When In Doubt, Talk to a Professional
Last week, when we did our post discussing the IRS rulings for contracted workers vs. employees there were a lot of questions and comments and ideas and thoughts and “what ifs”. My response to all of this: talk to your tax accountant. Don’t have one? Hire a good CPA with great references. (If you need one in Washington state, let me know… I have a GREAT accountant there.)
Listen… we expect our clients to hire professionals, don’t we? We constantly tell our clients:
- Hire a reputable and experienced photographer or you will regret your wedding photos
- Hire a capable and trustworthy wedding planner or your wedding will be disastrous
- Hire an invitation designer or you’ll be tying ribbons on programs at 3am the morning before your wedding
Why in the world do we think that we can get away being tax experts, legal experts, graphic designers, financial experts, and so on?
We expect our clients to hire professionals to manage their wedding, yet we don’t hire professionals to help us with OUR BUSINESSES! HOLY MOLY! We have this all wrong. We use our friends for legal advice when we should be talking with a lawyer. We read blogs for tax advice without ever consulting a CPA. We design our own logos in Microsoft Word.
Now, I realize all of these professionals can be costly. But, a lawsuit is quite costly also… as is an IRS audit. The cost of advertising is costly… especially if you lose business when the client gets to your website.
Here’s a few quick things I advise business owners to do at the very minimum:
- Have a lawyer review your contracts
- Have a CPA review your employee, intern, and contractor agreements
- Discuss your bookkeeping procedures with a CPA
- If you know your website needs work, talk to a designer
Like everything, prioritize your finances and find a way to work this into your budget in the next 12 months. It can save you heart ache and dollars in the long run.
Excellent Post!
It’s true. For the longest time I thought (for some reason) I should be able to do anything design related myself. I.e. the web site. Why on earth? I have no training! So glad to be in the hands of professionals this time — I have a feeling it will be worth every penny. Oh and there is also the bonus of I DON’T HAVE TO DO IT! 🙂
I absolutely LOVE my CPA! I have a background in accounting, but haven’t practiced in over 10 years. I opened the newest version of Quickbooks and felt overwhelmed, like a deer in headlights, and my creativity was nearly paralyzed. I hired Nona and got back behind my lens…..where I belong.
(Plus she likes shoes as much as I do & even sends me her shoe-shots. Sweet!)
Thanks for writing such great posts!
Great advice as always Michelle!
Great advice! You have to do what you are good at and leave the other things to the professionals. Doing things that you are not skilled at just wastes time and money (even though saving money is what drives most business owners to try to do these things themselves.) We are lucky and grateful to have an amazing accountant, web designer, graphic designer and attorney:)
Thanks for posting this!!
I definitely practice what I preach! So many wedding planners try to get away with designing their own site and I love your quote, “We expect our clients to hire professionals to manage their wedding, yet we don’t hire professionals to help us with OUR BUSINESSES!” I cringe when I see DIY websites created by wedding planners. You can design an event but that doesn’t mean you can design a website.
I have NEVER understood why people don’t take their logo, brand, website, etc. seriously. My husband has a graphic design degree yet I hired a separate graphic designer well versed in the wedding industry to design my logo. Money well spent.