Blueprint to a Learning Organization
By Roman H. Kepczyk, CPA.CITP (January 20, 2010) 

David Maister in his landmark firm management book “True Professionalism” wrote: “any firm that can outperform its competition in building and creating skills, will gain a significant competitive advantage.”  We believe with today’s ability for firms to quickly identify, share and emulate effective processes, that their ability to standardize and integrate new and evolving best practices may be the last competitive advantage for firms today. Changing the firm’s culture towards a learning organization takes time, but can be streamlined by following the successes of other firms.  In that light, we lay out our blueprint to a learning organization which consists of identify needs, developing an effective curriculum, designating accountability, and taking advantage of appropriate tools and resources.

The first step in drafting a learning organization is to identify the learning needs within the firm.  Studies done in the past showed that untrained employees use three to six times more technical support and take two to six times longer to get to the same level of proficiency as trained workers.  A more telling statistic is what percentage of your technical support personnel’s day is dedicated to training issues, rather than the technical items they were hired to address.  In most firms, IT personnel spend between 50% and 80% of their day on non-technical issues that would not be an issue if the end user had been given proper training. Firms that document their help desk and IT support questions can easily identify the types of issues they are spending most of their time on, which highlights where training is needed.  This can assist with the development of a firmwide and departmental training needs assessment form, which personnel can complete individually to identify specific training courses.  Some firms have also found that by identifying minimum standards for firmwide applications such as Microsoft Excel, Word and Outlook, they can utilize third party pre-hire tests and skills assessment forms to ensure that job candidates meet the expected entry level knowledge for those applications.  Another effective process in formalizing firm learning needs is to identify product champions in each department and application, and document what types of questions they are answering, as well as functions or processes where the entire department is having issues.  Common issues point to opportunities where additional standardization and training would create a stronger return on the training investment.

Once the firm’s initial training needs are identified, the next step is to create an effective learning curriculum which not only includes the initial firm orientation, but also standardized and evolving technical skills.  New hires need to be quickly indoctrinated on firm culture and firmwide applications.  This would include best practices in email, calendar, time keeping, and the core spreadsheet and word processing applications.  Firm standards for document access and naming, in addition to security and remote access considerations, should be included for all firm personnel.  For more experienced personnel, the firm must not only identify higher level technical skills training for their area of practice, but also soft skills training.  For firm personnel to grow in their career, firms must also provide targeted marketing, communication, and etiquette courses to transition these personnel into future management roles.

One outstanding resource to help firms develop an effective orientation and learning curriculum process is the AICPA’s PCPS (Private Companies Practice Section) which most firms are already a member of.  The PCPS has a Practice Center dedicated specifically to the learning and orientation function which includes a series of orientation and assimilation checklists, detailed action plans, and even a PowerPoint presentation template that firms can utilize to create a comprehensive orientation program.  Using these tools allow firms to quickly develop a complete learning program and hit the ground running.

Firms must also be aware of the learning resources available outside of the firm where they can go to identify and capture new and evolving processes.  Many firms are members of a CPA firm association or groups such as the Association for Accounting Administration (CPAAdmin.org) that focus on internal firm production and have annual conferences designed to share best practices. In addition, the AICPA hosts their own TECH Plus and Practitioners Symposium where both consultants and vendors congregate with the firms.  The major vendors also have their User’s Conferences, which are ideal places to not only meet directly with development and support personnel, but also to network with peer firms. 

Another critical aspect of having a training program is designating accountability for the learning function and allocating an appropriate financial and personnel budget.  For firms with 100 members or more, a full time person can be designated in the role of the training coordinator, whereas in medium sized firms, this role may be combined with helpdesk support.  In smaller firms it is not likely that a full time person can be placed in this role, but these firms can still fill the position by allocating hours to “power” users in individual applications to document and train on best practices.  Firms have found that by allocating 2-4 hours per week to their best producers, they capture and standardize critical practices much faster, which makes the entire firm more effective, as well as documenting those practices in the event that person leaves the firm.

While technical IT knowledge is what makes IT personnel effective, the learning coordinator requires a different set of skills that is more conducive to being a liaison between IT personnel and professional staff.  We recommend firms look for degreed professionals so they are viewed at this level by the accounting staff and that they have exceptional communication skills which will be better received by them.  It would be expected that the individual has a strong interest in technology and overall firm applications, but they would not be expected to understand or train on departmental applications.  In the past, some of the most effective learning coordinators came from education or military backgrounds and it is expected that financial services personnel being laid off in the current economy would also be an option.  The learning coordinator position is often placed at the same level as the network administrator, and would report to the same Partner as the IT personnel.  To be successful, it is imperative that the learning coordinator be given the responsibility of the training budget and the support of the partners to ensure that firm personnel attend training sessions.

Finally, firms must have a training environment that is conducive to learning and for capturing firm knowledge.  Most firms have a designated conference room or training facility that has network access and a projector.  For firms with satellite offices or remote personnel, video conferencing and applications such as NetMeeting and WebEx can deliver the training screens and audio to remote users so they can participate without having to travel to the central office location.  An important component of learning organizations is capturing this type of learning for future use, so firms can utilize video recording, audio recording, and screen capture applications such as Camtasia and Snag-IT in addition to written documentation.  This knowledge can then be stored on a firmwide intranet, FAQ section, or document management system, so it is easily accessible by all those that need it whenever and wherever they are.

Our world will continue to involve at a faster and faster pace, providing new and exciting opportunities to those firms that are able to identify and capitalize on them.  To do this successfully, these firms will need a formal process that entails an evolution to a learning organization concept, which can be streamlined by following the successes of previous firms and taking advantages of today’s available resources.

Roman H. Kepczyk, CPA.CITP is president of InfoTech Partners North America, Inc. and works exclusively with CPA firms to understand and implement today’s digital best practices within their tax, audit, client service and administrative departments.  This article is reprinted with the publisher's permission from the CPA Practice Management, Forum a journal published by CCH INCORPORATED. Copying or distribution without the publisher's permission is prohibited. To subscribe to the CPA Practice Management Forum or other CCH Journals please call 800-449-8114 or visit www.tax.cchgroup.com.

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