Why you need a good accountant

You may be a whiz at finances, and you may think that hiring an outside accountant, or a permanent accountant for that matter, is unnecessary, but consider the following.

1. Let's say you're the head of your own business. It's got to be a small business, because if it was a big one, we wouldn't be discussing this. You'd have an accountant or two or a dozen on the payroll already. Now, this is the very first point we want to make. Big businesses, successful businesses, have accountants working round the clock for more reasons than one. Assuming that you'd like to grow your business, let's look at a few benefits for hiring an accountant even while you're still at the small stage.
2. You know the old axiom: a good way of reaching a goal is to imitate ways in which other people have reached the same goal. The artist reads up on successful artists and carefully writes down what their schedules were like, where they trained, how often they worked, what they considered important to the growth of their talent. An athlete does the same; a businessperson the same. The key to becoming like something, at first, is to imitate it, until you take on those characteristics permanently; and maybe others will someday imitate you. This principle applies to the question of why you need a good accountant. As I mentioned before, you may be a whiz at finances, but as the head of your company you've got a lot on your plate. Finances aren't your chief area of concern. As your company grows, so will your responsibilities. You'll have less and less time to focus solely or even mainly on finances, and your finances will suffer for it.
3. That's a good reason for hiring an accountant right there. Don't get me wrong: you'll still want to stay on top of your finances as much as you're able, if for no other reason than to impress your accountant and keep him or her on the ball constantly. But you'll find after a while that you're able to focus a little more energy here, a little more energy there; that you're able to get a greater picture of your business as a whole, thus a greater vision of where you want your business to go. THIS is why you need a good accountant, no matter where your business is currently, no matter how keen you are regarding business finances. An accountant will free you up to be the boss rather than the accountant. Furthermore:
4. No matter how naturally adept you are at something; no matter how much time you've spent teaching yourself the skills; no matter how confident you feel about handling X or Y; there's nothing like expert training for churning out expert performance. A kid can hit baseballs in his backyard all day long, and develop his natural gifts enormously, but a good hitting coach will take him to places he couldn't have dreamed were possible. A good track coach will give a talented runner an extra two inches no matter how much time that runner has spent honing his gifts on his own. In a race, two inches means everything, and you should think of this metaphor when you think of why you need a good accountant. An accountant has spent years in school learning not just the fundamentals of the craft, but learning how to keep up on the latest developments of the craft as well. A good accountant will always have a technique you were unaware of, an option to explore that you wouldn't have thought of exploring, simply because you weren't trained.
5. Consider these few reasons next time you think about hiring an accountant. An accountant will give you a head start on growing your business by allowing you to focus your energies in other places; and by the time your business starts growing, you won't need to adjust to the presence of an accountant. You'll smooth right on in. An accountant will also bring expert training to add to your natural competence (or incompetence-we haven't even talked about that yet). Whatever way you look at it, hiring a good accountant is a good idea.