. As we talk again about athletic coaches. “Snowing, there you are.” Sometimes you just need to be reminded that you need to toe the line. I’ve seen you do that with others in the weekly calls as well, but in the initial meeting, it was also about me. It was about what do you need and how do I can help you accomplish that. You even said to me the other day, and I’ve been hearing this in my head for a couple of days, is you actually stopped me as I was rambling on about something and said, “I need you to focus, and I need to help you make money.”
If you’re going to pay me, I’m going to make sure there’s money in your bank. As you said, you didn’t have to go for a line of credit. You have cash in the bank because in my earlier podcast, Debbie said, “I run a business not with a bank account of $0.” I believe a $0 bank account should be $100,000. If the bank account dips below $100,000. That’s the new minimum, but that’s a lesson I learned from a previous business where I was like you with cashflow problems all the time. I said, “I don’t want to live there.”
You talked about your fears earlier, and “I have to pay a mortgage.” When you live on $100,000 with your $0 in your bank account, everything’s easy peasy and less stress. When you can come from that place, you can enroll more, you can help more people because you’re not stressed about your payroll. You’re not stressed about your mortgage. You’re not stressed about your next vacation, you’re about to take off. You couldn’t care less if the internet goes out one day, whatever. We’re doing things proactively in advance. I think having all of that has reduced the pressure that you felt before.
I mentioned to my husband about two weeks ago, I’m not as angry as I used to be.
No, you’re not. You were angry the first day we spoke. I even have that written down. I think you told me, but I was like, “She is not a happy person.” Yeah, you’re not. I totally agree. You said you wanted to step away and retire and spend more time with your husband in about two years. That was when we spoke four months ago, or however many months ago. Now I’d be surprised, if you’re like, “I cannot step away too much. I can do like 80% on, but I like this. I think it’s fun.”
You’re thinking in a 50% to 60% range.
Look how this has even shifted. Before you’re like, “I’m out in two years.” Remember that?
Yeah. Snelling out. They have everybody hear me say, “You need to understand when my husband comes back, it is selling out.”
Now it’s 50 to 60. That’s great.
I like speaking engagements, which is unusual for people who do what we do. We’re getting ready to start booking some of those. That should help to bring in some additional revenue and some additional revenue streams. I once had a CFO who said, “Cash solves all problems.” I went, “Cash hides most problems.” What we’ve learned is that systems and processes, and managing expectations, and going back to what you were saying before are what was different about you. What’s different about you is that your focus is not you.
What’s different about you is that your focus is on helping the people who work with you succeed. Every marketing person I had ever spoken to would say things to me like, “You need to have a niche that you focus on.” I go, “Listen, everybody who does a tax return is my niche. What are you talking about? Everybody’s my client.” Not one of them could enunciate could elaborate to me why it was important. You just very clearly laid it out. I kept thinking to myself, “If your job is marketing and you cannot tell me the importance of why I need to do it your way, you don’t even understand your way.”
Debbie, the reason is that they were marketing or were in sales. When we talk about it from the sales perspective and having the niche, we have to do that because otherwise we cannot get to the touchy-feely stuff about being able to help our clients. As you had shared earlier, now you’re coming with the approach of helping to solve your client’s problem.
Cash hides most problems. Share on XEveryone who has a tax return is going to have multiple different problems. If we’re going to focus and a big part of what you’re focusing on, the non-compliance work, like resolution cases and tax planning. Those are bigger opportunities. From the sales perspective, we want to focus on maybe there’s a niche on revenue, but there’s also maybe a niche where these are all similar business owners, like real estate investors.
We start to understand what keeps those people up at night. The marketing people, it’s so different because that’s generating interest just to get someone to talk to you. Where you have so many people you’re already talking to that then we could qualify them as you shared earlier. Now you’re not talking to every Tom, Dick and Harry anymore. You were wasting a lot of time before. Now we’re more strategic with our time, and it creates a different client experience, which you created a different experience.
It triggers a switch in my mind as well that says, “My time is valuable. If you don’t respect my time, that’s okay. You’ve already shown me that you’re a client I don’t want to work with.”
A hundred percent. There you go. Love it.
More than that, I need to come back, and the problem before was that I was trying to solve financial problems for clients. I wasn’t trying to solve emotional problems. I wasn’t trying to get them away from their fear. With resolution, that’s easy to say. “Listen, I can make you sleep better at night.” “I owe the IRS $100,000.” “I can make you sleep at night. I can fix that.” For regular accounting work and tax preparation work, and selling CFO services, what they want to know is how I am going to solve their emotional issues? They don’t want me to tell them about how I’m going to improve their bank account.
That comes afterwards.
That comes after the stupid touchy-feely emotional stuff.
Advice For Burnt Out Firm Owners: Been There, Done That & Life-Changing Shift
Debbie got it. What if there’s a firm owner reading, Debbie, where you were 5 months ago or 4 months ago, and they’re burnt out? They’re angry like you were. They have no joy in their life. They’re overwhelmed. They’re definitely not making enough money. They’re working long hours. They’re just like, “What the heck did I get myself into?” The stress levels are just too high. What would you share with a firm owner that might be in your shoes where you were four months ago that you wish you would have heard to maybe do something about the challenge at hand a lot quicker, knowing that they’re skeptic?
