I have had opportunities to tell staff how it was in the “old days”. Filling out tax forms with a pencil…adding numbers with an adding machine…writing and mailing letters…talking to clients on the phone…mailing huge volumes of paper etc. Much has been replaced with spreadsheets…desktop tax preparation software…scanned documents…email/text messages/video conferences…efiling… and thankfully still talking to clients on the phone. I feel like my father telling about walking to school five miles, uphill both ways with no shoes. My partner, Dennis Stein, and I are thankful that we no longer suffer from the most vicious of all accounting injuries…the dreaded paper cut.
Even with all of this change, the Talking Heads (that's a band for you youngsters) had it right
that it is the “Same as it ever was”.
How we grow as a firm is still is guided by a culture of working hard to
take great care of our clients. Yes
doing this today is done with a new set of tools in our tool box (like my
iPhone 4S, which is pretty cool). However,
without great people, the tool box would be underutilized. DKB has great people who work hard to take
great care of our clients and are darn good with the new tools of public
accounting. Clients may wonder at times
why we ask a question twice so we fully understand a transaction and find the
hidden tax benefits. Or wonder why it is
taking a little bit longer to complete their tax return filing or financial
statements. Or understand why they might
be getting an email from DKB staff at 10pm asking a question to they can meet a
critical deadline. It is about taking
great care of our clients.
I feel like we have a
“connection” with every one of our clients.
The connection can be different from client to client. A relationship can be deeper with some clients
than others. However at DKB, our firm
culture has never been built on a customer who simply pays us revenue and we
provide service. I think there is always
some further connection or story to the relationship with our clients. That’s why we have great clients. We thank everyone of you. Happy tax day to all.
