At Kahuna, our CEO Frank Lunn has this frustrating habit of always asking this question:

Why?

In our marketing department, we’ll come up with our plans and goals for the week and share what we are going to do, and he’ll take it in and just ask why?

And the worst part is after I provide an answer to why, his next question is the same. “Ok, why?”

He does the same thing with young entrepreneurs who are sharing their business plans and dreams and ideas for growing a new business.

He’ll continue to ask why until he gets deep into their real intentions to uncover the true purpose of what is going on.

Most of us drift

The reason he is always asking why is to get to what he calls “the question behind the question.”

Most people and most businesses drift to where they are. Rather than taking purposeful, deliberate action to get from point A to point B, we take a series of actions and then see where we end up.

In marketing, there is a strong temptation to do activity for activity’s sake. When you do that, you can be really busy, but not really go anywhere.

Strategic vs tactical

The goal of getting to the question behind the question is to look beyond the activities themselves and get to the bigger point of where we are trying to go.

Here is an example.

At Kahuna, we are using Infusionsoft for our CRM and marketing.

When we first started using it, we had no idea what to do with it. That’s because we had this really cool software tool, but no plan in place.

Instead, we had to step back and think about the big picture. Infusionsoft, while a great tool, is simply a tactic. On its own, it won’t do anything for us.

And the best way to see the big picture and start thinking strategically is to ask the right questions.

Why?

What is the goal?

And the best question of all for getting you to think strategically is:

In a perfect world, what would I want?

Too often, we set limitations that don’t need to exist. It’s better to think as if there are no limitations at all and wonder, “In a perfect world, this is exactly what I want.”

Then when you have that picture in mind of the perfect world situation, you know what you can work toward. You can build all your tools and tactics around that perfect world and know you are being strategic and working toward a purpose.

But most just take action and hope they end up at their desired destination. First, you have to determine the destination then work toward it.

Strategic thinking with bookkeeping

At Kahuna Accounting, we help businesses find a bookkeeping solution that meets their needs.

Probably 99% of businesses think tactically when it comes to bookkeeping.

When you start a business, you know bookkeeping is part of it, so you create your own ledger in a spreadsheet, or you get Quickbooks.

You do it just because that’s what you’re supposed to do, without ever asking why?

Instead, you should start your business and look at bookkeeping by asking, “In a perfect world, what would I want?”

The Perfect world of bookkeeping

Kahuna specializes in helping small business owners – especially law firms – define what that perfect world looks like.

Once they can do that, it dramatically changes the approach, and opportunity within the specific tactics in bookkeeping.

For lawyers, the perfect world in bookkeeping is quite simple.

First, they want it to be right.

Trust accounting is nothing to play around with, and audits are a real possibility. Lawyers know this, and when it comes to bookkeeping, nothing is more important than knowing they are in line with their trust accounting requirements.

Second, they want to know their firm is viable as a business

In law school, you learn a lot about being a lawyer, but very little about being a business owner.

So when a lawyer steps out and starts a firm, there are many questions and doubts about where things are headed.

Most of all, solo and small firm lawyers want to know they are on track as a business. Not just knowing that money is coming in and they are OK right now, but they want to look ahead and know what to expect 2 months, 6 months or even a year in the future.

In a perfect world, bookkeeping can provide the metrics and the dashboard snapshot to tell the viability and path to profitability for a law firm or any small business.

Third, they want to spend as little time as possible on the books.

While solo and small law firms acknowledge the importance of bookkeeping, they also realize it’s not always the best or most efficient use of their time.

In a perfect world, they would have their finger on the pulse of the numbers, would be confident their accounting is being done correctly, but would be able to spend most of their time on client relationships, cases and growing the firm.

Most small firms would not even believe it is possible to have all three of these pieces working together at the same time.

But most have never even taken the time to decide what they want. They’ve never asked the big questions and thought about what they would want if it was possible.

So, if that perfect world situation is available, how would you ever get there if you didn’t make it a priority?

See how it can happen

This Thursday, Kahuna will be hosting a webinar to show how to think strategically about your law firm’s bookkeeping.

We’ll cover the big picture items and make something that’s typically chaotic and confusing simple and logical.

Best of all, we’ll show you the path to finding a perfect world solution for your small firm, and it’s not as hard as you think.

Register For Webinar Now