The One About My Big Mouth
Cringe with me...
TL;DR
In the last edition of this newsletter (which you can read in Substack) I talked about how my main takeaway from the Reframe Conference was about the importance of asking questions instead of jumping straight to offering advice.
To drive home the point further and entertain you, I will share a cringe-worthy story that shows just how slow I am at learning and how we can appear the fool when we offer advice too soon.
Are you ready to cringe with me?
So not even 1 hour after the Reframe Conference was over, I was traveling with a new friend to the airport because we realized we were on the same flight (yay to in-person friends).
As we are waiting for our Uber, 2 other conference attendees briefly spoke to me as they were passing by. My Uber buddy could tell that I had some other connection to them than just meeting them at the conference. She asks me how I know them. I explain that we all took a course called The Theater of Public Speaking which is a training program that helps accounting industry folks learn how to speak and deliver presentations and ideally get paid for that kind of work.
Well, her face lights up and she says something like “Oh goodness, that is like my dream. I did my very first stage presentation earlier this year and I liked it so much that I would do it every day if I could.”
Talk about a tee-up. This is a textbook case where you lean in to letting the person who is excited do the talking. I should have asked her more questions! I would have saved myself much humiliation.
But ohhhhh no. Yours truly proceeds to flap her jaw for probably 10 minutes about my speaking experience. Let me tell you some of the phrases that came out of my mouth.
“I’ve done a few presentations by now. You know, you probably should be willing to do some for free to get some practice and get your name out there.”
“At one accounting conference I got picked for, I got a free ticket and one hotel night and $400. I was going to go to the conference anyway, so it all gravy.”
“One time I was paid $1,000 and a hotel room and flight. I was proud of that.”
“My advice is to make sure that you can always use your material in more than one setting or you will feel poor because it is a lot of work to create a single presentation.”
Eventually I had to come up for air. Even the biggest blabber mouth in the world runs out of stuff to say.
And you know what she contributed to the conversation...
“I got paid $5,000 for my first presentation. Plus flight and hotel. It was a lawyer conference and I did it with one of my clients as a two-person panel and we really didn’t have to prepare too much at all. More of a conversation. And I’m not sure if I’d ever want to do it for less than that. You know the idea…once you fly first class, it is hard to ever fly economy again.”
Oof. Who is the one feeling poor now!
What I wouldn’t have given for a redo on that conversation.
She was so gracious. She was not rude in saying this at all. Just participating in the conversation.
But if I would have just LISTENED to her, if I had asked even ONE QUESTION, I think the conversation could have taken a much different turn. And I might have learned something from her, because clearly she is doing something more right than I am!
Before we move on, please take a moment to connect with our title sponsor, Seth David from Nerd Enterprises. Bang that graphic and learn more about his support group. Shoot, it is so much more than a support group.The guy is a QBO expert but also an App-aholic. He has just as much content about different tech tools as he does QBO, and he is one of the original QBO instructors. He’s got a money-back guarantee. Go into the group and see how well he listens.
Deals Deals Deals
💰 Find a 10% off code to purchase the nerdy T-Account Cheat Sheet Mousepad after completing a feedback survery about this newsletter.
💰 Black November bundle sale at Fast & Easy QBO for their signature QBO Certification Courses. This totals a 59% discount. Not too shabby!
💥 PLEASE REPLY TO SHARE ANY BLACK FRIDAY DEALS THAT YOU KNOW OF FOR THE NEXT EDITION! 💥
Be There or Be Square
Items with a “+” are hosted by me. All these events can be viewed and registered for in the DESCRIPTIONS of each event on the Bookkeeping Side Hustle Calendar.
📅 November 14: Bookkeeping Buds Magic Hour. Join Bookkeeping Buds for their monthly community call. Register HERE.
📅 +November 19: Website 101 for Bookkeepers: RSVP in the FB group. Do you need a website? What should it say?
📅 +December 5: The Solopreneur’s Ultimate Year Close with FreshBooks and QuickBooks Online. Sign up HERE* I’m doing this session with Mariette Martinez. As far as I know, this is the very first live webinar about how to use Freshbooks that wasn’t put on by Freshbooks HQ.
Featured Posts
🌶️ Shea L. wanted opinions on social media etiquette - specifically someone “stealing” content. How do you think we should repost/share other peoples’ content? Was my feedback too harsh?
🌶️ Deidre H. asked for feedback on renting a laptop to start her business. There was a pretty strong consensus answer for her with suggestions on how to get your hands on a laptop today if you are strapped for cash.
🌶️ Catherine is looking for the best 1099 requirement training video to share with new bookkeepers. Please add any other top-notch instructional resources you know of.
Help You Hustle
💪 We did a laser focused deep dive with Financial Cents about their brand new Solo Plan. FC is a practice management app that does tasks, client communication, document requests, billing, proposals, etc. Sign up for a free trial here* .
Here is what stood out to me about the Solo Plan:
It hit me how much this tool will make small/solo firms look sooooo much bigger than you actually are. For just $9 per month, your clients are not going to think you are running some cute little side biz with some word docs and post-it notes.
Financial Cents made the choice to build a new plan for solos instead of building “up” to target enterprise clients. That is naturally going to lead to a community, because we little guys have to help each other. That crowd-sourced template library he mentioned is an example of the benefits of having a community of “co-workers” when you are a solo operator. Let’s be honest, templates from your peers are going to be way better than any templates a software company creates on its own.
I bet the solo plan users are going to feel so peaceful when they can simply click the “upgrade to team plan” button and seamlessly take your practice to the next level when you want to grow, instead of doing some sort of painful migration from whatever hacks you have cobbled together to a full blow practice management software. Software migrations are so lame, y’all. You will behave badly to avoid them because most people will always opt to put off short term pain.
