[ 00:00:01,080 ]Let’s go!

[ 00:00:22,490 ]Welcome into Behind the Brand Podcast. I’m Adam Hayes. To my right is my co-host, Bob Payton. Today, in the middle, our guest is Derek McGee. Welcome in, yeah, thank you for having me, yeah. So tell us a little bit about you. Well, born and raised in Indianapolis. Okay. Stayed close to home. Where’d you go to high school? Franklin Central. Okay. Yeah. So southeast side. So Franklin Central. Flashes. Flashes. Yeah. Awesome. And then so graduated, went to college, where’d you go to college? At Und. Okay. Yeah. You you’re you’re Indianapolis through and through. Yes, yeah. Yes, we kind of stayed close to home. Did you play sports at U of Indy? Football for a year. And then went on to coach for a couple of years at Franklin Central. Oh, nice.

[ 00:01:09,910 ]With the freshman team there. Um, that ended up ending around the time Sort of getting into the professional career part-time tax intern at a firm here on the north side of Indy so started out there and That was January of 2018 and so It’s been five years ago at least. Six. Six now. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. So what was your degree in? Accounting. Okay. All right. So you went to the standard firm. Was it a bigger firm? It was a smaller firm. Smaller firm. Was it commercial and personal or both? Both. Yeah, okay. Yeah. As you’re working through and gaining experience, did you start to go, ‘Hey, here’s the area of accounting that I’m gravitating towards?’ It was a while before that happened.

[ 00:02:04,890 ]I think I was really blessed early on for the first probably six or seven years of my career there where I was able to get a wide range of experience, not just in one area like tax, but working in like the outsourced accounting functions, the tax services, the audit and assurance services. So I was fortunate enough to get a wide range of experience. And then that’s obviously led to, you know, being beneficial. Some of the mentors I had there were really intentional in developing me and was even fortunate enough to learn the administrative side of running a public accounting firm as well. So billing, client acquisition, how do you estimate fees? How do you communicate it? Sort of the art of that side of things, not just getting the work done.

[ 00:03:05,410 ]Yeah. So you are CPA now? Yes. Oh, awesome. So that’s congratulations. That’s a big feat. Thank you. Thank you. And so at what point in that experience did you kind of get to the point? Point in your life or decision that you might not want to be there and that’s not a bad thing. No, that’s a tough one. That’s a great question. The firm experienced a lot of growth and ultimately turned into something still a great firm. And I still believe today it’s an incredible firm. Which firm was it? Uh, Donovan CPAs. Okay, yeah, super reputable firm, great people that work there. Yeah, um. It. We got to the point where sort of a crossroads where it was processes and procedures were going in a direction that maybe didn’t necessarily fit.

[ 00:04:01,290 ]What we needed on the home front. Wife, three kids, and I recognize I’m not saying anything special in that regard, but just our situation could have used a little more flexibility than what we were moving toward. So, and a couple of other things, but. Ultimately, one realized that was not a good fit anymore. Moved on from there. No, that’s fine. I mean, especially COVID, right? COVID reset. The office workspace rules—yes, right, sure— just did. You know, I’ll call it the usual pendulum, right? The pendulum swings. Everybody’s at home. You can’t even go into work. They won’t let you come into work all the way down. We’re gonna swing back. People get caught up, right? There’s like, I didn’t, I don’t necessarily want to be on that other end of the pendulum and that’s fine.

[ 00:05:01,180 ]So yeah, fully, fully get that. So were you with another firm during that time? Then, after you left Donovan? I went to a group of nonprofit organizations. Okay. Also in Indianapolis. Was it Zach? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. CFO there for several months. Similar things got to the point where I personal life I was not able to fulfill— I think what the organization’s needed with what requirements the demand of a full-time CFO. Yeah. So, when we realized that, it kind of wasn’t for me. We were thinking, wife and I, praying about what’s next. I likely wasn’t able to go back to Donovan. And so. Also in that time, around July, we had actually started an LLC. Good to uh start helping just a couple of people on the side and um I think every CPA at one point just briefly has the conversation with himself.

