This is the 1,005th blog I posted in the last ten years, and today will start my eleventh year of these blogs.

This is primarily a business blog and I post topics clients have expressed interest in, and I am gratified to be able to help them in this manner. When I look back, I also see blogs that documented some of my personal activities and nonpartisan “political” views, including blogs on my activities as the pandemic developed, blogs about books I read and even some TV shows I watch, the U.S. Supreme Court, my pre-Covid trips including my vacation to China nine years ago which I reposted last week on LinkedIn where I seem to have a regular and steady following. Actually, I post links to everything I write on LinkedIn, and readers can post comments or “Likes,” making that a good way to be connected.

I am teaching Intermediate Accounting this semester at Baruch College, which is my alma mater, and while it is remote, I am starting to have one-on-one Zoom meetings with students, and I find that energizing. I also have been presenting numerous continuing education courses for other accountants, and along with the teaching at Baruch, it is a process that sharpens my skills, keeps me current and allows me to detect growing trends.

I am working with clients on M&A and succession planning projects that I find interesting and challenging. However, mainly I am connecting clients with the many talented specialists at Withum who could now help them better than I ever could. Things have changed and public accounting has been transformed into a behemoth providing professional services in every critical area clients need assistance. While the demand for quality auditing and tax consulting is greater than ever, advisory services are fast-growing. As an FYI, some of the new types of services Withum offers that have no relation to traditional accounting services are cyber security and incident remediation, turn-key web-based commerce sites, cost segregation, tangible and intangible asset appraisals, asset management and family office services, insurance and risk management, back office and supply chain operations, physician revenue optimization, employee benefit plan conceptualization, establishment, oversight and management, investment banking services, chief financial officer on-demand services, strategic, innovation and change management planning and implementation, technology and vendor selection, adaption and implementation, data privacy, compliance and security, customer immersion, government agency regulation compliance risk assessments, electronic discovery and too many other “nonstandard” services that are currently being performed or that are being developed for clients. It is no longer possible for me, or anyone, to try to keep up to date on everything and the trend at larger firms, such as Withum, which is a Top 25 firm, is for niche services and industry expertise and specialization.

When I started in accounting, advisory services were limited to helping clients work through problems. It worked well. Today, clients no longer need basic accounting services since they all have computerized systems that provide the daily, weekly or monthly reports they need. However, they still need someone to review, analyze, interpret and make sense of it for them, which we continue to do. What clients also need is to understand the underlying meaning of the numbers and how yesterday and today’s numbers can be projected and trended toward the future. This is exciting work and provides good value to our clients and for those that are so inclined, it can help propel growth. Clients also still need accountants to help them work through problems. Many of my blogs have also addressed such problems, and I intend to keep doing it for at least another ten years.

I just want to add one comment. The support I get on the blogs at Withum is beyond great, and I specifically want to thank some of the marketing staff that help me with these blogs. While my name is on it, many hands touch it to make sure it delivers the right message, and they are posted timely. Cheers to Heather Campisi, Jessica Forenza, Krysten Hambrook and Kelly Materia. They are all top-notch professionals, and it is my good fortune to know and work with them.

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