Preparing for Top 100 and ProAdvisor of the Year

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Years gone past has shown that a lot of ProAdvisors have used the end of the year holidays for exam preparation and certification testing.  I think this use to be more prevalent when the desktop certifications were just rolling out a couple of months after the new releases of the desktop products, but Intuit was also working on a schedule that recognized continuing education credits and also had 'renewal courses' due by shortly after year's end for Advanced ProAdvisors. 

Regardless of the causes there were just a lot of ProAdvisors who went through the courses and took their certifications examinations at this time of the year.  It wasn't by coincidence that we here at Insightful Accountant decided to 'kick-off' our Top 100/ProAdvisor of the Year process at this time of the year either.  We felt that the opening of nominations would get you 'in gear' to do what you needed to do to prepare yourself as best your could for the application process. Similarly, we felt that the course work and certification exams many ProAdvisors were taking would be fresh on their mind as they got ready to complete the details of their formal applications and therein document their qualifications toward the awards.

You see, there is in fact a formal correlation between much of the training and certification of ProAdvisors and these Awards and we strive to maintain that correlation in our application process each year.  But the application itself is fundamentally a classification tool, designed to qualify candidates into one or more categorical classifications during the process. These classifications correspond to the 'categorical awards' we recognize each year and the majority of the questions within our application are geared toward these categorical classifications. Additional questions within the application impact individual standings within each category. Not all questions posed in the application are related to all categories.

A lot of people have the misconception that our Top 100 is simply one long list of 100 names out of the 800 or so nominees. But, the Top 100 actually consists of the top 10 ProAdvisors within each of the categorical classifications we examine during this process (10 X 10 = 100).  It represents the best of each category we recognize, and our ProAdvisor of the Year, well they represent the 'best of the best.'

If you think about the process based upon the above, you should realize how the various application questions, and criteria they reflect, drive the points in each category. To help you further prepare prior to our opening of the ‘formal applications’ early in 2020, I want to cover just some of the criteria we use in our awards process.

This should give you time to consider what you need to do, and prepare accordingly, between now and the actual application deadline should you wish to participate, and either self-nominate or ask someone to nominate you.  Remember, just because nominations close on a specific date, and applications open on a specific date doesn't meant you have to be 'application ready' by those dates.  You have until the very last day that APPLICATIONS CLOSE to complete the very best application possible with the most accurate information including the latest and most current training and certifications possible, along with the other information available for 'your' status.

Individual NOT Firm Awards

Insightful Accountant’s ProAdvisor awards are designed to recognize individual ProAdvisors, they are not intended to recognize a ‘firm.’ These awards are NOT like Intuit's Firm of the Future awards recognizing a 'Firm.'

ProAdvisors must have an active practice with one or more actual clients using QuickBooks (QuickBooks Online and/or QuickBooks Desktop). Individuals providing staff services that do not involve actual client interaction in rendering ProAdvisor services using QuickBooks (Online and/or Desktop) are NOT eligible for these awards.

We spend a lot of time ‘hashing and scoring’ the numbers you report in your application for these awards. Therefore, it is important for you to take time to reflect upon what makes up 'your own' ProAdvisor practice. 

Even though you may be part of a big accounting firm, or a small bookkeeping practice, we are only concerned with the work YOU do, and the clients that you actually support. So, when we ask you about your clients, that is exactly what we mean, “your” clients. Do you know the exact number of clients for whom you ‘installed QuickBooks’ (or set-up QuickBooks Online) last year? How about the number of clients for whom you ‘reconciled their bank accounts’? What percentage of your clients are ‘in the construction business,’ or ‘healthcare?' How many, or what percentage, of ‘your clients’ are using QuickBooks Online in contrast to the number using one of the QuickBooks Desktop versions? 

Each year we always have some applicants who attempt to answer these questions on what can only be their ‘firm wide’ numbers. What would you think about the validity of an individual’s application where they listed that they performed 3,500 QuickBooks Desktop installations in a single year? That works out to be like 11 installations per hour for ever single working hour during the year... "I don't think so."  The result is they actually loose points, not gain them.

