Achieving Financial Mastery: The Profit First Professional Advantage
In this episode, Tim Seymour chats with Deb Halliday, a Certified Profit First Professional, about the real value of joining the Profit First Professionals community in the UK and Ireland.
Deb shares her journey of becoming certified, from the initial doubts she had to the transformation she experienced in her own business. She explains how implementing Profit First first-hand gave her the confidence and tools to create bigger results for her clients.
Tim and Deb also discuss the power of community, regular calls, peer support, and shared learning that helps accountants, bookkeepers and coaches move beyond compliance into profitable advisory work.
Key takeaways:
- Certification gives you a proven framework to improve your business and deliver more value to clients.
- Profit First starts with your own finances—so you can lead clients with confidence.
- The Profit First Professionals community offers support, collaboration, and a place to grow.
Transcript
Foreign.
Speaker B:Welcome to Profit first beyond the Book, a podcast that takes you beyond the book with Profit first brought to you by Tim Duncan and the rest of the Profit First Professionals UK and Ireland.
Speaker B:Deb Halladay is with me again today and we are going to be talking about membership with Profit First Professionals.
Speaker B:Welcome, Deb.
Speaker A:Hi Tim.
Speaker A:Thanks for having me.
Speaker B:You're welcome.
Speaker B:You're welcome.
Speaker B:So I want to kind of highlight a couple of aspects about what being a Profit First Professional is all about.
Speaker B:And Profit First Professionals as an organization is aimed towards accountants, bookkeepers and financial coaches.
Speaker B:And first and foremost we are their Profit First Professional.
Speaker B:We look after our members and our members business so that they can learn to improve their business, enhance their finances and then share that information with their clients to do the same with their clients.
Speaker B:Do you say that captures everything there, Deb?
Speaker A:Yeah, I do.
Speaker A:I think we, we've all implemented Profit first but it's only the starting point isn't kind of shows you what area of your business you need to be focusing on.
Speaker A:And I look at it as we were trained in Profit first and had experience and now we're training other accountants and bookkeepers.
Speaker A:So we're kind of like their Profit First Professionals, aren't we?
Speaker B:Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker B:And not just with Profit first by the way.
Speaker B:So there's a misconception that Profit First Official is only about Profit first, but we do so much more with our members which we will come to later on.
Speaker B:And that helps our members give all round advice and an all round service and to their clients, but also to attract the right type of clients.
Speaker B:So let's talk about, let's share our experience perhaps.
Speaker B:So when you first join as a Profit First Professional, it's a leap of faith.
Speaker B:It could be a little bit scary because you're signing up to a membership, but what happens is for many of our members it's transformed their life and it's become a game changer for many in their own businesses and with their clients feedback to how it's affected their business with such positivity.
Speaker B:So when you come into the certification program, which is the first stage of membership, one of the first things you have to do is implement Profit first in your own business.
Speaker B:And that's because it would be impossible to go out and try and sell Profit first.
Speaker B:Try and implement Profit first in the client's business.
Speaker B:If you haven't gone through this yourself.
Speaker B:It really is one of the core principles of our membership that you have to live and breathe Profit first in your business.
Speaker B:And I can remember, I Had an accountancy practice, as you know, and I can remember doing my profit assessment for the first time and probably, you know, did it around with it a little bit because the, the percentages weren't very good and I'm going to be brutally honest about it, and it felt quite overwhelming.
Speaker B:But I spoke to Liz, who was my guide.
Speaker B:Liz is based in the us, obviously now our members get the access to all of us in the uk and, and Liz just basically talked me through the next steps and I felt so reassured and suddenly I felt empowered with my own money, which I probably hadn't felt like before, if truth be told.
Speaker B:And once I made those first allocations into the, into all the pops, as you know, because the percentages were worked out in the right way, because the profit assessment was correctly calculated, it gave me confidence that I could make these allocations without worrying about paying my bills.
Speaker B:Still, yes, there was an element of I needed to squeeze my expenses down, I need to look at my cost and I need to go through the nut exercise and reduce costs in certain areas if I could find them, which of course I did.
Speaker B:But it was just comfortable to do this and to see a profit part starting to build.
Speaker B:Knowing that I was going to reward myself in three months time was just, it's just an amazing feeling, especially when you get to that point.
Speaker B:So I was wondering, though I know I've shared how I felt, how was it when you did your profit first assessment?
Speaker B:Most likely with me as well, I would imagine.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:When I did my first profit first assessment, I was a bit horrified, to be honest, but I looked at it as a health check and then the rollout plan was like the ultimate fitness guide.