The easy answer is just do it. Just take a leap of faith. That goes down back exactly to where I was before. I couldn’t take a leap of faith because nobody had convinced me prior to that that I should have any faith in them. That’s the difference, again, I’m going to say again, the fact that you are an entrepreneur and that you have been successful and that you’ve been there, done that. I once had a CFO I said to him, “You’ve built so many great teams, and I’m struggling so hard to get the right staff.” He said, “I’ve told you this before, and this is the last time I’m going to tell you that you need to hire been there, done that.”
I went, “That’s easy for you to say, you’ve got the budget for been there, done that. I got the budget for potential.” It goes to that, “That’s your problem, is that you keep hiring potential, and potential doesn’t pan out.” Add that all together with you, the conversation with you, which was part of the why, is the reason the potential wasn’t panning out was my leadership or lack thereof. Part of it was that I wasn’t directing my focus in the right direction, which is really where you helped, which was to pay attention to the emotion, pay attention to the touchy-feely.
Creating a sales process that you’re creating and created parts of it and different elements that are coming together.
Which also led to me creating processes around other things, again, where the employees are coming to me now and saying, “Things are so much better than they used to be as early as six months ago.” We improve things during tax season, during the time when we don’t have time to improve things. The answer isn’t just to have faith, take the leap. The answer is been there, done that, it works. It’s worked for lots of other people. I can tell you that the expression that I hate is “If I can do it, you can too.” “No, you cannot. Not everybody can do it.”
It’s not for anybody because it does require work. If you don’t like to work or put in hard work, then don’t bother, just go get a job.
Just because an employee or a client craps on you, doesn't mean you have to stay under that pile of crap. Share on XYou’ve got to be able to accept that everybody who’s talking to you or is reading is saying, “I’m not doing something right, and I need to make a change.” This is a change that is proven and that works. It took some effort. I’m not saying it was easy, but it’s been life-changing. Honestly, I resented the job. I resented that I was still working and not going home to my husband. Now I’m working at most 50 hours a week during tax season.
I’m getting out of ops. My staff is doing a better job. At 5:00 on April 15th, we locked the doors and went home. We were done because we had processes in place, and that all started with the conversations with you and putting sales processes in place, which led to, “Let’s take this same thing that we’re doing here and do it in the other areas of the firm.” It’s just made a tremendous difference, both in terms of happiness for me, happiness for my staff, being able to get clients onboarded, getting them to pay for things that I used to give away for free.
I think I’ve told you I had a friend who would come to me asking me for tax planning ideas, and I would give her ideas, and I would be giving away for free to my clients. She had somebody the other day, she’s like, “I’m going to charge them $50,000 for this.” I’m like, “I’m giving this stuff away.” Appreciating the value of what you do and that when you save your client money, it is okay for you to charge for that, for goodness’ sake. The big four does, I had no problem with it. If they came to me and told me that they would save me a million dollars and they would just charge me 25% of that, we stroked them a check for $250,000 as they proved it.
I don’t know why I had a problem with that in my own firm. There were so many excuses. My client cannot afford it. Many excuses, and it’s not a take a leap of faith. It’s put in the time. The leap of faith is knowing that the systems will work, the process will work, and that you don’t have to resent your job. Your staff doesn’t have to see you come in angry all the time and deal with an angry boss. It just improves everything. Honestly, it makes you a better salesperson, too. You’re better able to talk to your clients.
It’s so true. With this whole shift in your being and who you are, thank you so much for sharing that, as it’s been amazing to work with you, and I look forward to continuing to work with you in our mastermind. What are you most excited about coming up now that you see things from a clear lens versus a dusty lens?
The Clear Lens: Future Vision, Staff Growth, & Lasting Transformation
I am excited about the potential for the firm. I’m excited about the potential. I’m now at a place where with every staff member, we’re approaching them individually and saying, “What do we need to develop you and get you where you want to be?” That’s about having the change of the mindset of, again, as you hear me say all the time, stupid emotions, appreciating that their emotions matter and that their happiness mattered.
Again, I knew that and I felt that and I wanted that for them because I was so angry all the time, all they saw was angry. That shift was gigantic. From there, the potential for the firm to be a multimillion-dollar firm. I expect that this year we’ll probably only grow by about 50% this year. I say only 50%, as if that’s not a big thing. That’s a giant thing. Truthfully, I expect next year that it will double in size from where we will be at the end of this year. It’s huge. That’s me collecting a six-figure retirement working part-time if I feel like it.
That’s lovely. I’m so proud of you. I was going to ask you what have been your biggest wins and successes in the last four months?
For me, everything. I’ve always said in my life, people say, “What do you do? Tell me about yourself.” I never tell them about my job, which is very unusual in the US. What’s the biggest thing that I’m proud of in my life? I’m proud that I have a happy marriage. I’ve been married to my husband for 32 years, and we still like each other and like to spend our days together. I’m proud that we took good care of my mom, that we took good care of his parents in their older years.
