Are you overwhelmed?
Some bookkeeping business owners with families are.
Let's face it.
It's hard work making sure the kids are fed and your clients are happy.
Our guest, Nancy Gwynne-Vaughan knows the battle all to well.
She's a bookkeeper who helps lawyers grow their practices profitably.
But, she also doesn't like grocery shopping.
It used to really drain her.
In fact, doing some of these family tasks would take up her weekends then she'd dread going to the office on Monday especially during tax season.
Well, that all changed when she discovered how to streamline these duties so she could not only be more efficient at home and with her business, but she was able to enjoy life at a more reasonable pace.
During this interview, you'll learn...
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How to utilize the power of productivity apps such as Evernote to keep you on track
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Why delegating tasks to family members is a must
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Why planning meals weeks in advance is a huge time-saver
If you'd like to find out more about Nancy, email her at info@bookkeepingforlawyers.ca.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION
Michael Palmer: 01:20 Welcome back to The Successful Bookkeeper podcast. I am your host, Michael Palmer, and today is going to be another terrific episode. Our guest today specializes in working with lawyers and that's all she does. She helps lawyers grow their practice profitably. What I love about that is it's so specific. It enables her to be an expert and deliver incredible service to the people she serves. Welcome to the show, Nancy Gwynne-Vaughan.
Nancy Gwynne-Vaughan: 01:51 Thank you, Michael. It's a great pleasure to be here.
MP: 01:53 Yeah, it's a great pleasure to have you. And I'm excited because we've been working together actually for a long time now. And uh, I really want to share your journey because I think it's both educational and as well inspiring.
NGV: 02:08 Well, thank you very much.
MP: 02:10 Yeah. So tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became to be working with lawyers.
NGV: 02:16 Well, my dad was a lawyer and, uh, I say to people, I was born into the legal profession as a kid. It was a big treat to go into his office. And when I got old enough, he let me work there in the summers and Christmas holidays. And so I had some pretty good training. Um, I went to university and kept changing my major and couldn't decide what I wanted to do with my life. So I decided to take a job for a little while until I decided, and, uh, I took a job as a legal secretary in a small law firm and stayed there for 23 years. And in a small law firm, uh, you learned to do whatever you need to do. And when our bookkeeper quit, she came back and taught me how to do the books and I learned that I really, really love doing that.
NGV: 03:05 So for, I don't know, maybe 20 years I did the books, the accountant would come in and every year I try to figure out, okay, what are you doing that entry for and how are you getting that information? So we went to a point where I was actually doing all the closing entries and the accountant was just supervising. And, uh, it got to a point where my boss had really slowed down. He was quite a bit older than I was, and I had little kids at home and there wasn't much going on at the office. I was bored and I thought about getting another job, but I had a lot of flexibility and I didn't really want to go and work nine to five anywhere, so I decided to fall back on the bookkeeping. It was something that I could do that would give me the flexibility and I enjoyed it, but I have to say that for many years I did bookkeeping.
NGV: 03:59 I got a few clients, but at the end of tax time I would always think, oh, you know, I got to go get a real job, and I would think, oh, should I go to law school or should I go get my MBA or a ca? I don't want to be just a bookkeeper. And then I joined IPBC and I met some bookkeepers and I was completely blown away. I met one bookkeeper at my first meeting who was just about to buy her own building, and then I learned about Debbie Roberts and what she had accomplished, and suddenly bookkeeping was no longer just a job for me. It was a career and an amazing career that I absolutely loved. I had to decide was I going to do bookkeeping for all kinds of businesses or was I going to stick with what I knew and, and stick with lawyers and I had a couple of non lawyer clients and it just became apparent to me that I was going to have to really learn about all kinds of different industries and I was going to have to either charge my clients for my learning curve or I was going to have to do that on my own.
NGV: 05:09 And I really didn't want to do either of those things. So I decided I would stick with what I know, uh, develop a system, get really streamlined and good at that. And then, uh, my business started growing by word of mouth and that's where we are today.