[ 00:06:07,290 ]Do I want to ever go out on my own versus do I just stay with the firm? We had talked about it a lot. I had kind of felt a nudge. I don’t know if it was the Lord or what, but Whitestown is such a growing community. With the Lily plant going in in Lebanon, I think it’s a great time to start a CPA firm right and so we were praying about it. I think I got to the point where I was talking about it and talking about it. One day my wife was like, you just need to stop talking about it. Why don’t we do about it instead of talk about it? That was all the. The affirmation I needed. I think, um, with did you kind of look at her?

[ 00:06:46,390 ]Are you sure? Yeah, a little bit with, I mean, with, with, uh, with three kiddos, a home, a mortgage, you know, she had every reason to say, ‘No, you need to go get a stable job, fixed salary, full benefits, which, as a CPA, I’m sure.’ We could have gone that route, but with her being on board, I was like, ‘Okay, let’s go for it.’ So that, that. kind of occurred mid-September. And so at that point, I said, ‘Okay, well, let’s just start putting some feelers out there and see, you know, maybe we’ll get some clients and a few months went by.’ So we’re, you know, December, we kind of filled up. decent workload of clients, some monthly recurring revenue to keep the bills paid and give us time to really think through.

[ 00:07:44,400 ]You know we’re still in January, so as of you know today, we’ve made the decision— you know we’re going to go all in right on this and uh, word willing, we’ll see where it goes. We’ve got our grand opening in Whitestown next week. The town’s going to come out and do a little ribbon cutting ceremony. That’ll be cool. Get some PR with it. Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome. Should be, should be a good time. And it’s less of a, they have a chamber in Weishaupt. Boone County. Okay. I think they have a chamber. Yeah. I’m sure it’s on my schedule somewhere. They do monthly events. Oh, yeah. I know. Yep. Talk about, you know, just for another owner, right, that’s budding in the future that’s not there yet.

[ 00:08:31,380 ]You know, somebody’s setting in another CPA firm somewhere. Just kind of that journey you went on mentally, the struggle, right? Because it’s real. It’s terrifying, right? Describe what it was like just the last six months and kind of where you’re at right at the moment. Sure. Uh, I And this might not be the most popular answer, but it’s the truth. I’ve honestly had a sense of peace throughout this whole journey that I can only accredit to the Lord. My wife and I were very, our Christian faith is important to us and a real part of our lives. And we’re very intentional from day one. We said, ‘Lord, this is your firm. Do with it what you want, if it’s not meant to be.

[ 00:09:19,440 ]Slam the door, like— please don’t let us go down this road right meant to be. If it would be your will for us to serve this community and help people, um, and get to just be a light and in the white town and surrounding communities. We ask that you bless it. And so I see myself as a manager, a steward of the firm. I’m not the boss. I’m not in charge by any means. And so I’ve just said I’m going to serve clients well that the Lord may send our way. Similar to the emotion piece, though, maybe more. Technically speaking. Advice to anyone thinking of starting their own business is just go. Just take the first step. You’ll never feel ready. It may sound a little cliche, but just go.

[ 00:10:13,400 ]Just go. Keep moving. If you stay in the same spot, your perspective can never change. You can never grow. And worst case scenario, you get 10 steps in and you’re like, ‘Oh, this was the wrong direction.’ Okay, I’ll go this direction. But without taking the steps, you can’t figure that out. Correct. No, good. Yeah. And it’s, it’s, it’s just a topic that comes up all the time and everybody we ever meet, especially those that maybe they have a corporate job or a full-time gig and they’re just, just kind of thinking. Right. And I always tell them, I, you know, in our language, I want them to count the cost, whatever that is, right and then make sure that’s, and as you’ve talked about with your spouse, make sure your other spouse, your spouse, is on board.

[ 00:11:00,190 ]Because I’ll be honest, I didn’t necessarily make that very obvious, or I didn’t intentionally really work through that first before kind of hitting the button. And I tell people now, right? It’s got consequences. It just does, right? Whether it’s financial or otherwise. Yeah, no, it’s good. I think I would disclaim, too. I’m again very blessed in the sense that I’m a CPA. It’s a profession that is in high demand. So not everybody that starts a business starts a business in something that’s. um, their things not yeah not competitive i guess um now nowadays i think the latest statistics say 75 of cpas are 65 years old yes so the opportunity for young professionals. Whether or not you start your own firm or stay plugged in at the firm they’re at to potentially become an owner there someday, it’s greater than.

