The Wize Way

Episode 182: If You Want Better SOPs, Listen to Your Team's Questions

• Wize Mentoring for Accountants and Bookkeepers • Season 2 • Episode 182

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Most firm owners try to improve performance by pushing harder, hiring more, or firefighting their way through the week. But the real bottleneck isn’t effort - it’s the lack of structure. Without clear systems and consistent meetings, your team is left guessing, and you end up carrying the weight alone.

In this episode of The Wize Way Podcast, we break down how effective meetings become the backbone of your SOPs and your leadership.

You’ll learn:

✅ Why meetings are the fastest way to uncover missing SOPs
 ✅ How 1:1s help new hires settle in and reveal process gaps
 ✅ The role meetings play in accountability, delegation, and culture
 ✅ How structured rhythms give you visibility across every part of the firm

If you’re ready to stop running your business in the dark and start leading with clarity and confidence, this episode is a must-listen.

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PS: Whenever you’re ready… here are the fastest 4 ways we can help you fix and grow your accounting firm:

1. Download our famous Wize Freedom Strategy Map for FREE - Find out the 96 projects every firm owner must implement to build a $5M+ firm that can run without them - Download here

2. Need to Hire right now? Book a 1:1 FREE discovery call with our WizeTalent hiring coaches to help find your next team member the Wize Way – Click Here

3. Book a 1:1 Wize Discovery Session – Spend 30mins with our Wize CEO, Jamie Johns, a $7M firm owner who is ready to give you his entire business plan to build a firm that can run without you – Find out more here

4. Work with Jamie and our mentors for 8 weeks - Build a custom business plan for your firm - Apply here

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to the Wise Wave. The show for academy of 53 firm modern five freedom. I'm Fred Ford, your host. And each week, we deep dive into the real story, proven strategies, battle-tested tools, and successful firm moders just like you. Our wise mentors want to share their journey of having scaled and find their way to freedom. So you can too. If you're stuck in the grind or you're ready to scale smarter, this is your blueprint. Let's get into the episode.

SPEAKER_03:

