Are All Accountants the Same?

A while back we were chatting to a recruitment manager. We were explaining to her the difference between a recruitment agency and a Talent Search Consultancy.

She was just not getting it.

I think the reason was that she had been dealing with so many agencies throughout her life, that she was just unable to make the paradigm shift to a new way of sourcing talent.

She told us that all agencies are just the same. Putting us in the agency box, which as you know we aren’t an agency.

I again tried to explain to her that we are a talent search consultancy, not an agency. She responded, “I need a vacancy filled. You fill vacancies; therefore you are just like everybody else. Even if the way you go about doing this is different.”

Some of you reading this article may even agree with her logic. It is quite common in the industry.

I suppose in some contexts she is actually right.

When you have a job, which is of low impact to the organisation, it probably does not matter that much who you put in it. A large multinational is famous for saying that their systems are so good, that people don’t matter. They are currently struggling with a massive crash in their revenues. I suppose people do matter after all.

So perhaps she was right for some vacancies, but definitely not all vacancies.

There are certain roles in a business where the person you hire really does matter. For instance, an executive role. Tom Boardman former Nedbank CEO added something like R2.1 Billion to the turnover of Nedbank in one year. In that case Nedbank made a brilliant hire. They put the right person in the job. Same would go for the more famous example of Steve Jobs turning around Apple and making it the world’s largest technology company. Also think about what has happened to Apple since his tragic departure.

If you think about these examples, I’m sure you would agree that good people do matter. Especially in critical roles where you have to get the right person.

A critical role is a role where if the person messes it up, there will be harm to the company. That may mean downtime, loss of revenue, losing key staff etc… Further, if the person does the job well the business will typically be uplifted. That may mean increased revenue, uninterrupted operations, break-through innovations etc…

I think we all instinctively know this. However, we are so busy with the hum-drum of business life that we often forget to think about it when hiring.

So now back to the title of this post. Are all Accountants the same?

You are probably thinking that I’m referring to hiring accountants. In a sense I am, but not in the sense you are thinking.

You see, we had a really perplexing problem when we started out.

We could not find a good accountant.

We tried and we tried and we tried. They either could not do the job, stole our money and did nothing, were unable to register us with the right authorities and generally left us frustrated with a lack of financial support and guidance.

Then we found a really top company. They were a bit more expensive for sure. But they made sure everything was sorted. They produced reports, filed compliance on our behalf and managed our books with excellence.

They were a world-class service provider.

As you can see from our experience, not all accountants are the same.

And by the same logic, neither are all recruiters.

Especially when it comes to hiring for critical skills.

Some recruiters will merely spam you with as many CVs as possible. Doing hardly any filtering for the role.

Others will send you two or three CVs that look good, and where they have even interviewed the person face-to-face. But when you climb into the details of their processes, you discover that their interview processes are at best primitive, and having limited actual relation to the role. Yes, they did send you a few good-looking CVs, but have they really done a broad industry search and found the Top 2%? Unlikely.

Then you get Xenitho. We have spent years perfecting our craft. Learning the difference between a Top 2% hire and a good-looking CV who impresses in interviews and then disappoints when hired. We have made our mistakes. Everything utilising lean continuous improvement does, but we have also learnt from them. Saving you the mistake of a mis-hire.

We perform many more activities when we evaluate candidates, but rather than repeat them all here, you are free to read through this site to discover them for yourself.

The key point is.

Not all accountants are the same. Not all CEOs are the same. Not all Engineers are the same.

And neither are the people that find you critical talent.

Some will send you just anybody. And others like Xenitho, will send you that somebody who lifts your business to new heights.

What do you think?

Are all accountants the same?