[ 00:12:04,859 ]It’s a little bit scary when you think of the numbers that are retiring and going to be retiring in the next. Is there enough coming up to replace? Capacity. There is not. We see that already. And it’s— it’s a problem and it’s the profession is moving in the right direction, but I don’t think it’s moving fast enough in this direction. Young people see public accounting as I have to go to school for four years. On top of that, to sit for the exams, you have to have 150 credit hours. So an extra 30 credit hours on top of your standard bachelor’s degree. Then after that, you’re saying, ‘I’ve got to study for these four exams for a year or two.’ For me, it was a two-year process. Then even after that, finally.

[ 00:12:59,470 ]am done i’m 24 25 years old now i have to work and this is really where people are getting turned off of the profession 60 70 hour weeks during busy season saturdays it’s just got this whole bad reputation and what I found is the smaller and medium-sized firms are really making great strides and uh decreasing that number of hours putting caps on busy season you know 45 50 hour week max busy seasons and that’s that’s rather attainable it’s public accounting and at the end of the day tax season is where it is in a year, there’s going to be peaks and valleys in this profession. But I think, and with the help of technology and just different strategies and outlooks, workloads have been able to be sorted throughout the year.

[ 00:13:55,210 ]So there’s things that can be done in November and December to decrease that spike in work in March and April. There’s likewise, there’s strategies to be done in March and April to maybe shift some, you know, more uh basic level tax returns into the summer, right? Just extend them and maybe you know focus on what needs done by March 15th or April 15th. Yeah. So talking about Whitestown, obviously, again, we live there, we live right on the road, right? So massive growth in the last 10 years. And I like the fact that you’ve kind of plucked yourself in the middle of that. So what do you feel? I’ve been there 30 years, so we’ve watched it all grow and happen, but now you’ve kind of plunked yourself in it.

[ 00:14:41,330 ]A newbie to a certain extent. Right. And that’s what does it feel like? I don’t know. I don’t, I mean, we live just far enough outside of White’s down to not feel it. Sure. We just see it. So I’m just curious what that feels like to you. It is fast growing. But it still has a small town feel in a lot of regards. A little bit of that, I think, is probably we’re involved in our church. Quite a bit. So it’s not uncommon to go to the Meyer right there or out to lunch and run into someone, you know, which probably adds to that sort of small town feel. Yep. What I think, maybe more specifically, though, I’m seeing, is just opportunity.

[ 00:15:28,090 ]Not only is it a good time to start a CPA firm, but Boone County, the surrounding areas between Brownsburg, Lebanon, Thorntown, even into the Pittsburgh area. With all of that growth, it’s just a great time I think to start a firm. Sure, something I don’t see in Whitestown is a lot of CPA firms. So, Lord willing, we able to get in there maybe before and start building that reputation. As you know, a firm that operates with integrity, ready to serve whoever walks through the doors. Our ideal clients the residents of Whitestown and I don’t mean specifically just Whitestown. I mean, while we do work with larger corporations and businesses, and certainly want to continue growing that out. We also want to serve just families where, you know, maybe every dollar counts.

[ 00:16:32,630 ]Right mom’s at home with the kiddos and you know dad works a job W-2 job and how can we optimize the tax position and withholding to maximize your cash flow every month versus letting the government have it for a while. Yes, best example is: If you get a $2,400 tax refund, we could have adjusted your withholding throughout the year. You could have added an extra $200 in your pocket for all 12 months. Each month to use for groceries, saving, investing, extracurriculars for the kiddos. So those are the types of things that fire me up. In kind of conjunction with our tax services, we’ve bundled in something we’ve coined as financial navigation. That’s more financial. coaching in a way. My passion is helping people build budgets, manage debt, structure their finances.

[ 00:17:29,180 ]In a way that can bring them kind of clarity and peace about their lives, help them make decisions confidently, and set their sort of household. System up in a way that lets them live with margin. Right. Wisdom. Versus stress. Yeah. Everything else. It sounds a little. I don’t want to sound too corporate, but a household is a business. A marriage is in some ways a business. And part of that business is the revenue. And just like a business has a budget, expenses, and goals, your household should have that too. Back to our ideal clients. That’s kind of the setup we aim for. For our just sole individual clients, is yeah we’ll do your tax return we’ll help you but I would love to be having an ongoing relationship with you monthly quarterly checking in hey how are things going and then just kind of more taking on that partnership approach as opposed to just being the tax guy.