So, welcome to this session. And I would like to be uh like uh more deeply with these things and see what are the things that you are struggling with and and how we can be handling from the meetings. Um yeah, please, uh it is uh so nice to see your faces if you have the possibility to have your cameras on, it will be great. And yeah, so uh Danny, uh we plan it to be Danny here. Unfortunately, she's not feeling well, but we have Danny. Uh, important to mention that if you need something from the wise talent, Danny is the person that can help you with everything related with that. And I am the person who's gonna run these things. Uh, I have already the pleasure to meet with some of you. Uh and yeah, okay. I will start sharing my wise hub so we can talk about the meetings and how we run this section. So the the meetings, you will have this in the execute. And here we have include meetings uh in the wise hub because we consider that it is a tool that you can use to manage also the delegation. For some of you, uh, when we have talked about the to delegate something, to create SOPs, and these persons that will be taking care of these new new responsibilities, new activities. It is a great tool to use the meetings so we can set up this conversation and evaluation from the work that they are doing. Obviously, we need to uh structure it uh the meetings and see what are the uh main points that we would like to receive or provide feedback from from that sections. And it I think it is the one of the the best ways to run this and maintaining contact uh that with the with your employee, but also knowing that the things are being uh going how it's supposed to go. You know, they are uh uh uh effectively delegated, but delegated with the responsibility that the things are are going good. Also, uh we have mentioned sometimes here in WISE that when you get a new hire, establish uh this 15-minute call that you can have with this, with your persons to reviewing what are the things that you are going to work, uh that the person is going to work, what are the things that uh uh will be working next, and if the people are struggling with something. These main three questions can help you to identify uh so many different things from from the employee. Uh, what are the things that the employee is capable to do? Uh if the if his role can be uh another, but potentially another, you know, we can identify if it's an introvert, extrovert, so the uh we can identify in in which sections this person can fit better. Also, when when the person is asking for uh for something that the the employee is struggling, we knowing that the person is actively working in that. You know, in these in these things, there's always a question, there's always a things that we are struggling when we are taking uh a new role or uh going to a new business, because every single business has their style, their way to do the things. And it is really normal to see that the person uh have questions, struggling with something, uh, can be a process that we are uh using in the firm. And in this way we can detect in which things uh the person is actively working, and also that the person is interested to knowing more about what we are doing. Yeah. So talking about the wise of and and how we have set this uh in the software, uh, as I mentioned, it's here under execute, and we care we can create the meetings in this section. We have divided this uh this schedule in these different areas so you can be accountable in in all of these areas. You can also create a meeting to have with yourself, you know, set 30 minutes, evaluated your WISH, evaluated your KPIs, how the things are going, and and and be accountable on these uh provide uh updates and see how your your process is going, also knowing if you're delegating with any part of the wise hub. But yeah, we have divided these because every uh many things are happening in the business. Your eyes need to be in all of these different areas, and different persons are in charge of these areas. Uh, some of you have been working under these CEO meetings. There are the activities that we have used to grow your firm. See how we have the activities on the left, and then the extra information on the right. Here it's where we are going to uh to add or objectives, or if there is any minute, or so if there is some achieve uh uh attachments that will be important. Here it's how the information will be displayed, but this is a guide in how to work. I will be focusing in these monthly 101 meetings that we are encouraging all of you to have with your employees here in the quality section. I have created this mic monthly where you can add the things that you will need to complete with your employees, knowing a little bit uh about them. I will be uh going a little bit more deeply with this section of having these meetings with your employees, or go to this, it's knowing about where is the current status that uh we have from them uh about our business, how are they feeling? Uh, how are we helping them to achieve their goals? You know, in in this uh in this business life, uh the work that they are doing for us, it's also working in their in their plans for their life. We are helping them to achieve their goals, uh, and they're also helping us to achieve our goals. That's why we have this this section when you can actively have this relation with the employee and knowing what's happening. You know, it is important to mention that every single firm it's different, every single person it's different. These are the things that you can start implementing to knowing more about your business, to knowing about your your employees, which kind of employee it's the person that you are integrating to your team. Same things that you do, guys, with your clients, same things that you do with your employees. Identify which are your ideal employees, uh, which things are the keys that you are looking for them when you are hiring someone, and you can identify a pattern by doing this, which are your ideal employees. Doing this and hiring in this way can help you to avoid future problems. But by by doing this and understanding which type of person are arriving to you, the person will make better match with the person that are currently working with you. The person will also make match with your ideals, with your ethic that you have in your business. Uh, not because we don't we are looking for someone without ethic, it is because we we every single uh firm have their values, and uh it is important to to have people that are aligned with that, with that with those values. And that's why that's why knowing a little bit about your ideal employee can have a huge impact with the future decisions in your firm. This this uh this information of the career audit, if you need uh this to be added to your WISA, you can send us an email to Selena or to me, and we can add these things for you. So you can create your meetings for every single one of your employees. You will have here the objective. And how you will run this, it's for example, I am the owner, you can select a due date for this, you can edit here the details, and this is gonna be like tomorrow. Then I have added Mike or Osco to this meeting. You can add the people to be an editors or viewers, and if they have uh uh certain access, they will have just access for the meetings that you have added. They will not have access to all of the meetings. In that way, you protect the information of other employees if when you're having uh these meetings with more employees. Also, you can add more attendees if it's necessary. And yeah, so I will just click here and update. You can add here the minutes by clicking here, and you will have the information with when this was created. Remember that we are in a day behind, so that's why it appears and one day behind. So if this is gonna appear here, you will know what was the feedback on this career outdate. You already know which things uh have happened, and when you have a topic, when there is things to delegate it, you can also this space to create the task. So you can create a task and delegate giving a due date. In this occasion, guys, uh your mind it's in an in so different areas in the business. You're uh taking care of their profit, taking care of an employee that it is not working really well, taking care of a new system that you are implementing, and the idea of creating the meetings and coming back constantly. It's don't forget the things that you that are important to you to achieve. Don't forget if if someone gets delegating any any activity, and and these things will will help help you to when you arrive to the next meeting, ask to the person and say, hey, what happened with this thing? Did you achieve these things? And I can I can provide uh great feedback about this because here in WICE, it this is how we work, this is how we run our meetings. This is not something that we create for our clients, this is something that we