I noticed this CFO.com headline in my Accounting News feed that sits in the sidebar of this blog: XBRL Skeptics Abound: Some doubt that interactive financial data will be of much use. Once again, we are faced with poorly articulated reasoning behind the introduction of a technology that has much wider benefit than that which has been put forward. The article quotes a panel attendee who said:
After attending a panel last month on the SEC and accounting developments in Atlanta, Jay Starkman, who runs an accounting firm there, was so unimpressed that he penned a letter to The Financial Times complaining that XBRL is a “consulting product” in search of a market.
“If it was really that great, it wouldn’t have to be mandated,” Starkman told CFO.com. “It’s being pushed by the people who have an interest in pushing it.”
I have a lot of sympathy for this view and I suspect that much of Jay Starkman’s ire is born from the frustration he experiences from the constant pimping of ‘stuff’ by consulting organizations. It’s sad but true that much consulting is sold on ‘hope and hype’ with rarely any genuine consideration for outcomes that match client needs or requirements.
I often find that organizations will start with a ‘Tell us what you know about…’ question. My answer is usually something like ‘Well, what is it you want to know?’ There’s a reason. The ‘Tell us etc’ question is often badly framed because the organization has probably heard or seen a bunch of buzz around a topic and assumes it should be of interest. They have no clue whether it has any application but you can bet most consultants will find a way of spinning it to make sure it has application – however obtuse.
If I am to do an honest job then I have to be clear in understanding what it is they want, not what I can foist upon them. As far as I am concerned, anything else is an abuse of the client relationship and a breach of trust. It sure has little integrity.
Recently, Hugh MacLeod tweeted something that made me think about consulting and which dovetails neatly to this discussion. He said:
I don’t have clients I have collaborators.
That’s an interesting statement because it implies an entirely different relationship to the one that usually exists between professional and the person paying the bill. In one of Hugh’s recent posts, he expands on the underlying themes that drive his thinking:
If I have succeeded in marketing in the past, the more I think about it, the more I realize that it was not some form of marketing genius on my part. It was simply because, on some level, I gave a damn. On some level, I cared about the product, I cared about the people making and selling it, and I cared about the people using it. And as I found out, passion is surprisingly easy to share, even with folk you don’t know. But it has to be there in the first place, and it’s devilishly hard to fake.
The question for those who read my stuff is simple. Can you identify with this idea or does it fill you with terror, fear and loathing? It’s a very simple choice but one you have to make. Perhaps if the Big Four were more like Hugh in their thinking, folks like Jay would not be so incensed. Oh yes – Hugh is wildly successful at what he does. Go figure.
