Motivation
Having had a conversation today with an individual I came to realise something I had never questioned before, what’s my motivation? I suppose having had a declining spiral of wellbeing over the last few years, I have either forgotten what my motivation was or indeed I had never actually decided what it was, as I struggle to make decisions. (I can’t decide what to have for tea, ask my wife, but that’s for another blog). As a younger person getting into accountancy, my ambition was actuallyto get qualified and pass as many exams as I could. I would study hard and revise for the exams to make sure I know everything that would get me the pass. In these early days I would be imaging and attempting to gain a high pass rate of over 90%. I passed my exams overall, I failed a few on the first time on the way, which I took as a major failure and here I think start the problems. As an accountant, I am very black and white, in and out, debit and credit, balanced or unbalanced, positive or negative, there is never any middle ground. It’s either one or the other. If I am not successfull then I must be a failure, if I have not passed, then I have failed. I failed my first driving test and ripped up and threw away the ‘re-test’ application form as a young adult. These could have been early depression warning signs. What I should have been doings is putting it down to experience gained and placing a positive value on it. No matter what the subject or experience, I had learnt a lot and was more knowledgeable than before I started the task or project. Here is what I try to think now, that in between the two ends of the spectrum of ‘Pass’ and ‘Fail’ is covered ground, increased experience and knowledge it is a step further than I was. My motivation was all wrong as once I had passed the accountancy qualification exams, I hit a brick wall, of ‘Well, what do I do now I am here?’ Another major realisation, is that i was always looking for what I term as ‘Authoritative Permission’.
No matter what my subject matter I would want to seek certification or ‘Pass’ i.e. Authoritative Permission’ from something or someone in the know.
I wanted to offer Sage Services, so I gained the Sage Certifications in Accounting and Payroll, I did the same with QuickBooks by becoming a ProAdvisor and then ultimately a Xero partner. All of these took time to achieve and gain the permission to be able to say, ‘I’m a Sage Expert’ or ‘I’m a Xero Expert’.
I did the same with Excel by looking into becoming a ‘Certified Microsoft Excel User’.
All of this was to ‘show’ my clients or indeed prospective clients that I was an ‘Official’ Expert in something or everything.
The very fact was that I was more than competent to use all of the software, I didn’t need Accountancy exams of top of Exams I just needed to do. Afterall, I had 20 years + of USING Excel, Sage, Quickbooks etc, so I was very knowledgeable and expereinced and just needed to get on with the job rather than looking for that perfected knowledge base.
Clients don’t ask me about whether I am qualified in accountancy nevermind in Sage, Excel , Xero or Excel they do not care, but in my head I have all of the approvals beforehand, which I wasted a lot of time, and instead I should of been building my practice of course which I was not. Hence, more contribution to the Depression Slide.
Thank you for reading
I have done it! What a feeling, I have achieved something today, this week, this year. I have blogged today.
Have a good day!
The Depressed Accountant