create for us. So we are actively using this platform and having the meetings this because the goal for every single person in the firm is to be accountable with the things that uh the persons are doing. So uh you can create the task as I mentioned. I'm gonna create just one, two, three. You can assign to any employee. In this case, I'm gonna assign to me, and I will have two weeks to create this. You can create some priority and description if it's necessary. If you have created this activity to other person, and and uh and you need to update before the person uh arrived at the the day of the meeting, you can review in the task management section, and the person can be uh updated this activity. When they come to their activities and say, like the status, it's uh in progress, it's in review, it is complete. So you are being reviewing the work that the persons are receiving and see an update and actually an active system of this feedback. The once the person are having the access to the WiseUp. Uh, I'm gonna show you how to give the your persons uh access and uh important to think to review the security matrix. Well, you have here the attachments, you know, if you it's necessary, a contract or a website of a website that you would like the the people to ask or or anything. Since I create this meeting and I am the owner, I can add also to my to-do list, and you will receive this information here in the business intelligence section. See, here is my to-do list, here is the activity that I need to complete. So when the persons obviously, this is a view for an executive that are the access that you have, but the the persons that are like the CFO or the admin will be able to see their task and if the meetings that they will be have uh they will have in the future. So coming back to this, once this is complete, you can mark as complete and it's disappearing from this list, and it's gonna appear in this completed section. So you will be able to uh constantly review the the activities. I will just mark another as a complete. And when these meetings take too long, and there are things that well well whether we're not resolving in in this meeting, you can create another meeting and just transfer the things that uh be incompleted, or you can create a database when you just repeat the meeting. For example, if it's a weekly meeting about our leads, about our sales calls, about the contacts that we have uh making to the or prospects. If and if it's always the same topic, you can create the meetings, and the person who's in charge of those areas just update before the meeting, and when you arrive, you have an order and and how to talk about this these meetings. Well, I will create a new meeting monthly uh meeting uh two, and these ones were completed, so I'm going to add the rest of them. It's not necessary the the first two, and we'll create so once I go back. Well, it's gonna take me to the beginning here in quality here. Mic monthly two, and we are going to see just a remaining topics that we didn't uh talk about. You know that that that uh sales meetings. Uh sales it's something that you guys are doing every single day, like uh uh talking with clients, talking with prospects, or this different area. Sales meeting uh or or prepare a sales report can be one of your first meetings and and see how accountable you can be with your sales process to uh contact your prospects to see if they accept the proposal or or they reject it, where are the feedback? Any any feedback that we are receiving in common can be, for example, too expensive uh uh you know, proposal. Uh we think it's too high. If it's a constant, well, you it is something that you can take care of. Uh if you are doing great or you delegated this sales process and this new person are closing more sales than you in the past, see what what is the reason, what are the good things that this person is doing. But as creating a sales meeting can be one of your topic or your homework from this meeting, and and and and just review the numbers, can be just with you, three three questions. What are new leads that have arrived this week? Uh number or or prospect that I have accepted, any feedback from uh new clients and clients that I lost this week. It can be uh uh a routine that you can have with yourself and in in with this section. Same thing, you just copy and create meeting for uh to second week of July, sale uh sales meeting, and you will have the same thing in this section, taking a little bit of time, but here you will have your sales. I don't have yet any one of them, so I can't I cannot provide any example of that, but this is this is a thing that you can create uh from your style and and the way that you are asking the people, and you can create a process when when everyone is uh accountable, and and that's our goal with this. Like we when we're talking about meetings, it's being accountable. Uh the owner can have different eyes in in different sections, so feel the confidence that your employees are taking care of their responsibilities, and and knowing in the case of the example in the quality meetings, having this relation with your employees because what happens when when we feel that we are not uh really near to our employees, we don't know how to talk with them, we don't know how to provide feedback. Well, you already have uh one excuse to talk with them at least once a month and receive their feedback, knowing if how uh possible it's that they leave the firm, how they're feeling with their uh with their current situation, if they are looking for more and or firm is going for more, and actually they can do more for us, or or these these kind of things, knowing a little bit uh uh of them. Uh touching uh the same point at the beginning of the these uh daily calls that you can have with your employee new employees. It can be uh icebreaker from your new employees, knowing uh a little bit more uh about them, about uh Which kind of person they are. So it's an uh icebreaker, and you will avoid this barrier that normally the person has, like, hey, I'm scared to ask some questions to the owner. Uh, I am afraid to ask uh anything from my direct manager, because there are meetings that you will have also with uh with your manager. It's not necessary sometimes that you have with all your employees. If your firm is too big and you have three managers and 20 other grinders, it's just uh an example. You can talk with your managers, give you the insights that that the managers can provide to you so you know basically how's the the the temperature in the firm, knowing uh which can be a problem or not. These kind of things can can make uh uh can help the owners to run their business uh more, you know, um I don't know, smarter or or feel confident in it in all of these areas are we are doing great. You can also care identify what are your main challenges. Uh I already give you guys the the example of the sales, but you can start with also with your main challenge that you can that you're struggling with. If you're uh in a process of hiring, uh create a meeting, see which persons are good, adding feedback from uh the new employee, whatever it's the reason, can be added to the meetings. Uh, I have mentioned that you can uh include your people, and in the case that you have not provided yet access to your to your people, you can add it here in settings, then manage user. Here will be add a user. If it's an already an existing employee and you have added the email and all the all that information, you can add it from here. Here will be the the your current employees, or you will have the section of create new employee. The user role, it will be here. I'm gonna show you in a moment where you can uh review the the security matrix. This is an automatically password, or you can create one by yourself. Don't forget just to put it here the credentials so your employee can receive their password and that information. Here in the support center, we have the knowledge center, and here we have the user role security matrix. Here is so for any question you have, you can uh go here and review it. Uh okay, I have one okay, perfect. So then you will uh see here also when was the last time that they log in, if it's uh relevant for you. And yeah, you can always change their access. So uh if they start with admin, you can change for for other one. Yeah, okay, amazing. So I think we have a question from Joy. It is just uh uh simply note, uh Joy. It is just a simply note. Uh, if you create uh a sales, but what what you're asking can be impacted more in this measure section in the metrics. So here in the fees one and lost schedule, you can have uh an entire list of all the uh clients that you have won or or lost, just quin. And also allocating when you're going to receive the money. Sorry, it's because I have not added anyone in the can you make your screen a little bit bigger, please?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, there we go.