I’m now proud that I have a firm where my staff is being adequately paid and my staff is successful, and my staff is happy. We’re doing a better job of servicing our clients, and we’re working more cohesively as a team because a happier boss promotes communication. As recently as three months ago, one of my employees had said that at this firm, our opinion is not as welcome as you say it is. Now that very person says it’s a profound difference.
Those are huge wins. Those are huge successes. It’s even more than the money. Even though the money helps a lot, but it’s even more than that. I’m so proud of you and everything that you’ve created in your firm and just taking out this time to be of service to another firm owner that might be stuck, might be angry, might keep saying, “I know I need to change something, but I just don’t know what it is.” Hopefully, this has inspired them to make a change and to grow. As a collective in this industry, if we all make a change, then we can all earn more revenue.
We can all spend more time with our family and work less and have happier teams and pay more to our staff, and all of that. It helps everything tremendously. I just want to thank you so much for your time and for being here and sharing so openly and candidly. It’s just been amazing to work with you. I look forward to continuing. Are there any other last words of advice or wisdom that you would love to share with another firm owner before we wrap up?
It’s the same thing I’ve been saying, only saying it more clearly. Thanks for the shift in the mindset. The shift in the mindset on how to approach running a practice. It’s not just that you’re talking to practice owners about sales. Everything that you talk about is about running a successful practice. It also plays into being a better salesperson and being a better practice owner, and practice manager.
Accounting Firm Transformation: Your problem is that you keep hiring potential, and potential doesn’t pan out. You need to hire “been there, done that.”
You are most welcome, and you did the work. I just guided you. Thank you for placing your trust in me and the team and for being open to the shift in mindset. What’d you say? I don’t remember what you said to me on the first day we spoke, but something I was like, “This is going to be tough.” I was open to the possibility, and I’m glad I was. This is why I love what I do. This is the shift that I love to see in firm owners just like yourself. That’s what makes me happy, because I don’t like angry, exhausted, stressed-out firm owners.
I want you to be at peace, hang out with your husband, whom you’ve been married to for 30 years, and work part-time. The fact that you just wanted to be out in two years, and now you’re like, “I might stick around 50% to 60% of the time and then go hang out and do my projects and house things and travel.” You can do both. It’s like doing both and other things all at once and still having that freedom to continue, even to grow your firm, but with you being there a lot less and never having a stressful tax season.
My staff now feels that they can have that as well, and it doesn’t have to. We had one staff member who had taken me years, but I had that boundaries conversation with you and said, “Just because an employee, or just because a client craps on you, doesn’t mean you have to stay under that pile of crap.”
That’s a good one. True. Debbie, thank you so much for being here with us on the show. It’s been an honor. I cannot wait to see your growth even more and get to the 50% working time. Thank you.
Thanks for what you’ve done to get us to where we are. I know I couldn’t have gotten here without you.
Thank you.
I don’t like that touchy-feely.
I got it. Got it. Received. Thank you again. I really appreciate your time.
Thank you.
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Thank you all so much for joining Debbie and I on another amazing episode of the show. I love having our clients come and talk and share about how their lives have changed, because honestly, it made my day. That’s what I live for every single day. What if you could be like Debbie and only work with your dream clients and not take on every Tom, Dick and Harry? Those ones who respect your time pay you what you’re worth. They don’t ghost you when you ask for paperwork. They don’t ghost you because you’re no longer sending out a quote proposal or an invoice. What if this became your reality this month?
What if you can multiply your revenue, trim your workday down to four days a week and take your weekends off, and never work 16 or 18-hour days ever again? This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a framework. I’ve taught it to hundreds of firm owners just like you. If you’re ready to take your firm to another level and remove the anger and have fun and be happy, just like Debbie and have profits, and never have to dip into lines of credit or borrow and get in alignment with the life that you want, then let’s talk
Head to TheAbundantCall.com and book your complimentary strategy session with me and my team. Let’s design a firm that works for you, not the other way around. Once again, TheAbundantCall.com. I look forward to speaking to some of you, and I’ll see you in the next episode.
Important Links
- Debbie Snelling on LinkedIn
- North Georgia Tax Solutions
- 4 Shifts to Double Revenue
- The Abundant Call
About Debbie Snelling
With extensive experience as a former Tax Director for a publicly traded company, Debbie brings a deep understanding of the tax code’s complexities and opportunities. Her strategic approach to tax planning has consistently generated significant savings—often tens of thousands of dollars annually—for her clients.
Beyond her technical expertise, Debbie values innovation and creativity in business. Her creativity shines in problem-solving and finding unique ways to enhance clients’ financial success. Debbie admires visionaries who transcend traditional methods and thrives on helping clients navigate challenges to achieve their goals.
Debbie’s mission is to empower clients to focus on what they do best by providing reliable, personalized tax and accounting solutions that drive measurable results. With a commitment to integrity, precision, and forward-thinking strategies, she is dedicated to helping businesses and individuals achieve financial clarity and success, with her firm, North Georgia Tax Solutions.
