What do CAS include?
CAS include a wide array of services that depend on the specific needs of each client, including cash flow forecasting, budgeting, technology implementation, industry benchmarking, business valuations, and tax planning. Ultimately, advisory services are any form of advice regularly given to a client in relation to their business.
The list of potential services is as diverse as the specific needs of your client base. Whether it involves pricing, sales, hiring, or expansion, clients are looking for a professional who can explain future-looking forecasts, and help them use that knowledge in their business decisions.
Adding value for clients
Technological changes are upending the industry in many ways. What hasn’t changed is the level of trust small business owners place in their accountants. Through the pandemic, accounting professionals became therapists, coaches, and partners to their clients, helping them navigate the most significant economic downturn they’d ever known.
Clients look to their accountant for answers to questions ranging from how to pay an employee, how cash flow will affect a loan application, and even how to use accounting software. While technology can generate more data and often better information, your clients need you to help them understand that information and apply it in ways that make sense for their business.
Why is now the best time to consider adding CAS?
Working in accounting can be a rewarding endeavor, professionally and personally. If you’re anything like me, you find fulfillment in helping businesses thrive by keeping their financials in order.
Accounting firms have always provided valuable information to their clients through financial statements and tax returns. However, the assembling of this information is becoming more automated and commoditized by the day.
Next-generation accounting tools powered by machine learning are processing transactions and analyzing data with greater efficiency, which is devaluing traditional bookkeeping and tax preparation services.
You don’t have to look any further than a recent investment by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in an accounting startup called Pilot ($1.2 billion valuation) to understand that the field of accounting is in the midst of a sea change with far-reaching impacts on firms that serve SMB clients. You may already recognize this trend in subtle ways through conversations with prospective clients who are beginning to care less about how and more about how much.
