Attracting and keeping great people is the number one challenge facing accounting firms today. Actually, if you ask almost any business owner, he or she will say their people are their most important asset.
As a firm, we put a lot of emphasis on this challenge. As you may have seen in our last newsletter, most of the partners and several of the staff have been together at SPS for more than 20 years. We cherish this continuity and family atmosphere.
One of our keys to success in staffing is a simple philosophy that has been with the firm since day one. It is what has helped SPS maintain what we believe is the best staff in the business.
A Simple Philosophy
- Balance of work and life
- Building respect in the community
- Talented people, well compensated
- Pick a specialty… we’ll support it
- Promote from within
- Staff contact with partners and clients
- Adopting clients’ problems and solving them
- Delegation with the support to succeed
- Technology leadership to increase efficiency and deliver on clients’ needs
- Opportunity to become a partner of the future
Another key is that the leadership team invests a lot of time to help staff achieve their career goals. Each career path is formally reviewed twice-per-year, and further discussed during partner meetings and retreats, and in monthly lunches between staff and partners. We also operate an ongoing open-door policy where partners and managers are available most days for walk-in conversations.
We also try not to overwork our people, even in our busy season. Then, when busy season has ended, we take the entire staff to Las Vegas. There are also ongoing social events every couple of months, now organized by the newly formed SEC, Social Events Committee. But one of the greatest things we offer staff is flexibility, such as mothers working on flex time, which allows people to do great work for SPS without sacrificing other aspects of their lives.
We encourage all businesses to work diligently at attracting and keeping great people. They really are a company’s number one asset and well worth the effort.
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