MP: 05:25 That's phenomenal, I just love your, your backstory and the amount of time that you've put into really the training part of your, of your profession today in the business that you have today is you spent 20, 30 years developing yourself and becoming an expert before actually going into business for yourself when you did go into business. And when we met. Let's talk a little bit about some of the challenges that you faced. I mean, you have the experience, you have the knowledge, you have the technical ability. What was not working for you in business?
NGV: 06:00 I was, I wanted to fix everybody and help everybody and that was my focus. And you know, in a way when you're doing that, that makes you feel good. But I was doing it in a way that was very, very inefficient. I was running all around picking up books at people's offices, going into their offices, um, because the lawyers all, not all, but many of them work on the specialized software. Uh, at the time I was starting, it was only available in their offices and sometimes they would just have a computer, one computer. And so I'd have to go in when they weren't there or an evening, they'd give me a key to their office and I'd spend my nights and weekends away from my family working. By the time I ran around and, and got all of their stuff at the end of the day, I really hadn't done a lot of billable hours. Uh, so I was working like crazy and not really seeing a big benefit from it.
MP: 07:05 Yeah. And then from a pricing standpoint as well, I know that was something you struggled with as well.
NGV: 07:11 Yes. I forgot about that. Thank you for reminding me. Yes, I was charging very, very low hourly rate and I know when you and I started to work together, I went to one of the pure bookkeeping seminars and managed to get up the courage to ask you afterward if you did business coaching and, and that's when we started working together. And that was one of the first things that you, uh, made me do was put up my prices and man, I thought that was going to kill me. I was afraid I was gonna lose every single client and uh, I didn't lose a single one.
MP: 07:48 Yeah. It really is. You know, the one thing that stood out to me was that you're highly specialized. You've been doing this for a very long time and what you have available to the people that you work with is extremely valuable. And that's the one connection that you weren't making was that your value and how it relates back to your customer. And so putting up you're putting up what you charge these people was just really a clear, clear is about.
NGV: 08:17 Yeah. And, and uh, and I think a lot of that came from just that perception of being just a bookkeeper. And it's funny when I think about it, that came from something a kid in high school said to me, I got really high marks and did really well. And this kid in one of my classes said to me, Oh yeah, but you know, people like you, you just end up being bookkeepers or something like that. And I, and that just put this idea in my mind that stayed there for the longest time. And it was ridiculous. And I think when I finally started to meet other bookkeepers and go to IPBC events to intuit events, I'm talking to you. That really, really changed my perception of what it meant to be a bookkeeper and the value that I was bringing to my clients. Once I got that them, then it was easier.
NGV: 09:14 easier to,
NG: 09:16 to put the prices up.
MP: 09:25 I love this conversation because it's a conversation. It's just a language. It's how. Why is it that people consider bookkeeping to be less valuable than working with an accountant?
NGV: 09: 35 It's only because of the people who have been in the business in the past have felt the same way you have and it is made up of people just like you and we're starting to change that conversation, which is I thought about this morning. I was just sitting there thinking about that. Literally the brand, I guess you could say of bookkeepers and why people don't value them. Business owners don't value them. But the ones who are really bright business people actually do value bookkeepers and they value the information that they have and they use that information to help them make better business decisions and to grow their business. And I know you know a lot of really successful, uh, owners that have used bookkeepers to become really, really profitable.
NGV: 10:23 But you see, it takes a bookkeeper having that knowledge and actually stepping forward, stepping out there and, and helping owners with the information they have in order to change that. So you have to be a great bookkeeper. You have to be someone who's interested in business, that's interested in helping a business owner figure out a better way, figure out how to be more profitable. And if you're not going to be that type of bookkeeper, then well, you're probably not worth that much in the marketplace. But people like yourself, Nancy, you actually really care about helping those lawyers be more efficient, be more profitable, be more successful. And you're starting to do things and say, hey, look it, there's a better way. Let's do it this way. Let's get you more information, let's get you that information more quickly. Those people are the ones that are going to value more and more and more.