There are more than 50 questions in our process that require answers based upon your practice, your work, your clients, and your services. For the vast majority, we ask you to select a range like ‘5 or fewer,’ or ’50-70%’ rather than asking you to give us ‘exact numerators.’ I can’t emphasize enough the importance of answering ‘all’ of these questions. In prior years, far too many applicants failed to provide answers to critical questions that not only ‘generate points’ relative to their overall score, but also are essential in determining each applicant’s categorization(s) toward awards.

Now if we asked you a question that essentially is wanting to know if the majority of your clients are using QuickBooks Desktop, or QuickBooks Online, or 'it's essentially even between the two... "wouldn't you think that was extremely important knowing that many of our categories are 'Desktop based' and many others are 'Online based'?

Certifications

Nominees from the United States must hold one or more current Intuit ‘U.S.’ ProAdvisor certifications in order to be considered for these awards. Canadian participants must hold one or more current Intuit ‘Canadian’ ProAdvisor certifications. Duplicate certification is acceptable but cross-certification will be accepted only if a person’s application demonstrates that they predominately conduct business with clients in their non-resident country.

I started off this article talking about exam preparation and certification testing, so doesn't is seem obvious that one of the single biggest factors in our scoring criteria is ‘certification’ within the Intuit Ecosystem. For our QuickBooks Online Category, it means the most current QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Online-Advanced certifications. For our QuickBooks Desktop Category, it means the most current QuickBooks Desktop certification as well as QuickBooks Desktop-Advanced and QuickBooks Enterprise.

Even though Intuit recognizes you as a ProAdvisor if you have had a 'certification' within the past 3 years, and that's fine for 'getting your foot in the door for nomination qualification toward these awards', when it comes to the real point counts on the application process, that simply doesn't 'cut the mustard' for these awards. Whether we are talking about QuickBooks Online, or QuickBooks Desktop, it isn’t enough to just ‘be certified’ at any time in the past, you need to be (most) ‘current’ in ALL certifications applicable.

While a person’s certification ‘history’ comes into play, and those people with a long history of having been certified tend to rank higher, the reality is that each year we have high ranking historical certification participants drop several points because they haven’t yet completed the most recent certifications when they submit their applications. The most current certifications simply outweigh several years of past historical certification in our process.

Now let me toss in some words of encouragement for our ‘Canadian Participants’ because we recognize that QuickBooks Certification have not always been available to you when they were available to your U.S. counterparts. We here at Insightful Accountant fully recognize these distinctions between U.S. ProAdvisors and Canadian ProAdvisors and we also believe that ‘our process’ takes into account past distinctions as well as commonalities and has the ability to recognize outstanding Canadian ProAdvisor nominees within our core of Top 100 with the full complement of former world-wide international places now reserved for Canadian participants within our awards structure.  With this said, we will however hold you to the same 'strict standard' of most current certification(s) available to your at the time of the application process.

Training

Another significant factor in our scoring criteria is ‘training’ related to the Intuit Ecosystem. Staying current and keeping-up with what is going on in the industry and ecosystem are essential; if you are not participating in training events each year, you cannot be doing that. We do not mandate a minimum number of hours in specific topics as a part of categorical award rankings; however, we recognize training related to the various areas of practice.

We also ‘value’ training as it relates to the various categories we recognize. So, training related to the QuickBooks Online ecosystem has higher value for ranking purposes within the QuickBooks Online Category than it does within the QuickBooks Desktop Category. Similarly, training related to the QuickBooks Desktop ecosystem has higher value for ranking purposes within the QuickBooks Desktop Category than it does within the QuickBooks Online Category. Intuit offers a wealth of trainings for ProAdvisors including their live in-person QuickBooks 'training tour' that will be starting up again in the new year. 

Many of our Canadian participants will have just attended QuickBooks Connect in Toronto that provided significant opportunities to earn training points. Intuit also offers multiple training opportunities ranging from self-paced study, to webinar-based instruction, to virtual conferences, and live in-person training throughout the year available to our Canadian ProAdvisor Brothers and Sisters, so the more trainings you take the more points you will earn toward award status.