Speaker A:I could see that as it.
Speaker A:The profit pulp started building up, so did the health of my business and so did my decision making.
Speaker A:And I just, it just shifted my mindset completely because instead of looking at everything as one whole and looking at the profit underneath, it was transformational because you can look at each.
Speaker A:What am I taking out of the business?
Speaker A:As a business owner, does that cover my costs?
Speaker A:What am I taking out?
Speaker A:How am I running my business?
Speaker A:Is it as lean as it can be?
Speaker A:Tax.
Speaker A:Have I estimated my tax correctly and I could separate various different categories within my business and really drill down into the numbers?
Speaker A:And then I had a plan going forward.
Speaker A:So from that dread, oh no, what am I going to do?
Speaker A:It gave me a clear plan of what I, what I could do.
Speaker A:So it was exciting really, when I got over the initial shock, especially when you've been Doing it for years, haven't you?
Speaker A:You've been running your business for years and then all of a sudden you have a health, this health check, instant assessment and you think it's not going to get any better unless I address these areas.
Speaker A:I'm not going to make the money that I need to make unless I actually address what this instant assessment has shown me.
Speaker A:So, yeah, pretty similar journey, I would say, Tim.
Speaker B:And I think a financial health check is a really good way of looking at it because we're looking at how cash is being handled in our business over a period of time up to this point.
Speaker B:And I think we're all guilty of not handling cash in the right way throughout our lives in general and particularly in business, because I don't think we take business money as serious as personal money sometimes.
Speaker B:So there becomes that kind of, it'd be okay.
Speaker B:I'm an accountant, I'm a bookkeeper, I know what I'm doing.
Speaker B:Everything could work out come the end of the month, come the end of the year, everything'd be fine.
Speaker B:But quite often it's not, you know, and you know, I've done this in the past and I know some of our members have in the past and I know there's a lot of accountants of bookkeepers out there still doing this right now, having to finance their tax bills or having to agree payment plans with hmrc.
Speaker B:And do you know what?
Speaker B:There's no shame in that.
Speaker B:There's absolutely no shame in this happening if it's happening right now.
Speaker B:But what Profit first does, it gives you a really good solution to that.
Speaker B:And until you can get yourself into this positive financial mindset that Profit first provides for you and have that control over your own business and, and realize that actually there's a step by step process you can follow as a Profit first professional that takes you forward in this way.
Speaker B:You've suddenly got this enlightening moment where you've got something to talk to your clients about, something that's different and something that, you know, if they follow your guidance, they will find success and improve their financial position.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker A:And on that point, I mean, it opens up so many different discussions.
Speaker A:It can open up, how are we going to tackle the debt issue that you can see the debt payments going out.
Speaker A:You can have scenario planning, as in what happens if you increase your, your fees by X amount of percentage?
Speaker A:How does that affect all your pots?
Speaker A:What happens if you take 20, try and take on a couple more clients or 10% more clients in the next quarter?
Speaker A:How does that affect.
Speaker A:So it's not all about cutting costs, but it opens up all these different areas.
Speaker A:How do you want to grow?
Speaker A:How are you going to market?
Speaker A:I always look at it as the, when business is like a roller coaster, have you got the supportive framework underneath?
Speaker A:Because otherwise you're going to come off.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:But Profit first allows you to predict that framework, doesn't it, for all those different areas of your business in a way that the clients understand rather than just pulling out your, I always mention it, management reporting, which they don't understand.
Speaker A:But if you can actually just tell them, you know, in layman's terms what they need to do to add money to each of these pots or to reduce cost, then it's, it's clarifying for the client and they, you can see that their shoulders just relax because they understand what to do.
Speaker B:So yeah, without doubt, without doubt.
Speaker B:And there speaks the experience from a, from a, from a profit for a professional of three, three and a half years that's worked with clients for a long time, having gone through the process of implementing in your own business as well and measuring these percentages as you've gone through on a regular basis and then achieving some really good increases in your percentages over that time.
Speaker B:And what happens is when our members are going through the profit assessment, obviously they have these feelings of overwhelm.
Speaker B:But then we look at their rollout plan like you, and we give them some step by step steps to take.
Speaker B:They're coming onto calls with us on a weekly basis and every week when we get them on that call, we ask them if they've made their allocations this week, what you know, because I know it's difficult because income comes into a business quite sporadically sometimes for some people.
Speaker B:A lot of accountants these days are getting everybody to pay by go cardless or DD or some similar method like that.
