Strategies that motivate management to listen to the Tax Department is what we will address in this week’s post. Although there are dozens of topics I could address, this post will address a couple of challenges faced by most anyone leading a tax organization when it comes to compensating your tax team. This post will also provide solutions; these are solutions intended to make your job leading a tax organization easier. Although I know better than to put “ Head of Tax” and “Easy” in the same line, leading a tax organization is one of the toughest jobs out there today.
Each year I receive more than one hundred calls from the head of a tax organization; they want to know about compensation. They are all dealing with the same problem on compensation. In fact, often times I will hear that they lost great hires due to compensation structure. They spent months interviewing and when they made the offer it was just not enough. Most prospective employees are polite and will not tell you the salary is too low when the offer is extended. It is simply an uncomfortable subject for many to discuss directly with you or the HR department. You discover you are wasting so much time getting the talent you really need for this highly technical job when the compensation structure is too low to be competitive. What do you do to solve this problem?
Here is the best solution and I provide this remedy to all my clients. When you hire an experienced expert to find you the people you need; you need to ask them to work up a compensation report on every candidate submitted. Keep in mind these are candidates who come forward to interview with the company as they will give you straight compensation information. Trust compensation information from people who are sincerely interested in the tax role as they know you will likely check the numbers if hired. Information obtained from an expert tax recruiter conducting a thorough search is outstanding; you have a right to acquire it on all retained searches. You then take this data and provide the information to HR who will take it to the compensation board. It takes all the drama out of fighting for salaries because you are armed with accurate data ready for management…end of discussion.
How do you obtain compensation data if you are trying to benchmark your entire tax department? This is a big project but can be done on a budget with companies you trust. Many times people do not want to share compensation data but they will if they know they can trust a study was done by a neutral party and they do not reveal or identify exactly who is compensated what package. These studies cover Company A through Company L (12 similar companies) but not identify who Company A really is . I will have each organization submit a portion of the cost to be shared by 12-20 similar companies and cover all levels and even how it is organized. You keep your costs down and get to the meat of the subject fairly quickly without spending a lot or money.
One more thing I will add is “do not trust data from many sources as they most likely grouped the tax department with the finance and accounting departments”. These kind of reports bring down the salaries of tax professionals and it is frustrating to deal with these as they are absolutely worthless in demonstrating true numbers in tax professional compensation. They waste everyone’s time! I know very well the companies who do their homework and pay their tax professionals enough so no one else can touch them. Your senior executive management teams may change but you are best armed with the facts if and when they do.
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Kat Jennings, TaxConnections, CEO and Founder and Advisory Team provides three areas of services: 1) Internationally recognized, retained executive search services for multinational corporations, public accounting firms, and law firms; 2) Introductions of sellers to buyers of small and medium size accounting firms; and 3) Provide brand building and education services that support and prepare accounting firm owners to buy/sell an accounting practice. We focus on educating the journey to sell a practice and how to increase firm revenue prior to any sale. Our program ensures you start years prior to a sale by learning what is expected of you during the selling process, and introducing firm Partners to cross selling opportunities that are easy to implement and reduce your workload at the same time. We introduce you to value added connections to smartly grow revenue in your accounting practice.
Kat Jennings has been retained by organizations worldwide to locate tax professionals with highly specialized tax knowledge and expertise. She has a thorough understanding of the tax business community, with a proven record of stellar performances matching professionals with organizations. Bringing two parties together to work successfully is the art of understanding personalities, cultural fit, expectations by both parties, flexible or inflexible work environments, understanding what drives and motivates each party, and revolves around the personality and ethics of each executive team.
Kat is a widely recognized expert in high level, tax executive search, as well as connecting buyers and sellers of accounting firms. TaxConnections provides and educates small to medium size accounting firms owners and Partners how to prepare and sell their firms so they can build a succession plan for their retirement. With larger firms seeking to acquire smaller accounting practices, there is a real need to help firm owners prepare to be acquired. Most firm owners are unaware they are not ready to sell when they decide to retire. TaxConnections educates firm owners’ what they need to do years in advance of selling an accounting firm practice.
Senior tax executives expect the utmost privacy when being introduced to multinational organizations about a new tax opportunity under consideration. Having said that, companies searching for a new head of tax expecting tax executive candidates to submit their resume through a resume portal, will never see a full slate of outstanding tax executives available due to a candidates’ desire for greater privacy. This is why privacy focused Uber Tax Recruiters consistently outperform in-house recruiters on tax executive searches.
We offer our clients a Performance Retainer Agreement arrangement so their HR department can still recruit and compete with the tax candidates we present on Head of Tax searches. The client pays us a partial fee upfront, and if they find a candidate they deem better than we introduce to them, we forfeit the final fee. Most of the time, they love and prefer our private introductions to tax executive candidates better than what they source through their own resume portals.
When we represent selling/buying small to medium-sized firms, firm owners/partners also demand greater privacy when considering the sale of their practice. TaxConnections provides a safe place to discuss their business needs, elevate their practices’ online reputation, and increase revenue through new streams of business development by outsourcing work and partnering with other firms. Over three decades, we have worked tirelessly to build relationships between firm owners most organizations rarely have access to in the world of tax. There are numerous possibilities you may never have considered previously to bolster the value of your practice and service offerings.
As a globally recognized consultant to multinational organizations, accounting firms, and law firms searching for tax expertise, Kat has been retained by public accounting firms, law firms, and corporations worldwide including Apple Computer, AC Neilson, Accenture, Agilent Technologies, Allergan, Alza, American Express, American Media, Aon, Baker & McKenzie, Barclays Bank, Bechtel, Cargill, Carl Zieuss Vision, Century Aluminum, Chevron, Clorox, Citigroup, Commercials Metals, Constellation Energy, Countrywide, Del Monte, Deloitte Touche, DFS, DLA Piper, E&J Gallo Winery, Electronic Arts, Ernst &Young, Fox Entertainment, Fremont Investments, General Electric,General Motors, Herbalife, Hewlett Packard, Hyatt, Intel, Jones Lang LaSalle, Kimco Realty, KLA Tencor, Koch Industries, KPMG, Levi Strauss, Liberty Mutual, LKQ, Loews, Logitech, Lucas Film, Maersk, McKesson, Nalco, Newell Rubbermaid, Nissan, Oracle, Orbitax, Pacific Gas & Electric, PwC, QAD, SAIC, SanDisk, Sanmina, Sempra Energy, SONY, Synopsys, Ticketmaster, Trimble Navigation, Toyota, Univar, Wal-Mart, Wells Fargo, Vertex, Yahoo, Xilinx, and many more not listed here.
Contact Kat at 858,999.0053 Office/858.232.4415 Cell or kat@taxconnections.com to request a private consultation regarding the sale of your practice, adding top talent to your organization, or merging your practice with another firm owner with a book of business. The possibilities are endless; if you have a dream of a new vision for your professional life; we will scout opportunities throughout the market to make it happen.
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