All ProAdvisors can earn training points by attending events like Scaling New Heights, both live and the ‘online version' which I am just finished up last week as the ‘subject matter expert’ answering questions in more than 20 sessions. I guess I would have earned myself more than a few ‘points’ if I could in fact ‘earn points’ for these awards, NOT.

Other events like AccountEx (offered in both the USA and Europe), as well as participation in any ‘related webinars’ that issue CPE credits are also great sources for training to boost your standing for these awards. This year we will be asking you about 'related CPE credit courses' that can earn you additional points if they truly are related to the services you render as a QuickBooks ProAdvisor.

Third-party Products

3rd-party Products, call them software or Apps, matter in our process. Prior to last year we listed hundreds of 3-party products that worked with both QuickBooks Desktop and QBO but last year we removed that long list and took a different approach because we realized that the section was an overly time-consuming part of our application process. We believe we found a better way to evaluate the extent to which you assist your clients with solutions above and beyond QuickBooks by letting you tell us about the specific Apps and software you use (in other words 'your App/software stack', how you use them, and the details (such as number of clients or installations for each) solution.

We also reward you with points based on the extent to which you are involved with each of those products. We value a ‘product certification’ higher than being a ‘referral partner’, and we value an ‘implementation’ partner for a App higher than someone who ‘only uses the App.’ When you think about it you should realize that it takes far longer to gain certifications or become qualified to earn an implementation designation then to simply become a referral/commission partner or turn the app on for your own use. 

And, as of last year’s awards (2019), we issued two categorical awards in this area because we recognize the growing importance of these products. We not only recognize a QuickBooks Desktop Integration award but a QuickBooks Online Appologist award.

By the way, you can count on the fact that our award winners' credentials have been ‘verified’ with the various 3rd-party product developers prior to our finalization of these awards, so please don’t fudge your credentials.

Insightful Accountant recognizes that our Canadian candidates may not have access to as many 3rd-party products or Apps as their American ProAdvisor brothers and sisters simply because not all developers choose to make a version that works with the Canadian QuickBooks products. Still the same. most Canadian ProAdvisors do have a ‘stack’ of Apps they use themselves, recommend to or help clients implement, even if those Apps don’t offer certification but do offer  ‘partner programs’ for referrals or implementation. Again, our process focuses on both your use of these preferred apps (and software), your implementation of them, and also and the extent of your participation within any offered developer programs (at whatever level of participation they offer). 

Client Reviews

Another scoring factor involves the 'client reviews' that appear as part of a ProAdvisor’s (Find a Pro) profile. We factor the total number of reviews times the review score for each and then factor in the total number of clients reported to us in the formal application.

As an example, if a ProAdvisor has 110 rankings of an average of 4.8 points, and reported that they had 450 clients, then their ranking represents (approximately) 25% of the computed ranking score. Similarly, a ProAdvisor who only has 5 rankings of 4.8 but has only 20 clients, essentially earns the same ranking score. On the other hand, someone with 450 clients who only had 20 ratings of 4.8 would have a much lower raking then either of the previous two examples.

This approach is designed to provide an equalization in rankings between smaller practices including those within smaller geographic service areas in contrast with large practices located in large geographic areas. We are striving to prevent a ProAdvisor’s geo-location from overly influencing their standing as it relates to serving clients.

If you open your profile and recognize that you are ‘weak’ in this area, we suggest that you reach out to your clients and ask them to provide a review of your services using the Find a ProAdvisor website. You could be pleasantly rewarded with some great new reviews simply by asking.

Score One for Yourself

We haven't even announced the 'opening' of the formal applications, and certainly you have plenty of time to being working on each and every one of these areas between now and the eventual close of this year's formal applications in 2020.  But first you must get to the application process and that means get thru step one 'Nomination'. 

Remember, there is only 'One Person' you can rely on to 'Nominate You'... and that person 'is  you'.  I know of two people who waited all last year and never got nominated by the persons they thought were going to nominate them so they didn't nominate themselves... so sad, too bad. 

Lesson to be learned... 'There is Absolutely Nothing Wrong with Nominating Yourself!' Do it now! Don't get left out in the dark.

Click Here to Nominate Yourself or Someone Else.

And by the way... if you are not going to work on training, exam preparation and certification testing...... Happy Holidays!

Murph