[ 00:18:39,810 ]If you just want someone to do your tax return for the lowest cost. There are places you can go for that. We’re not blocking the green box. And those are perfectly fine places to go. It’s just not our. great sort of business model sure right now and That’s good. I think you’re in a good spot. I mean, there’s not going to be a lack of people and families and kids and the next generation. I mean, there’s families coming in just like yours. That’s, you know, that’s happened over the last decade. That those kids will become teenagers, they’re already coming there, right? And soon they’ll be adults. Yeah, so you’ve got the multi-generational thing. That that area has just not seen— I just never seen it before. So yeah, good spot.

[ 00:19:33,940 ]You know, plenty of small businesses as well. And Just a really exciting time, I think, to be starting a business. I mean, you both know it’s terrifying. It’s terrifying. Yes. Yes. Sure. It can be. It’s exciting. It’s so exciting at the same time. I heard it put. Once really well, and I’m sure you would both agree that the highs are higher and the lows are lower, very much as an owner. Yes. Amplitude. Amplitude. Yes. Yes. So maybe frequency signal and noise. Yes. Yes. I mean, when you, you know, corporate job, you get paid every two weeks or whatever it is, right. That rhythm, you just get used to. And then, when that’s totally disrupted, when all of a sudden you may be three months without a paycheck.

[ 00:20:22,020 ]and people just look at you like, ‘Yeah, you know, are you from outer space and it’s work, you know, it’s like, well, it doesn’t just come out of the air; it’s like it so, yes, it’s part of it. That gets into something I found just beautiful about the last few months. If if if you’re only measuring, I think, the success, with you know, save for just meeting the basic bills being paid, a huge component and a huge sort of form of compensation about being self-employed is the freedom that comes along with it. There’s a saying, ‘What’s your rich life now look like?’ And it might not be. Having the most amount of money in the bank. Maybe it’s having the freedom to, a few weeks ago, I left the office and went to my wife and kids for lunch.

[ 00:21:11,660 ]It was a two-minute drive for me there. It was a five-minute drive for them there. Little things like that. I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do that before, and I recognize. Some people don’t have that option and screw it, based on whatever career they chose. Sure, I’m not naive to the fact that I’m insanely blessed and fortunate to be in this position, but um Yeah, it’s—it’s— it’s just wonderful. Yeah, I mean, you describe it sometimes it’s not, but a lot of times I would say it is. The level of pay that you may have been used to, you may never see again. Right. But. You’re trading that off for other things. And those other things become way more important. It’s still nice to have a better income.

[ 00:22:03,770 ]If that’s how it works out, fantastic. But a lot of times it’s not. It’s not a trade-off of, oh, I’m not going to survive. You just may decide, I don’t go to Disney three times a year. I go once. But yet. To your point, that allows you then the freedom to do something on a Friday afternoon, whereas before you were stuck in an office in a cube and a stack of files and just get it done before you go home. Right. And so. And that’s why I always talk about the other half, you know, the spouse and what that looks like to them may not be what you think it looks like to all those kinds of things. So it’s really important. So yeah, no good stuff. Suit me up.

[ 00:22:45,440 ]We talked a little bit, you know, off air. You’re you’re in a musician, you’re in the the church band. So how did you, were you playing an instrument before the church band, or did you get inspired because you were watching the band perform, and you’re like, ‘Hey, I want to do that too.’ Sure. How’d that come about? Yeah. Most of my dad’s side of the family is music, musician, sort of inclined, and some regard my, my. My grandfather plays guitar and bass. My two uncles both play guitar, bass, piano. My dad plays the drums. My little brother plays the bass. I kind of fell into the acoustic and electric guitar route. And so from a very early age, I was exposed to it. My grandpa got me my first guitar when I was eight years old.