Speaker B:Therefore, most of the money comes in in one go.
Speaker B:Might be the first of the month, might be the seventh of the month, whatever that works out as.
Speaker B:But even so, there's still quite often some one off ad hoc work, some annual work that gets invoiced once a month.
Speaker B:So I fully subscribe and I always have done and this always worked for me personally and it's worked for all of the people I've worked with, with Profit first as well to, to commit to the same time and same day on a weekly basis to log on to your, open up your banking app, have a look at the income that's come in and move it into the pots appropriately by the percentages that are set.
Speaker B:Those percentages can only be determined from a correct and full profit assessment being ran on that business.
Speaker B:So this is the.
Speaker B:It's dynamite.
Speaker B:Being a Profit first professional, becoming in a member and having the guidance from all of us as their profit first professional, with all of our experience to guide them through that process.
Speaker B:Because you just cannot work that out from the book, no matter who you are, because the book isn't a manual or a textbook.
Speaker B:The book is full of the theory behind what Profit first is and the concept and some ideal scenario percentages based on businesses in the us, not necessarily based on business and industries in the uk.
Speaker B:So straight away there's a, there's a slight difference in how it works over here.
Speaker B:With our experience and our knowledge of different industries and different niches that we and our members have worked in, it gives us that elevated kind of area of success to be able to share with our members.
Speaker B:And our members really do benefit from the kind of tweaks and the, and the little tricks that we've learned along the way.
Speaker B:When they're going through this process with us and then being able to, for them to then talk to their clients, it's just immense.
Speaker B:And the beta client stage is what comes next.
Speaker B:So they implement profit first in their own business, which, by the way, is an ongoing journey.
Speaker B:You go through the implementation, but every week we keep asking about the allocations and every time we speak to our members, we always ask how their allocations are going and we review these over periodic sort of times as well with our members to make sure they're achieving the same success.
Speaker B:But moving on in the certification program, we then go to implement with three beta clients.
Speaker B:This is often the part that holds people up because people suddenly they've got to go and talk to a client.
Speaker B:A lot of accountants, Deb, are sometimes not the best communicators in the world.
Speaker B:Perhaps maybe it's because they haven't got the content or the value to be able to share with the client because it's the end of year situation.
Speaker B:So how did you deal with the beta client stage when you were going through certification?
Speaker B:I know it's a few years ago, but can you remember?
Speaker A:Yeah, there was small steps really, and I went to the clients that I could help the most that were most receptive.
Speaker A:And I had a really good rapport with and I kind of did it in a way that I was offering them a upgrade for a few months in service while I worked out and worked through my certification.
Speaker A:So that's how, that's how I did it.
Speaker A:They were very receptive because it was, it was something new.
Speaker A:But it's, it's choosing the right clients, but also not being overwhelmed yourself.
Speaker A:So just taking those small steps and following your guidance and the certification program, even though it was us, I had you there, Tim, to, to help me along with the, the UK version.
Speaker A:So, yeah, I just, I just took it one at a time really.
Speaker A:And when I had one conversation with one, that gave me the confidence to have the same conversation with the next.
Speaker A:And, and that's, that's how I built it up.
Speaker B:Yeah, because you've implemented in your own business as well and you've had the guidance from, from us as Profit first professionals.
Speaker B:You've already had a few points of resistance and maybe a couple of obstacles to overcome yourself.
Speaker B:But because you've done that, and I can remember this, you know, because we've overcome those obstacles and we've made the allocations and we start to see success, you can help your clients overcome those obstacles because you know they're going to come at you with the same issue that you had.
Speaker B:And that's why living it and breathing it and walking the walk is so important in the world of profit first.
Speaker A:Yeah, it was taken into consideration when they were being paid by their own clients and making sure that the money that they had coming in was covering the pots that were going out.
Speaker A:So we started with weekly because that was a great way to assess the inflow and outflow of the cash coming in.
Speaker A:But you quickly realize that if you, if the clients that aren't as profitable as they think they are, or they're dipping in to the, to their bank account to pay for personal items, it stops that kind of behavior because they end up having to take out from one pot to pay another, and that defeats the object.
Speaker A:So I explained numerous times, you have to be profitable to be able to run profit first with ease.
Speaker A:If not, you're going to be taking out.
Speaker A:So let's not dip in.
Speaker A:Let's just give you a set amount of money to cover your expenses, your personal expenses, every month or every week.
Speaker A:But stop dipping in and using your, your business bank account for your personal expenses.
