If you - as a leader of your team, your department, your firm, even - want to build a profoundly successful business, you'll want data at your fingertips. You'll want the data that enables you to make the best decisions and that will enable you to grow the business that you've got in your mind's eye.

As well as the data, you'll want to better appreciate how to grow and develop the knowledge, skills and habits of your team so that they bring a client focus in a way that ensures that your clients believe they're in the best hands, that they're working with the best possible firm for them.

Data, team, clients - these are the three topics of the discussion I was fortunate enough to have with Dawn Marriott, ex-CEO of Azets. Dawn is currently working with the funder HG Capital and with their rising stars across the 50 companies in which HG Capital invest.

If you want to hear more of what Dawn's got to say about some of the key aspects of growing a highly successful firm, go to your favourite podcast platform or, if you prefer, go to humanisethenumbers.online.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for contact information for Dawn and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

Stop thinking that return on investment is what drives the financial performance of your business, and start thinking that return on humanity is the ultimate starting point, the foundation of the success of your accounting firm.

This is the subject of Philippa White's book, Return on Humanity. In this podcast discussion, Philippa dives into the practical, tangible skills necessary to build a more human firm, and she’s profoundly shifted my thinking around a number of things.

First, the importance of building flexibility into your working model – the way you as an individual work, as well as the way your firm works – plus the need for and power of vulnerability. Also, simply being curious, perhaps coming from a place of doubt, can establish a greater degree of connectedness between you and your team and you and your clients.

So why not go to the podcast discussion with Philippa White at humanisethenumbers.online. You'll also find it on Spotify, iTunes and other podcast platforms.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Philippa and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

It’s sometimes easy to become distracted with the bells and whistles, the proactivity and the value-add of the way you serve and work with your clients and, as a consequence, you can lose the need, the essential need, of delivering brilliantly at the basics.

This podcast with Jolawn Victor, Chief Growth Officer of Go Cardless, got me thinking (and will likely do the same for you) about the basics around helping clients collect cash. She shares insights to help you and your firm become better at collecting cash, as it is one of the fundamental basics of running a healthy business – it’s the oxygen of the business. As everyone says, cash is king.

If you want to learn more and dive deeper into the insights shared by Jolawn, go to humanisethenumbers.online or go to your favourite podcast platform, including Spotify and iTunes and seek out the podcast discussion with Jolawn Victor.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Jolawn and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

I recently had the great privilege to spend an hour with a business leader who had sold their business just a few days before, after 22 years.

That business started in their bedroom, and they built it up over time to just short of a million-pound turnover – a modest-sized business, but what an insight into client care and how you create a business that works brilliantly with three grades of client, establishing enough capital value to enable it to be sold for a substantial sum.

I hope you'll take time out to listen to this deep and meaningful, highly valuable conversation with Tracy Irwin. She signposts specifics that you and your firm can employ to build that value equation in your clients' minds, allow you to better look after your team so that they deliver exceptionally for your clients and then to ‘live happily ever after’, as the saying goes.

I thoroughly enjoyed and found the discussion with Tracy profoundly insightful. Go to your favourite podcast platform or to www.humanisethenumbers.online and please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Tracy and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

What must it feel like to leave a promising, high-flying career with a leading firm and start up your own firm – to hand your notice in and, six months later, kick-start your accountancy firm with one client?

Well, that's exactly what Kat Wellum-Kent has done. She set up Fractional Finance and has grown that to a business with a fairly clear vision of building a £5 million turnover business in just five years. She already has clients paying her, yes, £400 a month, but also clients paying her £7500 a month.

On this podcast, you'll hear Kat share her insights around fairness for the team and the vision based around how this will play out for her clients and the capital value that she's going to help them grow. She shares the importance of building a vision board and having good reasons for why you're doing what you're doing, so that in those moments where it gets tough, you can have a quick check-in on your vision board and say, yeah, I'm on the right path.

Why not go to this podcast discussion with Kat Wellum-Kent to hear those deep insights and see how they might apply to your established firm, or your startup firm, or the firm that you've got in your mind's eye that you're looking to set up in the not-too-distant future. I'm certain you'll get great value and enjoy the discussion we have together.

Go to www.humanisethenumbers.online or to your favourite podcast platform and you'll find Kat Wellum-Kent sharing her deep, meaningful insights.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Kat and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

There’s something very remarkable about the work accountants can do to transform the lives of their business owner clients, transform the results of their business, and feel a sense of pride, satisfaction and passion for the work they do.

On this podcast discussion with Andrew Botham – accountant, business owner, guide, consultant, whatever label you want to give him – Andrew tells a handful of stories about how, with two or three numbers – not numbers that show up in the balance sheet or the P&L, but a handful of numbers – you can help business owners see sense and make decisions that turn a business that's generating £300k worth of profit per annum into a business that's generating £927k in net profit every month.

This is because, as accountants, they help the business owner zero in on a handful of KPIs, ask a handful of questions and encourage the business owner to make a handful of key decisions. I've worked with Andrew in the past, and it was a delight to have him on the podcast to unpack his simple, effective ways and means of running client discussions, helping business owners transform their results.

You can access the full podcast at Spotify, iTunes or your favourite podcast platform, or you can find it at www.humanisethenumbers.online.

Please scroll down the episode page for this podcast for the contact information for Andrew and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

When your clients feel at home, they tend to want to stay at home. That's a statement by James Butterworth, a tech and advisory specialist from the VIP team at Croner-i.

In this podcast discussion, I was surprised by how this conversation moved to a place where we discussed how a better understanding of the client and what they want, as well as tax law and the way you manage your clients' tax affairs, is what ultimately humanises the numbers.

This is a fascinating conversation with James which essentially confirms that the better you are at being curious about what's in the best interests of your clients, you build stronger relationships that ensure that clients are more likely to stay with you. If it's a prospect, they are more likely to join your firm because you take a proactive approach to your clients’ tax affairs using the support of a specialist.

This is far from a sales pitch from James – it's more a ‘what can you do in general practice to make more of tax when working with your clients?’ It was an unexpected, enjoyable and valuable conversation with James. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

You can get access to the full podcast discussion on your favourite podcast platform or go to www.humanisethenumbers.online.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for James and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

When you dive into a deep conversation with a person who has worked in a village accountancy practice, someone who has also been part of a national firm and who has worked within an organisation to establish a new office, improving the fees by £100k per month, you know you're likely to have a decent podcast discussion.

In this conversation with Stuart Hurst of Cloud 10, a business in startup phase, we start unpacking what a startup does to not only build revenue, but also to build capital value by installing good structure and process. Stuart’s got a real eye on scaling the business without putting undue stress on him as a business leader.

Don't get me wrong – any startup has its own challenges, and significant opportunities as well, and Stuart shares some of those on this podcast. When you've got a podcast called Humanise The Numbers, it's great to have a deep, meaningful, personal conversation to tie the numbers to the humanity of what's going on in an accounting firm.

I hope you enjoy this podcast and find it as valuable, insightful and practical as both Stuart and I tried to make it. If you want to hear more, please go to www.humanisethenumbers.online or to your favourite podcast platform.

Please scroll down the episode page for this podcast for the contact information for Stuart and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.