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Hi Richard
I hope you are keeping well and perhaps I will see you again this year at the ICB summit.
I am late to this discussion as I have been on holiday. I agree with all advice Andy Partridge gave. As some of the members may know I have had a spinal fusion and a couple of significant hearing operations over the years, so I had my fair share of being stressed.
I would like to add something regarding the loneliness and stress. We have discussed this in a great deal at some of our ICB meetings. I would like to suggest that people join their professional body networking events or a local event where they meet other accountants or bookkeepers.
I am a member of the ICB and as well as the ICB Glasgow branch leader. We all meet up all over the country. Many of us have become good friends for this very reason. We have built up knowledge share groups for example 3 of you in a skype group where you can share worries, stresses of clients during the day, get IT knowledge and be exceptionally open or you can have two of you ring each other for example, we can use the branch Facebook network. I must admit I am not a facebook fan, so I do not use the Facebook, but many do.
It is not like a forum because it is having that total trust with a colleague. I take part in a quite a few, as like everyone else I have up days even though I have employees. I have terrific colleagues in Glasgow, Brighton and London, Newcastle where I have asked for help.
Nearly four years ago someone from Brighton contacted me because they liked my comments on Accounting Web and wanted to know if could keep in touch. We have skyped each other ever since and have attended events in London together. All I will say is I feel a hell of lot happier since I opened up and found there was so much support from others.
I always thought that the others were my competitors they have now turned out to be good friends, mentors and brilliant support network.
My point is if you can find someone you like even online or at a meeting make that friend because I guarantee you in our line of work so many feel the same way as many have already said.
Just said "no, I'm on holiday" to someone who had arranged a meeting with a mortgage adviser and had sent me her accounts by email to deal with immediately - only to have her follow up with an email saying she had done it herself and we would no longer be acting!
Good advice from Richard. Maybe I can add my tuppence worth having worked for both a 2 partner firm of accountants and then a sole practitioner in the past. My experiences were so bad that I vowed never to work in professional practice and I haven't since then.
OK picture this scenario, sole practitioner with lots of small clients (carrier bag jobs). The client (probably a builder, carpenter, plumber, electrician etc. walks into the office and asks how much it will cost to do his accounts and submit them to the tax office.
The nervous practitioner who needs every new client he can get, sizes him up, checks out his clothing etc. to determine what he can charge. Forget charging a reasonable rate to do the job, its a dog eat dog world now and you are competing with qualified people working from home (very little overheads) and offering the same service for half your price.
So you nervously quote him 75% of your normal fee in the hope of securing a new client into the long future. The client lets out a gasp of exasperation as he knows you need his job so he shakes his head and offers you only 50%. Glumly you are forced to accept thinking you will somehow manage to make a profit over the years. You and your staff are now under pressure to produce an accurate set of accounts on a time budget that is based on the fee agreed upfront and bears no resemblance to reality.
This is just the start of the stress, you then have to chase several times to get paid by which time another year is ready. Multiply this by numerous clients and you will realise that being a sole practitioner is a very tough job. Basically there is a glut of accountants in the market place, a lot of whom work from home. Logical advice and time management goes out of the window as you desperately collect fees to provide a living.
So what is the alternative? Working in an office less stressful? No chance, every office I have worked in since then has had huge amounts of politics and dominant characters who rule the office and expect you to conform or else they will make your life miserable. This is the downfall of the UK now, politics everywhere and that is why so many people visit their doctors for stress related illness.
At least if you are in a job, you can find something else and move whenever you are not happy. When you are a sole practitioner you are pretty much at a dead end unless you leave the profession to work and even then you have to face discrimination in finding a job as most of our vile employment agencies will categorise you into professional practice roles only and will be reluctant to offer you other jobs.
In short the UK has become a very tough market overall. Its purely your luck now as to how much stress you suffer in your working life. Gone are the days when you could do your 9 to 5 and go home relaxed to your family. Good luck.