💪 I saw this post on LinkedIn with the exact text of an email to ask for referrals. Bless people who can write few words! The author gave permission to copy it directly.
💪 Xero just announced a “Mentor Match” program for new folks who want to be matched with a more experienced accounting mentor. You do have to be a Xero Partner to participate. If you aren’t one yet, you can use this link* to join. It is free.
Jobs
A job and a cleanup were added to the BSH Job Guide. Check it out! Don’t forget to use #jobopp when posting your jobs.
Don’t forget the standing opps on my Find A Freelance Job article. 1099 and W-2 opps.
My Family Circus (43F, 39M, 13M, 11F, 10M)
🎪 Less Stuff. More Memories.
Last night we went to a Movie Cafe to watch “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever”. If you’ve never read this book, you really should. It is outstanding! One of my favorite books of all time. Read it aloud to your kids and share tons of laughs.
I was worried that the movie would be lame compared to the book, but it was outstanding, too!
But I will tell you, that we almost never all 5 go to the movies. We just don’t. Not a part of our family culture. So last night was a huge treat for my kids. So why did we do this?
Because it is almost December and last Christmas, our kids got a homemade coupon to go to a movie cafe as one of their Christmas presents. We were running out of time!
We’ve been doing 3 homemade coupons for our kids for Christmas gifts for years. As a military family, we were often traveling for Christmas, and schlepping tons of presents is not practical, so we had to get creative.
So each year, my husband and I think of 3 “experiences” for the 5 of us and make coupons in Canva. Last Christmas we did coupons for a Movie Cafe, a Lego Builders’ Lounge, and an Escape Room. Each kid gets to open one envelope so there is no fighting.
Because we’d likely take our kids to some of these types of experiences anyway. But by making them a gift, we get to reduce the amount of junk we buy at Christmas 💩. We have some things to look forward to throughout the year 🌞. And we all get to hang out together 💓.
Kate Builds In Public
🎢 ⚠⚠⚠⚠ Feedback: I have been faithfully writing some version of this newsletter for over 3 years. I would be so very grateful if you would complete this short survey. There is a discount code on the completion page for those who submit the survey. 🙏
🎢 When you don’t know the answer: During my Freshbooks Office Hours, a member asked a more advanced question. She bought a very expensive piece of equipment but only put down a $50k deposit. She won't take possession until next year. She asked how to book this.
Several eyes were staring at me. My neck started to get hot. But my brain could not conjure the Debit side of this transaction. I kept my cool and liked the challenge. I kept my eyes on my nerdy T-Account mousepad that has bailed me out of many technical situations like this in the past.
I talked aloud for 30 seconds as my brain wheels spun so she could tell I was trying hard. But all my brain could grab was “I know it needs to go to an 1000-level asset account and my mind is telling me it will have the word “Deferred” in the account name. But I also know that “Deferred” is NOT the right word. But it is something like that. Grr…Come on Kate! Tip of my tongue! Where is that time machine back to accounting class?!?”
I am not lying. That is not far from a word-for-word stream of consciousness of what I said aloud in front of the group members.
Then I said, “you know what, let's consult the Oracle. Y'all watch this.”
And I picked up my phone, opened the ChatGPT voice bot and described the situation (remember, you literally just talk to it like you would your neighbor in plain english). And it joined the conversation and returned something like “Sounds like this situation calls for using a Current Asset account called Prepaid Fixed Asset account in your Chart of Accounts”. 🤯 That is good enough for me! Creating an account like that pulls it out on a separate line of the Balance Sheet for the tax pro to see. And we’ll clear it to a PPE account when they take possession of the equipment.
I was both a hero for guiding this person to the proper accounting treatment and for showing off the value of a brand new app feature that they weren't using yet. I was like the hippest and smartest accounting person these group members know. Felt good.
And you know what. I’m ZERO PERCENT SCARED that they will think that all they need is ChatGPT to handle their bookkeeping on Freshbooks. Zero percent. I made these clients love me more, not less.
🎢 Lost my Google Business listing: I should have known better. As soon as it happened, I felt like such a dummy and had this terrible knot in my stomach. But after 15 months of living at our new duty station in Fort Worth, I updated my address for Google my business and they shut me down and I lost all my reviews. I only had 22 of them. But they were my 22.
Learn from my mistakes, folks. Any changes to your business address is a big deal and can cause a host of problems with payment processors, bookkeeping Directory profiles, bank accounts, and, unfortunately for me, also Google Business listings. Proceed with caution.
So now I have to figure out how to appeal (I already did and already lost 1 appeal, so things are not looking good), or I have to just walk away and find somewhere else to collect reviews. Maybe down in the “Recommendations” section on LinkedIn??? What would you do?
From The Vault
If you are using Zoom to teach clients and view their screens like I do - make sure you know these tips!
Letters To The Editor
✉️ Corry J shared this about the last edition. Thanks for the encouragement. Feedbck like this helps me stay motivated to “keep showing up.”
I read very few newsletters but always enjoy yours. This one was exceptional!! There are so many takeaways from Reframe but this summarized it perfectly for me! Thanks for always showing up, especially in my inbox. 🤩
Classifieds (Clickable)
Keep hustling!
Kate
-Chief Hustler-
I am down right rabid about transparency and full disclosure. If a link has a * beside it, it means it is either an affiliate link where I might receive compensation if you make a purchase, at no additional charge to you. Or it could be a tracking link that another business provided me to see how many readers click on that link.