SPEAKER_02:

That's much better.

SPEAKER_03:

Amazing. No, hey, uh all of you can see my screen better. Thanks, Sean. So I will uh start again with the no with the entire presentation. I will start again with the with the fees one and lost uh regarding to the question of join. So you can have here uh the information of the employees that you're the clients that you're receiving, also the the the fees that you will receive and in which the uh division will be allocated. And normally if it's if the uh new client it's a fixed fee, you will select the month that you will start invoicing, and the software will tell you which one will be in this year and which one will be in the next financial year. Yeah. So that answered your question, Joey. Perfect. Yeah, what what you can add in the in the meetings section uh will be better if you add it manually just as a feedback, and uh which clients will be needed to follow up, which prospect are we waiting, and we have not received any questions. This is because sales activity it's uh and a constant activity that we are doing all days, and sometimes the clients we leave the clients in the lead pipelines. Sometimes we just uh forget to make a a follow-up because we are in the uh in the production related and really focusing on on that area, and whatever can be the reason, you are the owner of the firm, you're the busiest person uh uh in the firm. So your eyes need to be in in different places. That's why we provide these kind of areas when you can have a uh schedule uh 30 minutes per week, talk about your sales, update your numbers. Uh can be a schedule that it is not necessary to be updated from you. If uh if you can create a template and just make a uh routine, another employee can come to the meeting, give the permission of uh to edit, and 30 minutes you will be receiving, reviewing, sorry, the information that the that the employee is updating. It's just an example in how to run the the meeting. Yeah, and I also encourage you to create this for your managers so you can have uh uh better information about what's going on in your firm. Uh you can be prepared for more things if you know more about what's going on in in all these different areas in in your business. And and yeah, basically, uh this is pure information and feel confident that that the people it's doing the things that that we are expecting from them. Yeah. So any questions about meetings? How can I provide extra help with this? Uh we will be or only breakout room. So let me know uh which questions if you would like to go deeply with with another topic. Yeah, there uh Joy, there is uh different access. So as I here in the knowledge center, you will see here are executive, senior client manager, production team, administration team, and CFO. These are the differences. So you can see in the meetings section here is so the executive, it's the only ones uh that have full access that will see every single uh meeting. The other ones will be if you add it to the meeting as attendee and then viewer or editor, but it is private, so yeah, yeah. Any other question, guys? Uh what are the things that uh you feel that you're struggling with, or which things uh would you like to start doing with your meetings? Yeah, what about you, Sean? How how do you feel about this? It's anything that you're doing that this can help you.

SPEAKER_02:

My camera is not working, but my meetings are getting much better.

