2020 Vision: What accountants in practice can learn from Pokemon Go
So for anyone dismissing Pokemon, and in fact any developments in modern culture - I’d respectfully suggest pulling your head out of where the sun doesn’t shine
ALMOST seems too bizarre to be true, right? Accountants, Pokemon Go, learning something we don’t know… But trust me. Persevere with this article. It will help both your client and your staff engagement.
I took up the challenge to write an article on this, and at first the link seemed tenuous at best. Trying to become a “gym” or a “PokeStop” would just lead to crowds of pre-pubescent kids milling around in our car park. Talking to the team, they suggested that it could be used for staff morale… maybe, just maybe, tying it in with a FitBit centric staff welfare programme could work.
But that’s what opened my mind.
Despite it not being directly applicable to my business, it is applicable to my clients businesses. They would love to have crowds of kids entering their cafes, their dance classes, their shops. They would happily provide “lures” and incentives for certain team members. Heck, they might even earn a few quid from it. Shouldn’t we as business advisers know what’s going on in their world, and their market?
And despite it not being particularly of interest to me, it is of interest to my staff. Just talking about it with the team led me to find out that Steve is happy he lives where he does, because there are lots of Pokemon nearby. Lewis went out at 3am hunting for Pokemon. Jodie spent all weekend in London looking for the things…
I didn’t realise my team enjoyed meeting targets, being competitive and achieving goals… That can’t help my business, can it…?
So for anyone dismissing Pokemon, and in fact any developments in modern culture – I’d respectfully suggest pulling your head out of where the sun doesn’t shine (or, the pile of tax returns on your desk). While it might not involve tax rates, legislation, and the ability to charge by the hour; it’s the “real” stuff happening in your clients’ businesses and your staffs lives. You never know – if you have young children or grandchildren, you might even have something to bond with them about too.
Carl Reader is a director of Wiltshire-based firm d&t, which won the 2013 British Accountancy Award for Independent Firm of the Year-Wales and South West England
