Do Go It Alone

In an episode of the classic 1950s sitcom, “The Honeymooners,” the Ed Norton character was bemoaning to Ralph Kramden that he had just gotten fired from his job in the sewer. He insisted that finding other work was going to be difficult, if not impossible, because in his view “sewer workers are like brain surgeons, we’re both specialists!”

I thought about this the other day when I was a guest at an engagement party for my nephew and struck up a conversation with a young man while waiting at the bar for a drink (naturally).

He was a typical Millennial, able to converse and text simultaneously and I gather seemingly without a slew of grammatical errors. He revealed to me that he had just started an IT company that had developed some app whose purpose, and of course functionality, was far over my Baby Boomer head.

So, in my line of work, the next question unsurprisingly, was did he have an accountant?

He said no, he was going to keep the books himself with the help of one of myriad accounting applications for small business available in today’s market.

In an eerie coincidence I recently came across an article stating that nearly 60 percent of small businesses in the U.S. do not use an accountant. I found that statistic somewhat mystifying after being involved with the profession for 18 years. Why would you not want to employ someone who specializes in financial statement preparation? Especially if you are a start-up. I would think that fledgling businesses like his would need financial guidance more than anyone.

This young man may have Silicon-Valley like IT knowledge, but his skills in management and administration are still largely unknown and not to mention as-yet untested. And what about spending? Surely you would need someone to monitor that on a regular basis. And should his business hit the ground running and he needed to hire people, will he have sufficient time to divide his time between running the company and worrying about a now longer list of financial obligations?

I hope he bothered to research the shocking statistics from the Small Business Administration on how many start-ups crash and burn during their first year of operation. I can’t imagine bypassing an account’s services would do anything to diminish that figure.

Despite my recommendations, he remained unconvinced but did thank me for my advice nevertheless.

I wished him luck in his new venture. I didn’t want to spoil his enthusiasm by telling him he’s going to need it.