NGV: 11:11 And we're changing people like you are changing the landscape and it's through the help of the IPB. It's through the help of sure for sure. People like Debbie Roberts helping you change your mindset to give you the courage to give you the confidence to do that. So I really have to say, you know, and my hat is off to you and the rest of the bookkeepers that I work with that are doing similar things as you are in particular industries, uh, that are changing the conversation about what it is and what it means to be a bookkeeper and how that's extremely valuable to business owners.
MP: 11:46 Oh, it's, it's incredibly valuable. And a lot of people don't really understand that the bookkeeper is in such an excellent position to be able to help with the business because they see the everyday numbers and they see, they go into the offices, they see the inefficiencies.
NGV: 12:00 Um, and you know, you can't always rely on the client to know what technology is out there, uh, what potential streamlining we could do in their office. And often I find, at least with the lawyers, they're a little bit resistant to change. And it's funny, when I went to the, uh, IPBC conference in Niagara a couple of years ago, that was the first time that I had learned about things like Hubdoc and Wage Point and QuickBooks online. And I was completely blown away by what was out there and available. And nobody knew about that in the legal profession that I had run into.
NGV: 12:43 And so I started telling all of my clients about that and they were very resistant at first. Uh, and it was quite interesting. So what I did strategically, I just kept talking about it. Then QBO, uh, gave me a QuickBooks online account as a bookkeeper. And I don't know whether they're still doing that, but anybody who has not looked into that, uh, at least for a time, a lot of these app partners of QuickBooks online are offering free accounts to bookkeepers. It's part of their marketing. They give the bookkeeper a free account and then the bookkeeper can do some marketing for them with his or her own clients. So I got a free, uh, QBO account. I got a free Hubdoc account and I started using them. And then I started going into my client's offices and saying, oh, you wouldn't believe how easy QuickBooks online is.
NGV: 13:38 It's amazing. And here's things that it's doing and I'm actually working with it. And they started to get a little bit curious. And then I would say, you know, you're a management company that you have, I think would be ideal for QuickBooks online. And I would start talking to them about how I thought that would save me a lot of time and that would, in turn, save them a lot of money and we could have information for them much more quickly in, in real-time. And eventually, a couple of the clients were willing to try. And then of course, once you get one of the lawyers doing it, you can go into the other offices and saying, well, not only am I doing this in my own business, but also so and so and so and so are, are working on that and it's working really well in their firm.
NGV: 14:25 One of the things that I tried to do when I first go into a firm is streamline the bookkeeping process and, and try to save them a little bit of money, tell them how we can make things a little bit better for them. My husband, who is an hourly employee, used to get really angry with me and he'd say, why are you telling them how to reduce the amount of time they need you? You're paid by the hour and that means you'll make less money. And that was a concept that he really had a lot of trouble getting his head around. And uh, and I said to him, you know, that's how you build the trust with your client. You go in there and, and you go in with the mindset that you're really working for them. You're really doing everything you can to make their business run efficiently, to have them spend as little as they can on the expense part of bookkeeping.
NGV: 15:24 I would much rather have them streamline their data entry and those sorts of tasks and then spend time sitting down with them and talking about their business saying, hey, did you notice that your receivables are getting really high and you're working on the weekends and your, you're working like crazy, but you're not actually making money. Because at the end of the year we're writing off so much of this and fewer lawyers. They're just in such an ideal position because they can get retainers and you know, they say to me, what's the best way to collect accounts receivable? And I say, Oh, well for you the best way to collect accounts receivable is don't have them get retainers. So we have worked, uh, at least in our business to try to really find ways to make them efficient and technology. The technology that I've been learning through IPBC has gone a long way to really make that happen and to try to really help them in their businesses.
NGV: 16:26 To get some value rather than just some, somebody coming in and doing data entry. And it's interesting because I talked with a lot of lawyers, some of them are in what they call law chambers, which is the practice with a group of other lawyers. And I've heard comments like, um, oh my bookkeeper said we should try this and this and this. And, and another lawyer will respond by saying, your bookkeeper has ideas. Um, and I, I, I thought that was kind of interesting that there are people out there who aren't taking that approach. And I would really encourage people who are in the bookkeeping profession to pitch ideas to your clients. They're, they're open and they need that.