Speaker A:It was a pain of our life.
Speaker A:Isn't it, Tim, that with clients.
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:It happens real.
Speaker B:The thing is, real world things happen.
Speaker B:You know, an annual cost that's been forgotten suddenly comes out of the bank account and oh no, we've got to cover that.
Speaker B:It causes panic.
Speaker B:But, you know, a plumber may have a van and the van's broken down and he needs to get something replaced or a new engine or, you know, and a few thousand pounds later, you know, back on the road earning money.
Speaker B:These things happen in the real world.
Speaker B:And being able to have a profit first professional to come to, to, to, to seek guidance and support over how to solve that problem without breaking the system is, is unbelievably important.
Speaker B:And it just shows that the guidance that we are able to provide to clients, it's massive, isn't it, in those situations?
Speaker B:Because if someone's tried to do this from the book and then this has happened, that's when you get the, I take it all out of the pots.
Speaker B:Profit first doesn't work because that's happened.
Speaker B:It's a waste of time when actually no, that's not the case.
Speaker B:It's just that you haven't got someone helping you.
Speaker B:The same as you mentioned earlier about, I think you mentioned the, the rollout plan being like a fitness plan.
Speaker B:Exactly the same, isn't it?
Speaker B:You're not going to go into a gym and lift really heavy weights the first time.
Speaker B:You're going to start off on small weights and then as the weeks progress and you find it easy, you're going to go up a weight, then you're going to go up another way, then you're going to up another way.
Speaker B:It's exactly the same with profit first and the percentages.
Speaker B:We move into the different parts.
Speaker B:You know, it's a structure plan that takes time but it needs that accountability, it needs that fitness instructor to come in, check on your progress.
Speaker B:You know, how are you getting on?
Speaker B:You know, actually I think you could go up by another 2kg next week.
Speaker B:You know, actually I think you could go up by 2% next week in your profit account and your owners pay because we're looking at your costs.
Speaker B:We're really on top of this at the moment.
Speaker B:And your revenues increased a bit, so that's going to help the situation.
Speaker B:Without that guidance, it's very hard to make everything work in the right way.
Speaker B:And you know, from an accountant and bookkeeper's perspective, providing an annual set of accounts, you know, a profit loss and a balance sheet, you might as well discount the balance sheet because business owners aren't going to read the balance.
Speaker B:She's not going to.
Speaker B:Some can, but there's not going to be a massive amount of people that are going to really get their head around that.
Speaker B:So they look at the profit and loss, they look at the accounting profit and they look at the Tax bill, that's all they're going to look at, but it's already too late to effect.
Speaker B:So the Profit First Professional that provides a profit assessment, which actually measures the cash, tells them where they're at and tells them how they can move forward with a really important blueprint of a plan to go forward.
Speaker B:It's just so valuable to clients and the success stores we've got, we'll back that up.
Speaker B:But of course, the starting point if we go back to certification is starting with three beta clients.
Speaker B:It's a little bit scary because it's the first time you've talked to a client about Profit first.
Speaker B:But most people can do that comfortably once they've gone through the conversations with us.
Speaker B:Then when they've achieved that, they take the certification exam and they become a certified Profit First Professional.
Speaker B:But that's where the journey kind of begins.
Speaker B:It's almost so.
Speaker B:So Ron, who we had on the podcast a while ago, who's Mike's business partner at Proffers First Professionals in the us, he always calls out the launch pad of your membership.
Speaker B:And I think that's a great way to describe it because now it's making everything come to life, isn't it?
Speaker A:Yeah, it is.
Speaker A:That's a.
Speaker A:That's a great analogy.
Speaker A:Yeah, the launch pad, because it is.
Speaker A:It's where everything starts, isn't it?
Speaker A:You've got your knowledge, the basic knowledge, but now you're in the community and you're supported and you've got your weekly calls.
Speaker A:You can explain the weekly calls, Tim, but the support.
Speaker A:The thing I like about it is because we have them so regular, it's not like a once a month.
Speaker A:And it's not just when you get online assistance, but you can join a call and ask the questions.
Speaker A:By the time you.
Speaker A:If you've got a question with a client, by the time you're going to speak to that client again, you could have joined a call and you've got the answer ready for them.
Speaker A:You're not going to have to wait forever.
Speaker A:And not only have you got the answer from one person, you've got the answer from the room.
Speaker A:You know all the Profit first professionals that are in that call, we all help each other.
Speaker A:It's a collaboration, not a competition.
