Which professional can help you manage your finances effectively?
When small business owners are struggling with budgeting and saving one of the first places they often go for help is to their accountant, bookkeeper or financial planner.
These seem like the obvious first step in fixing their problem of overspending and debt overwhelm, being blindsided by unpredictable expenses and feeling anxious and out of control, but in most cases people are left feeling like they paid a lot of money and didn’t get what they really needed.
A really common statement we hear over and over from clients and subscribers is “My accountant, financial planner or bookkeeper should be able to help me with my finances. I certainly pay them enough!”
However, this is flawed thinking. While these professionals are excellent and in many cases essential for helping you keep great records for the ATO, reducing your tax, or helping you invest, they don’t specialise in helping people manage their finances effectively, especially their personal finances.
As a result of this misjudgement, people grow to be annoyed with their accountant, bookkeeper or financial planner. In truth, they are really wanting to fit a square peg into a round hole. Their misjudgement and frustration eventually leads them to giving up altogether, sending themselves further backwards financially.
Case Study – Kelly & Mark
Kelly and her husband Mark have run a successful fabrication business over the past 20-odd years. Their business turnover and cash flow has always been considerable and so they believed they could live the lifestyle of their dreams because cash was always available.
Over the years, though, they racked up a considerable amount of credit card debt for the business and were straining under the weight of it all.
When we spoke, Kelly told me that her accountant and financial planner were both ‘hopeless’ because they couldn’t seem to give her any advice about their cashflow or debt. I explained that accountants are essential for helping us get the most out of our tax return and make sure we’re tax compliant, and financial planners are essential for looking after our protection (ie insurance) and investing needs.
Everyone needs a good one of each of these professionals on their team, but it’s not their role to help you manage your spending.
Now that Kelly and Mark understand the proper role of these professionals, and also have a great system for managing their day-to-day spending, they’re finally able to pay off their debt and start saving for the future.
Case Study – Vivienne
Another client of ours, Vivienne, a bookkeeper herself, thought she had her finances all wrapped up until we had a chat. She realised that her fancy excel spreadsheet only allowed her to see a snapshot of her finances, and particularly what she’d spent (past tense), rather than giving her the daily information she needed to inform all her future spending decisions.
She had avoided putting extra money into Super because she was worried that she “might need it down the track”.
With a comprehensive and dynamic Spending Plan in place, covering for all her predictable, unpredictable and long-term expenses, Vivienne could then see exactly how much she could afford to pay into her super each week without leaving herself high and dry down the track.
Vivienne then felt assured that she could make this positive change to her finances and see her super balance grow. She knows that this is going to make a massive difference to her retirement lifestyle.
Our Advice
– If you’re in business and you don’t have a really good accountant, financial planner, bookkeeper AND spending planner on your team then start interviewing people for the job.
You want to find people who, in the words of Dave Ramsey, have the ‘heart of a teacher’. You will pay them well, but that investment will see you far better off for your investment.
A key member of your team should be that of a Spending Planner (or budgeting specialist). If you’re serious about harnessing every cent you earn and putting it to good use in creating wealth then getting a really comprehensive and customised Spending Plan set up is absolutely going to get you there faster than if you tried to do it all on your own.
You can find a Certified Spending Planner in your state, and possibly even in your home town or city, by going to https://findaspendingplanner.com.au.
The Spending Planners Institute is the body that trains and certifies Spending Planners to do the work that we do in helping people budget effectively so that can realise their financial dreams.
The fact is that most people simply do not have the time or the understanding to put together a comprehensive and dynamic spending plan for their family, not to mention one which is going to travel with you through life and stand the test of time.
You may have picked up a book on budgeting and saving, or downloaded a cheap app to help you with this stuff and then found that you abandoned it a short time later.
A Spending Planner’s job is to work with you to not only create a living dynamic spending plan for you but also help you use it to navigate every spending decision of your life.
We honestly don’t care whether you work with us, or any of the other Spending Planners around Australia, New Zealand, USA or the UK. We do care that you find someone who can help you get your money organised and working for you.
Image credits.
Feature image – Photo by Rawpixel.com
Two women working – Photo by Rawpixel.com
Bookkeeper – Photo by Freepik
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