MP: 17:17 Absolutely. And those ideas come from things like the Institute of professional bookkeepers, which is a Canadian Association for bookkeepers. There's the ICB in the United States and every country in every region, there's likely one like that. So listeners, you know, that's is where their job is to bring you information and knowledge. Like Nancy's talking about to sharpen your tools and to beat, make you a better person, a better business person, to be able to work with these different clients, which I think is just fantastic Nancy. And that's really how you do value is you be valuable to your customers. When you're valuable, you're, you're, you're valued. And that has a lot of implications around how much you get paid and as well how long you stick with a particular organization. I'd like to talk a little bit about your own, an improvement in your, in your business. And we had a conversation not that long ago about how you've started to see your life improve because of the systems that you're in. You're putting in place in your own business. You actually started putting into your, uh, your own life.
NGV: 18:27 Yes. And what a surprise that was. And I've always considered myself an organized person. I have had to do lists and spreadsheets and all that kind of stuff and, and thought I was doing a pretty good job. But, uh, we've had a really busy few years in our family. We had a wedding, we had people in and out of hospital. And, and I would like to say that the improvements that that came in my personal life were because I was brilliant and I, I made a plan. But the truth is they happened very accidentally and, and pretty much out of desperation, um, we had this really busy season as I've said. And, and, uh, my house really paid the price for that, uh, was getting really cluttered. Uh, it wasn't as organized as I would like it. And then my cleaning lady decided she was going to take eight weeks vacation at tax time.
NGV: 19:24 And so last May out of absolute desperation cause I couldn't take it anymore. I took off the first week of May and I spent the month of April really figuring out what do I need to do to make my housework because it's driving me nuts. It's disorganized and it's cluttered and it's dirty. And, and what do I need to do to fix that? What are the areas that are really bothering me? Um, where do I really need to put some effort? And so I spent the month of April. I had a list on a clipboard. I took it with me almost everywhere I went. And every time I had an idea pop into my head, I wrote it down on the list. So that by the first week of May I knew exactly what I wanted to accomplish. I set a timeline of what days I was going to do, which tasks, and then I just had laser focus.
NGV: 20:19 I got up in the early morning and just started working. I would run out by what I needed to do. I'd worked till 10 o'clock at night. I'd send my husband out for dinner, and by the end of that week, I had everything labeled and boxed. I had bags of garbage out at the curb. Um, and then I started to tackle some of the other areas over the summer. I bought QuickBooks online account from my own personal finances, and I started putting all of my bills onto electronic payments. I had all of the bills then go into my Hubdoc account. So I no longer had piles of paper on my desk that were personal that I had to deal with and file and all of that. I preauthorized all of my personal payments on my debit card or credit card. I opened a tangerine bank account and had savings, just a go automatically debited from my account.
NGV: 21:23 Just anything that I could do to streamline. I tried to tackle that and I tried to do it in the way that I would approach a client. So my systems that I had in place before were pretty good, but I don't take a set of books that are pretty good and hand those over to an accountant at the year-end. And so I tried to apply the same standards or I'm just going to sit and figure this out and take no prisoners, just keep at it and add it an out until I have a system that really, really works. And so I've, I started out with lists and in excel that I printed on a piece of paper to do every day. What are my goals and what do I want to get done? And that got awkward because I didn't always have the list with me.
NGV: 22:14 So then I would jot something down in my phone or I would do it on another list when I was out of clients and I every once in awhile my to-do list would have this item on it that said, consolidate to-do lists. And so then I learned about a software program called Evernote. They learned about that when I was at the intuit thrive conference. Some of the thought leaders in bookkeeping that I had become acquainted with through these conferences. We're talking about Evernote and I thought, Oh, I've got to explore that. And so I opened an Evernote account and now I have a single place where I have all my lists, all my to-do lists for clients, my to-do list for myself personally. And uh, I have two lists. One is my current to-do list and uh, per Scott Friesan who was on one of the other successful bookkeeper podcast, what's that list is what's going to be done in two weeks, in two hours.
