My original title for this post was “you’re not weird…you just haven’t found your community yet”. But I thought that was too long.
After traveling to Greenville, SC last weekend for the THRIVEal Firm of the Future Symposium, I can finally say I’ve found my community. From the moment I met Scott & Carl at the airport, to the moment I thanked Jason and flew home I felt welcomed and inspired by everyone around me. This from 40+ people I had only “met” online or talked to on the phone.
(This post isn’t going to rehash everything we learned during the Symposium, frankly I haven’t digested it all yet. And others do a much better job of explaining things.)
This is about my journey, starting about a year ago. Around that time something started to bug me about my profession. I thought we as CPAs we capable of so much more than simply producing a tax return or financial statement or “selling our time”. I started poking around the internet and found a few folks doing just that – giving their clients awesome service and actually innovating this profession!
Looking back, I’m not even sure exactly when or how I came about finding THRIVEal – it is almost like someone dropped it in my lap and said “here Kevin, you need to see this”.
From there, the group grew and we started to congregate on LinkedIn and share information. When Jason announced he was bringing Ron Baker & Ed Kless to Greenville to speak, I knew I had to go. I had read Ron’s book Firm of the Future and it just made sense.
Now I know what Simon Sinek talks about in his post about weirdos. We are the “left-siders”. Sometimes it is lonely, but we know our work must be done. We will support and counsel each other as we drive change.
Great post Kevin! Glad to be apart of your community and I am also thankful that I have found THRIVEal.
I know I said it at the THRIVEcast… But I feel the same way. Community is so important and I am so glad that I have you all. Making changes together is exciting and encouraging. I look forward to our futures. (and our community peeps are all pretty darn cool too!)
Dude, this is awesome! It was so good to have you in Greenville. I still can’t believe everyone came. It was life-changing for me!
@Joe – thanks for the comment, I’m glad we got to chat. I can’t wait to see where we are in 5 years!
@Shayna – I remember your comment during Thrivecast and found myself nodding along with what you said. I never realized there were so many cool accountants out there!
@Jason – life changing for sure. I’ll remember that weekend forever.