As accountants, you pour your hearts and souls into serving your clients and building your practices. Long hours. Late nights. Continual training. It’s a labor of love.
But have you planned for the unthinkable?
What would happen to your clients if you unexpectedly were unable to work tomorrow? Who would step in to prepare tax returns, provide payroll services, provide access to critical documents and ensure continuity? How would your family cope with the loss of income and business value we worked so hard to build?
When you don’t have a succession plan
The difficult truth is that without a proper succession plan, you leave your clients and families in the lurch. Power of attorney terminates upon death, so clients would have no authorized access to their critical records and documents.
For many solos, there is no partner who could readily take over client relationships. The business you slaved away to create could crumble rapidly.
Meanwhile, our spouses and children could suffer financial hardship without accounting for the full value of our firms. Other firms may swoop in to poach accounts, but they have no obligation to compensate our families.
That’s why creating a succession plan is so critical for solo practitioners and owners of small firms. It gives us peace of mind that our lives work and our families' futures are protected.
A proper succession plan should include:
- A complete client list with up-to-date contact information
- Introduction emails to clients explaining the plan is in place
- Secured access to client data and firm records
- A coordinated transition process and panel of accountants for clients to choose from
- Fair compensation to your estate for the full value of your practice
Options for getting your succession plan in place
Rather than reinventing the wheel, there are options for you to set up a succession plan that will protect your clients and your family. One option is to work with an attorney who specializes in creating succession plans.
If you are looking for a more economical and turnkey succession plan you can have implemented quickly, you also can use an Emergency Succession Plan that already is created as a template.
Regardless of which option is the best for you, partnering with an experienced succession planning firm can ensure your plan is comprehensive and turnkey. It can handle all the details, provide a smooth transition for your clients and deliver 100% of your business value to your family if the need arises.
As solo accountants and owners of small firms, your plates are already overflowing. Succession planning feels like one more imposing task. But by being proactive now, we gain priceless peace of mind and prevent needless distress for our families and clients down the road. We owe it to ourselves and those we care most about to plan for the future. Our time and efforts are worth protecting.
Join me on July 19 at noon for a webinar to show you exactly why and how to set up a succession plan for you and your firm. To register, CLICK HERE.
Alan Blakeborough, "Blake" as his friends and colleagues refer to him, is a serial entrepreneur—one of the crazy ones. He has an accounting degree and calls himself a recovering accountant. He is also a military mustang (enlisted converted to officer). He has served as both an infantry officer and a tank officer.
He created the Olympic fencing school model in the US in 1994, Knights of Siena, after he left the military and has opened over 60 fencing academies over the past 25 years.
Tax Titans is his latest and last big, very big project—one that he feels will be his legacy. Tax Titans is a veteran owned business that provides a platform for small businesses to receive bids/quotes from qualified and vetted tax professionals. This revolutionary platform will provide the tax professionals the ability to market their services to 32 million small businesses across the country without a referral fee.
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