NGV: 23:16 My other list is called not doing now. And Michael, you're the one who gave me the idea about the to-do list doing now and not doing now. And that has been amazing, amazing value. Now every task that I have to do is captured and I don't have to keep it in my head. And that has been huge. Um, the other thing that, that I tackled most recently was meal planning. And that for me, meal planning and Grocery shopping was just a huge pain point for me. And I know not everybody struggles with that. I have a girlfriend who doesn't even have a list. She just goes to the store and she knows what she needs. But for me, that was always a huge pain point. And my Saturdays would be get up, struggle with figuring out what the meals were going to be, struggle with the grocery list, then make lunch for my family, then go out and get the groceries, then come home and do the cooking and I'd fall into bed exhausted at the end of the day, feeling like I really had no weekend.
NGV: 24:23 Um, so what I did was I took that grocery shopping task and I delegated it to my husband. I love that. That took a lot. I was afraid he was going to mess it up. And, uh, so I, I created a list, it's a list. It's got brand names on, okay, buy this brand, not this brand. And here are the flavors of this that we like. I mean, we tried to make it as easy and he resisted. At first he was not really thrilled with the idea of doing the groceries, but I knew it was something that he would do because it was important to him, cause I'd get up on Saturday mornings and as soon as he got up, it'd be, okay, do you have the list on yet? Are Low, what are we going to do? Groceries. And so I thought, okay, you know what?
NGV: 25:05 This is really important to him. I think it's something he will actually do. And so, so we implemented that and then we implemented on Saturday lunches take out. So that's one less task that I have to do. And then I took it even further. I went into crazy detail and I planned several weeks worth of meals on an excel spreadsheet, including here's the grocery list that you have to do to get these meals and here's the prep that you need to do on Sunday to make these meals happen during the week. And since we have implemented that to that level, it's made a profound impact on my business. And that was something that I had not anticipated. I was just trying to get my house cleaned up and, and solve some personal pain points. I really wasn't thinking in terms of how that would impact the business, but I was sitting here, uh, about a month ago at my desk, which is not cluttered with paper.
NGV: 26:11 And I realized it's tax time and I'm not feeling in a huge panic. I'm busy and I'm steady, but I'm not feeling that sense of dread about tax time that I had felt in previous years. And I, I was trying to think of, you know, why do I feel like that I've got the same number of clients that I had before. I have the same staff I had before. What's the difference? And I, I realized that my head is clear. I'm juggling all of these personal tasks and when I come into my office on a Monday morning, the desk is clean, the to-do list is mostly done because it's in Evernote. Um, so I never have to write and rewrite lists. Um, and that has just created an amazing space for me to be able to work at my business.
NGV: 27:08 It's incredible.
MP: 27:16 It really isn't it, it's such a, an eloquent example of a system dependency and that you've built systems in your business, but now you've done it in your life. And a system is simply something that's repeatable. It's documented. People can understand that. And what happens is once you've created it, you can then improve it. And so I just love that example of your husband. It was like, okay, you know, here's the list and here's all the brand names is exactly what I want you to buy. And now here's a, uh, let, let's go further. Let's take this further. Let's have a, a scheduled repeatable scheduled menu with everything that needs to happen in order to fulfill on this, these meals, which takes all of the onus off of your family and the decision making. And, you know, what are we going to do next? I mean, if people can just sort of listen to your story and think, well that's, you know, just, you know, having systems in your life and having systems in your business, it's a game-changer. It gives you the ability to actually have more mind share and space available to do better work.
NGV: 28:30 Oh, it was absolutely incredible and life-changing. And I'm not saying by any means that I have arrived or that this is perfect. We're still tweaking and, and revising and changing. And I get little nuggets of ideas, um, from listing to successful bookkeeper podcasts, from going to conferences just in, in terms of little things that can make a profound difference in, in how your like life works. And it just creates this lovely space in which to think.