Speaker A:And we've all got so such varied experiences, a huge library of case studies, because we've all at different various niches and different aspects of the journey across.
Speaker A:So, yeah, it's a great analogy because you just take off after that, don't you?
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:And you know.
Speaker B:So when you go through certification, you have a weekly cohort session as well as some one to ones and you're in your small cohort, three or four people going through the same structure using the online platform, which we'll talk about after, because there's exciting news on that for us, isn't there?
Speaker B:Once you've certified, we then move you into the next cohort.
Speaker B:So this is for people recently certified and the aim for that is to, is to get people bringing three clients on board that they're working Profit first with within that quarter.
Speaker B:So there's some certain steps they can take.
Speaker B:Now it's not as scary as it sounds, is it?
Speaker B:Because that's one client, one new client per month.
Speaker B:And you know, when, when we have Jason on these, on these calls and Jason talks to our members, he kind of says, what is it worth to a client if you can take them from earning 30,000 from their business to 50,000 from their business, just using those two numbers as an example, because that's what Jason uses.
Speaker B:What would they pay for you to do that with them?
Speaker B:Because these are the transformations we're actually doing when we're implementing Profit first with our clients.
Speaker B:So the pricing aspect, we can answer quite easily with that kind of question.
Speaker B:Think about the value that's going through.
Speaker B:But the idea is that we want to get people working with three clients as quickly as possible because there's even more learning there.
Speaker B:So Deb, your experience of becoming certified and then taking profit first out to clients, bringing new clients on board, etc.
Speaker B:Working with those first few clients is a real learning curve in itself, isn't is?
Speaker A:But it's funny because with the Profit First Professionals membership, it's like the, the members mirror the reactions of the, of the clients.
Speaker A:So the members have really look forward to the calls and so do the clients.
Speaker A:When you talk to the clients, because all of a sudden it's something different, something new.
Speaker A:You're not, they're not going to dread your call because you're going to hit them with a tax bill that they haven't prepared for.
Speaker A:They're actually looking forward to how much profit they can increase, how much owners pay they can increase, where they can cut costs if they're covering enough for tax, where they can grow.
Speaker A:And it's a different conversation completely.
Speaker A:It's about the future and where they want their business to be heading.
Speaker A:And not only that, where they want their business to, well, what kind of timeline in their lifestyle plans their business can fund.
Speaker A:Because essentially that's what they're, they're in business for.
Speaker A:So it's all about what they want to do and their plans going forward and how they're going to get there.
Speaker A:And that's the same with the members.
Speaker A:So the members join because.
Speaker A:And on their calls, they want to know what they're going to learn next and how they're going to progress in their business and how they're going to support their clients with their advisory.
Speaker A:So it's all about what they're going to do, not disasters that might have happened that they've got to firefight.
Speaker A:So, yeah, it's, it's completely different way to talk to your clients.
Speaker A:And it's more friendly.
Speaker A:It's more kind of.
Speaker A:I mean, you can, you can't really dress up a really high tax bill.
Speaker A:You know, however cheerful you are on the call, if somebody's got a tax bill that you can see that they haven't planned for you, it doesn't matter how cheerful you are on the call, you know, it.
Speaker A:They end up doom and gloom, don't they?
Speaker A:So it's a completely different conversation.
Speaker A:And I ended up knowing far more about my clients, having closer relationships with my clients being the go to.
Speaker A:So any questions they had about business in general, they would, we would be the go to because we'd opened up the conversation to marketing or websites or, you know, new vans, financing, whatever it was that we'd been talking about with the client for their plans.
Speaker A:So all of a sudden you're just the person that they, they want to have a quick chat with about, and that's, that's what you want.
Speaker A:You.
Speaker A:I certainly didn't want to just be lumbering and filling out tax returns for people.
Speaker A:So, yes, for me it was, it was great.
Speaker A:I loved it, still love it.
Speaker B:So I think, I think it's because you, with profit first, you're just, by having the conversation from a different perspective, with a lot more openness and in a way that the clients can understand, you're breaking barriers down.
Speaker B:So they're relaxing and then they're opening up on everything they actually do want to achieve.
Speaker B:And, and the things that they're struggling with, they're a lot more open about that.
Speaker B:So that we can actually support them more.
Speaker B:We can hold their hand through all the things we can guide them through.
Speaker B:Sometimes we don't have the knowledge to answer all their questions, but we generally know someone who does.
Speaker B:And we can either put them in touch or we can find that and come back to them.