SPEAKER_03:

That's great, that's great. It is uh, have you started uh any routine with your meetings? Uh implementing anything that it's weekly or monthly. Nice, it's a big improvement. Perfect. That's great, mate. That's great. We are really confident, even that this is uh basically a schedule that you create, guys, that you create with your style. We have templates because we can add also here the freedom map project in the case that you would like to take an specific for that, and let me show you how you can add it. Uh, freedom map project needs marketing. Well, there is no attendees because it's gonna be just me. Well, it is this one where I just create, and here an agenda item. You can uh import meeting agenda. Here is the freedom map. So you can add these things if you're taking care of them, and then complete. I'm gonna be the owner, and I am pretending to finish this. So, this is another uh uh example that you can use with your meetings and adding your freedom map if you're taking care in specific activities for this, and yeah, even that there's all of these resources, it is uh a schedule that you can develop to the next level with your persons and match it with with the necessities of you. Uh it is uh also I I like to mention that if you have any questions or do you need any extra help and how to add and how to start, there is the resources uh in the wise vault that you can download and and add it here in the attachments. So, in the case that you are thinking in creating a uh I don't know better use of the CRM, and if you find a spreadsheet in in the wise vault, you can download add it here. So instead of be looking in the wise ball where where that document is, you can find it here in your meeting. This is yeah, something that we can that can be really useful. And and also you can just repeat. Also, if there is a link to any uh and any lead pipeline that you're using, uh you can just make it repeat and and doing in that way. Yeah, I think we uh received another one. Uh yeah, Joy, we have uh I can prepare some videos to you, but uh Salina, can you help me just to uh schedule uh a meeting with Joy? Joy, we can I can help you with that. Uh and we can start with one meeting, then I can help you to uh add your information to your people and and also uh the other uh schedules, and we can start from that. Yeah, guys, if you need any any extra help or anything related with your with your wise help, that I can provide help. There's a lot of different people here in in the wise that can provide help. It depends on which area. There's Alina, there's me. I normally help on the implementation. Also, if you have any doubts with with any schedule and you would like to go further, just review it, what's going on, how to implement, how can this make match with your current reality? Uh it identify uh where are the main things that you can update. Uh the Wise Hub can provide so many feedback from from your firm and and from the all those different areas, but obviously we need you to update the information. And for that, there's me, there's Selena, there's a ton of people that are on charge to make this easier. Yeah. So any any other questions, guys, that that you have? Uh Hank, nice to see you here. Uh uh any question uh about the the meetings. Are you using these?

SPEAKER_01:

Um no, not really. I was kind of going through it uh just to kind of get a gauge of what it is. Um, but it looked, yeah, it does look pretty useful. Uh so maybe I might actually start trying testing it out. So maybe I'll I'll reach out to you for um you know for some help that maybe this or next week.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Uh and guys, uh for for the moment, if there is not a uh you haven't had any chance to review, just hang out with the meetings uh schedule, move around, then identify if there is areas that can apply to you and how to use these things. Uh as much as you're playing around with with the software, the the software will be so much easier with with the with the constant use. But yeah. Uh well guys, uh if there is no any other question, I think we can finish this early. Uh please uh let me just open here. And here are more documents that can help you in the wise vault. Uh, don't forget to to review in in this case. As I have mentioned so many times in the meeting, every every firm has different problems. Uh, but the wise vault can provide a starting point and how to solve your problems. If you don't have uh any idea and which things can be applicable or not, we have here different resources that can guide you through through this process. Uh and yeah, uh don't forget if you need any extra help, you can schedule a one-on-one call with with uh Jamie and he can help you with some strategy. And uh next meeting will be in charge of Danny. Hope she she's getting better, and she will be next week with you guys. Uh, I would like to thank you. Uh yeah, can can you help me uh to Emma send an email to Joy Selena? Okay, Karen. Thank you, Selena. I would like to thank all of you to be here. Uh, hope that this can provide uh another view for the wise of or can provide any solutions for for the problems that that you're struggling, or if there's not uh a problem and you're just looking to get better, here is here is some information. We are here to help you and uh wish you a great great week.

SPEAKER_00:

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of The Wise Way. If today's episode sparked an idea or helped you see things differently, please don't forget to leave us a review. And if you haven't subscribed to the podcast on your favorite platform yet, please go ahead and do that as well. Let's continue the conversation here through YouTube or any other social platform that you can find us. And just remember, if you're not a subscriber of our weekly Friday tip newsletter, get that to your inbox every week going forward. Whether you're starting out or scaling up, you don't have to do it alone. Let's build a business that works for you, the wise way. See you in the next episode.