MP: 29:06 Absolutely. And that is the real key is that it's, it's not that systems are ever done and dusted. They are constantly needing to be retweaked. And same with the business, right? With Your Business. There's new technology, there are things that happen, there are changes in the business environment. All of these things happen. Your systems need to be tweaked and improved. And, and as things change, uh, thou, those changes need to be documented. So the key is though is that you think the system, you think like a, a system-dependent person. That's what enables you to actually put them in place and they take a lot of work. As you can see, just by listening to two Nancy's story here, there, there's a lot of thought went into a lot of work went into it. And, and what's the payoff? Well, the pay off is eventually you get this massive space of time and efficiency where your productivity soars.
NGV: 30:02 It was amazing. And, and I have to say that the process was really painful and for a very long time I did not feel I was making any progress. And, and I think the key is to really stick with it. You know, it's a little bit like when you're dieting and you start your diet on a Monday and then on Tuesday you have a doughnut and you'd say, Oh, well this week shot. And then you say, well, you know what, I'll start next Monday and since I'm starting next Monday, I'm going to eat like crazy, all my favorite things. And then I'll start again next Monday. And of course, then the cycle just repeats. And I think that the key was that there were two keys. The first one was taking time for extreme focus and we all tell ourselves in our business, oh, I don't have time for that.
NGV: 30:50 It's tax time. I can't take a week off. And, and we tell ourselves, and I certainly can't take a week off in the middle of talk time to do something for my personal life. I don't know about the other listeners, but my mindset often tends to go to, well, the business is the priority. I, that's where I've got to make my systems. And that's where I've got to put my focus. And you know, spend time with my family and that's also extremely important. But the, those systems things in those focus things that go with the business. And as I say, it was just such a surprise to me when I took that really focused time to do these things in the business. What a profound change that made in the business was just a really a huge surprise.
MP: 31:39 Beautiful. I love the story and I, I'm, I'm guessing that there's going to be listeners that are going to be inspired to do the same. Nancy, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you, connect with you if they know of somebody that would be great to be working with you if they know lawyers, what's the best way?
NGV: 31:57 I think the best way is email and my email address is info at bookkeeping for lawyers dot. Ca and I would be very happy to talk to anybody who had a question about working with lawyers or needed some advice about working with lawyers or wants to just shift all their lawyers my way. Cause they're driving them nuts.
MP: 32:18 Yeah, absolutely. Well. What's interesting is you recently, I saw a conversation on The Successful Bookkeeper Facebook group, which is a private group for our, for our listeners, for our community and listeners, if you're not on that group, it's an extremely valuable group to belong to. It's on Facebook. You can also join it on Linkedin, which is, it's much smaller there right now, but we're going to grow that out as well. But on Facebook, if you just simply search for the successful bookkeeper and the search and you request to join, you'll get access to that. And, and I, I noticed that there was a, someone who had a question about lawyers and dealing with lawyers and you had answered a whole bunch of those questions and now I know, I think you both are, can either have or about to connect offline. So just a great example of leveraging the network and you're such a generous person as well, generous with your knowledge and your time, which is, which is great.
MP: 33:14 So if you want to connect with Nancy, that's definitely a great place to do it is in the successful bookkeeper group on Facebook. And probably on Linkedin, if you searched your name, you'd find on LinkedIn connect with Nancy and she, uh, she's certainly a wonderful person to be associated with. And uh, and then we'll make sure that we have the connection on our show notes as well at Thesuccessfulbookkeeper.com. Well, Nancy, this has been just a delightful episode and you shared so many interesting tidbits around how you're operating in your business, how you're operating in your life as well to bring the sense of productivity and, and efficiency, which I think has just been great.
NGV: 33:56 Thanks, Michael. It has been a real pleasure. I have, I have enjoyed the other podcasts. I have got so much information from the other podcasts and uh, it's been my pleasure to share any little tidbits that I can share with the listeners. Uh, and it's been a great pleasure working with you all these years as well.
MP: 34:17 Absolutely. We'll definitely have you back again. I know there are so many other things I've, I've seen you do over the years, and I a, I want everyone to learn about it and, and just see the great things that you're doing. So thank you again. And until next time, well, that wraps up another episode of The Successful Bookkeeper podcast. To learn more about today's guest and they get access to all sorts of valuable free business-building resources. You can go to Thesuccessfulbookkeeper.com.
MP: 34:43 Until next time. Goodbye.