Speaker B:And I think when you, when you're an accountant, the bookkeeper, only providing compliance and, and dare I say, monthly management accounts that, that we know our business owners don't really understand.
Speaker B:It's just a tick in the box for them, isn't it?
Speaker B:You know, we're not getting asked meaningful questions.
Speaker B:We're getting asked questions like, what's my tax bill going to be?
Speaker B:You know, and so we're guessing the answer and we're saying, well, looking at your forecast is probably going to be this.
Speaker B:Whereas when you're a Profit First Professional, you, you've already got the answer to that question and you've already made sure that they've got money building up in the pot that's going to cover that tax bill.
Speaker B:And I think that's what takes away the stressful conversations and takes away the stress from the business owner because your customer is looking to you to be the expert.
Speaker B:They just don't know that you're an expert right now.
Speaker B:So, so Profit first enables that to happen in such a smooth way.
Speaker B:And, and you're exactly right, Debbie.
Speaker B:It is all in small steps.
Speaker B:So, you know, you do a profit assessment, you have a conversation, you agree a rollout plan, you open up some bank accounts, you start to make some allocations.
Speaker B:For some people, you may only allocate into the profit initially because it's just too much, too overwhelming for them.
Speaker B:But you know, the person you're working with and you hold their hand and you take them through step by step.
Speaker B:This is exactly what we do with the accountants and bookkeepers that join Profit First Professionals.
Speaker B:We hold their hand, we guide them through, because we understand, because we are accountants, bookkeepers and coaches ourselves.
Speaker B:And if, you know, I sold my accountancy practice, but I'm still a coach.
Speaker B:You know, you had a bookkeeping business, you've moved into training.
Speaker B:Jason is a coach.
Speaker B:Duncan still got his accounting practice, Kerry's still got her bookkeeping practice.
Speaker B:So all the people that our members come into contact with have all this experience and we've learned the way to move forward with Profit first is to follow the Profit first mantra, which is 1% at a time.
Speaker B:So we take one step at a time and they're easily achievable small steps.
Speaker B:And we guide you through each week to take another step.
Speaker B:And if you take one step forward in your business each week, come the end of the year, you've made massive progress.
Speaker B:You just don't realize it until you get to the end of the year because then you look back and think, look what I've achieved.
Speaker B:How did that happen.
Speaker B:And the answer is profit first.
Speaker B:And being a profit first professional is why that happened.
Speaker B:So it's so powerful and it's so rewarding from where I'm sitting to see our members succeed because, you know, they're succeeding, because their clients are succeeding, because it all goes hand in hand.
Speaker B:I mean, it all works together in unison.
Speaker A:It does.
Speaker A:The other thing I've noticed as well is by doing small steps with people, you're really getting to the heart of what's holding them back, maybe, or not they're not confident in.
Speaker A:So we address that by really breaking down every single obstacle or barrier that they're coming across.
Speaker A:But it creates a safe space.
Speaker A:So by having those, by not expecting people to jump from one service straight into another or different mindset of dealing with clients or a different type of conversation they're having with clients, you do it in such small steps, but we do it with the members first that it opens up a safe space.
Speaker A:We can talk about anything that's going on in our business, the difficulties and the problems.
Speaker A:And every time a problem comes up, there's always another person that's had the same issue, whether that's carrying debt through from a long time ago, long time ago to, you know, personal issues that they've had to step away from the business.
Speaker A:But when we do that with members, that's giving them the skills and we also help them with the skills when they have to deal with that with their clients.
Speaker A:And it opens up, allows them to create space, so a safe space for them and their clients as well.
Speaker A:Because it's only really when you have a safe space that you can really get to the heart of what's going on in.
Speaker A:Money's emotional at the end of the day, isn't it?
Speaker A:It's personal to a lot of people.
Speaker A:So I think that is another aspect that comes from the membership.
Speaker A:It's not always something that people expect when they, when they join.
Speaker A:So yeah, we like to share, don't we?
Speaker B:Oh, massively.
Speaker B:I mean the, the power is in the community, isn't it?
Speaker B:Without a doubt.
Speaker B:You know, we, we have our community, you have your cohort calls, we have our community calls.
Speaker B:And from the community there have, have been collaborations, there are continual collaborations.
Speaker B:You know, two of our, our members based in Ireland, a building a podcast together that they're going to be putting out soon.
Speaker B:You yourself worked with a profit, one of our other Profit first professionals who did some coaching in your, within your bookkeeping business.
Speaker B:You know, I, I love the fact that, that, that Trust and the, the, the spirit in our community is amazing.
Speaker B:We, we have a WhatsApp group that I was a bit resistant of, if I'm honest.
Speaker B:I was the sticking point there and I'm so glad we did it.
Speaker B:Everyone was telling me, you were telling me, Kerry was telling me, Jason was telling me, Duncan was telling me, and I was like, oh, I don't know.
Speaker B:I don't know about a.
Speaker B:Was that with my phone going off all the time?
Speaker B:It's the best thing ever.
Speaker B:I absolutely love it.
Speaker B:I love the conversations in there.
Speaker B:I love the encouragement in there, I love the celebrating success in there.
Speaker B:I love the fact that people will say, I've got a problem, can I bring it to the call?
Speaker B:You know, can we talk about this on the court?
Speaker B:Yeah, of course we can.
Speaker B:We open up the call, they share the problem in more details.
Speaker B:It's easier to talk it rather than message it.
Speaker B:Of course.
Speaker B:And then, like you said, everybody around that's come to the corners, there's generally a good dozen of us, you know, come to the core regularly and provide that support and advice and that knowledge and share experiences.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker B:There's no end to the power of a community and I'm really 100% certain about that because I've found that for my own, you know, for my own advantage as well, learning from the community.
Speaker B:So I wanna, I wanna talk about our new profit First University UK platform there because you have been instrumental in helping us get, you know, get this together and better get it out there to our members.
Speaker B:Which is, which is going to be when the date this is going out.
Speaker B:This is going to be very, very soon, if not already live.
Speaker B:But I'm not going to give too much away and commit to a date right now because we're still not quite there.
Speaker B:But it's quite exciting, isn't it?
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, it is.
Speaker A:I'm busy changing the Americanisms, if you like, to the UK version.
Speaker A:So, yeah, so we'll have our own profit First University uk.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:And it's tailored exactly for our UK members rather than trying to bridge the Americanisms to what we would do in the uk, particularly around tax etc.
Speaker A:But, yeah, it's exciting.
Speaker A:I'm enjoying it.
Speaker A:Yeah, I'm enjoying putting all the knowledge onto an online program so that we can work at our own pace in the community.
Speaker A:Because some like to go faster than others, don't they?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:But, yeah, this, it's going to be an exciting time.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It is exciting and it's very exciting from my Perspective.
Speaker B:I've been wanting to do this from the moment we took the license on.
Speaker B:And you know, here we are three and a half nearly, you know, yeah, three and a half years later and it's start, you know, almost there, almost going live.
Speaker B:And for me, it's not just the certification program, it's the other.
Speaker B:It's the additional training programs that are going on there.
Speaker B:You know, we've got some marketing master classes coming up that are going to go in there.
Speaker B:You know, we've got, it's full of templates for our members to use.
Speaker B:There's resources in there for them to look at.
Speaker B:There's going to be recordings from all the calls or the previous calls that are going to have access where they've already got access to that them, but they're going to be in a central pool so they can re watch certain conversations we've had as a community about certain topics.
Speaker B:It's just a wealth of information, education and so many different topics.
Speaker B:I just, I'm not going to list them all now, but it, it, it just demonstrates how we're.
Speaker B:Yes, of course, first and foremost is always going to be profit first with everything we do.
Speaker B:But there's so much more.
Speaker B:There's so much more support we provide to our members, even down to creating digital assets, you know, starting up podcasts, hosting webinars.
Speaker B:You know, one of our members, John, he, he procrastinated.
Speaker B:I don't think he would mind me saying this about getting this webinar out for a period of time, but he navigated his way through with our support and our encouragement and a bit of accountability and a bit of a nudge in the ribs occasionally.
Speaker B:And eventually he got his webinar out for the first time.
Speaker B:And I went along to support and just kind of be in the audience just to see what was going on, where appropriate.
Speaker B:I might have asked a question just to help, you know, John perhaps explain something different, but other than that, I just sat back and John had created this amazing presentation, but he only presented for about 15 to 20 minutes and then he left 10 minutes for Q and A.
Speaker B:By the end of that call, he'd signed a new client working with profit first.
Speaker B:First webinar signed a client up, you know, and, and so now those webinars are going out regularly and, and they're getting more and more slicker as he goes.
Speaker B:And it just shows that with the encouragement and the training that we provide, when people take action, the successes do follow.
Speaker B:So, so it's just.
Speaker B:Yeah, I, I can't really demonstrate how much more it is than just profit first.
Speaker B:I don't know what else to say about that.
Speaker B:Whether you've got anything to add or not, I don't know.
Speaker A:Yeah, no, I'm really excited for it because as I say, we wanted to support accountants and bookkeepers in their businesses and.
Speaker A:But it's got to start with profit first because that is the framework that you've got to work to.
Speaker A:But then, as you say, you've got marketing.
Speaker A:And between us, what is there that we haven't done already in.
Speaker A:In.
Speaker A:In our own businesses?
Speaker A:From.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Writing books, the podcasts, building websites, landing pages, funnels, and all the soft skills that go with that.
Speaker A:The soft skills are the.
Speaker A:The confidence and the skills that you need for maybe difficult conversations or stage presence, presentation skills, crafting a talk.
Speaker A:So all these kind of things that we've all done and we've had training on ourselves, that's what we'll be building.
Speaker A:And if anybody wonders why.
Speaker A:Deb Halliday.
Speaker A:I used to work for a training company.
Speaker A:So there we go.
Speaker A:So that's.
Speaker A:Me and Tim had a conversation, didn't we, Tim, about what I did before keeping an accountancy.
Speaker A:And I said, no, we can do all this.
Speaker A:We can do this for our members.
Speaker A:So, yeah, so we put it all online and have some live sessions and yeah, it's going to be really exciting.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:I'm hoping to cover every aspect of business so every department of your business will have some kind of support, some kind of training.
Speaker A:Because we've got to wear all the hats, don't we?
Speaker A:Wear all the hats.
Speaker A:And some are better at some hats than others.
Speaker A:So we want to support.
Speaker A:Support you as accountants, bookkeepers and business coaches with your businesses.
Speaker A:So then you can then help your clients.
Speaker A:Now you've got to get your good work out there.
Speaker A:So that helps that.
Speaker A:That includes supporting your business.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And you know what, Deb, I think I shared this with you before.
Speaker B:I worked for, when I set my business up, originally, my accountancy business, I had a client who I worked for two days a week and he said I used to produce these monthly figures, but he said I decided I needed to get someone in who could do it better than me.
Speaker B:And he said, that's you.
Speaker B:You're doing it better than me.
Speaker B:So I've always remembered that.
Speaker B:And when we talked about.
Speaker B:I think I had a discussion with you about the online platform and I was trying to get it off the ground and I was struggling with how to structure it and stuff, videos.
Speaker B:But the next bit was really difficult and then I, you know, you reminded me of your 20 years experience and I thought, well, that Deb, you need to get involved with this class because you're better at organizing this than I am.
Speaker B:That's what we should be doing.
Speaker B:The different skill sets we've got within our community, if we can use that to our advantage to help everybody, then it's got to be the way forward, you know, in life as well as in work.
Speaker B:But thanks Deb, for, for joining me today.
Speaker B:I just wanted to share a little bit of an insight into what membership's like.
Speaker B:We wanted to get the point across that it's not just all Profit first related, although Profit first is the front and foremost of everything we do because we live and breathe it in our business.
Speaker B:And also that everything that you do for accountants and bookkeepers is all about taking small steps forward in your business that you can then take your clients through.
Speaker B:We are here to help accountants and bookkeepers become successful to move out of that trap.
Speaker B:They're in compliance based trap where it's going to get price shot and with AI and automation coming it's going to be harder and harder.
Speaker B:But the advantage of that is if you use it right, you can free up your time to start to deliver that high value, high impact advisory to your clients.
Speaker B:And what better structure to follow than Profit first and what better community to be involved in is one that can support you and guide you with every aspect of your accounting book keeping business.
Speaker B:So, so for anyone that is interested in perhaps finding out more about becoming a Profit First Professional, joining our membership and, and seeing what everything's about, you can go on to our Website profit first uk.co.uk if you're interested in joining us or finding out more, you can hit the wait list tab and fill out your expression of interest form.
Speaker B:Just answer five or six questions, very simple, not detailed and we're not prying for loads of information out of you.
Speaker B:So you can just.
Speaker B:You'll end up coming into my inbox at the moment and I'll reach out to you and we'll schedule a call and have a chat.
Speaker B:So thank you Deb, really appreciate your time today.
Speaker B:As always, enjoyable conversations.
Speaker A:Yeah, as always Tim, love the conversations.
Speaker B:Thank you for joining us on our podcast today.
Speaker B:Profit first beyond the book was brought to you by the Profit First Professionals UK and Ireland team.
Speaker B:If you'd like to find out more about Profit first or becoming a Profit first professional, head to our website profit first uk.co.uk.