[ 00:23:36,640 ]It was a red mini Fender Squire. And so he taught me the basic chords that you can play. Um, shortly thereafter, that I started listening to bands like Kiss, Motley Crue. Not what you would hear at church. Sort of that style. Yeah, that metal, you know, the electric guitar solos and all of that. And that just hooked me. Absolutely hooked me. Right. The way I think I learned best took lessons for a little bit, but ultimately this didn’t pan out all that long. It was more so listening to, you know. A kiss song or a song from a different band that I liked and trying to, you know, go to YouTube and learn it, and right, you start to kind of reverse engineer, like how he was doing that, and then it’s like, ‘Oh, that solo actually fits that song because it was in this key and that’s that scale, so it was almost reverse learning it, like you would learn the solo,

[ 00:24:36,470 ]then learn the scale that the solo was rooted in, and then learn why did that scale for that solo work with that song, as opposed to I think the more traditional approach is to learn the scale first. I have no idea. Thank you. You play? I play drums. Yeah. Awesome. Nice. I also play guitar, not well. And I do neither. That’s my skill—no blessing you with my music. Thank you. My passion is drums. Okay. Yeah. Nice. So outside of music, outside the business, and let’s say even outside your family, maybe— what do you like to do for fun? Lift weights. Lift weights. Plugged into a couple of different small groups, a church. Some guys and I will get together every Friday morning for coffee, a little bit of Bible study.

[ 00:25:36,940 ]Amen. Yeah, outside of that, I mean, I hate— I probably sound like a boring person. I’m asking that like you have a lot of time. You’ve got kids, right? You’ve got your hands full, too. Just got a business and a few family things— a great family, right? Busy, active, time for that season of your life, you know, the minivan phase. Okay, yeah. What ages are your children? Three and a half, one and a half. So two daughters, okay, and our son was just born in December. Okay, oh wow. Yes. Okay. You don’t have— i had to reschedule. Yeah. Yes. And chasing kids around. Right. We’ll let you hang out here just a little while before you go home. Right. It’s all right. We have a couch in the other office.

[ 00:26:24,870 ]You can take a nap. That’s right. Admitly though, I mean, that’s it. You know, you asked what— maybe prepared me for the business earlier and, probably, to a fault, I overfocused on my career in my early and mid 20s. So, if it didn’t have to do with my relationship with God, my wife, my children, my very close family— meaning my parents, brother, and in-laws— It was career. It was just. Sure. Working it’s very common. Yeah, sure. Um, very heads down. It’s only been in the last, probably, three to six months that I felt like, okay, I need to start thinking about, you know, what types, who we want to be, and model, you know, for our kids, what do we want them to think is normal?

[ 00:27:16,750 ]I want them to see mom and dad having friendships outside of the home and be involved in the community and being social and having connection and serving others and taking meals to people, things like that. It’s yeah, probably the last three to six months where I felt like I’ve really made an effort to come up for air a little bit more. Yeah, but at the same time, I think it did maybe pay off a little bit. Having my early and mid-20s, so heads down in my career, I was able to get the exams passed and a lot of really, really good experience at Donovan CPAs that kind of has culminated into where we are today. Gotcha. Awesome. Yeah, that’s awesome. So what do you think? 26 kind of looks like for you then?

[ 00:28:14,730 ]Well, I mean, the first. Survive, right? I’m joking. It’s a good question because I want. Now that we know we’re all in with this firm, I want to have goals to operate as a professional business. I alluded to the fact earlier I was enjoying some of the flexibility that came with being self-employed. I also want to balance that with, if you’re self-employed, if you’re not working, no one else is working. Right now, the money just doesn’t show up, and you got to have goals, systems in place. Yes, it looks different for a one-person firm. Something on the horizon, if our growth continues, is going to be hiring. Making our first hire that would be a blessing. Um, and then more so, I think, defining just processes, procedures, the name of the game.

[ 00:29:09,380 ]The last three to six months has been keeping the bills paid. Yes. You know, making sure our wife, children, are taken care of, maybe saving a little bit, investing a little bit. But by and large, it’s just been. Get clients very just messy yes and so 26 is just probably just honing in on processes, procedures continue to be active in the community and try to gain clients, grow in a healthy way. I’m the biggest believer in that bigger is not always better when it comes to business. I do want to grow, but I want to grow responsibly and also in proportion to the season I’m in personally. Not to say that I’m complacent, but I am content with where we are today. I’m not interested in taking this firm to a million dollars tomorrow and then never being home for my wife and kids. I would love someday to have the firm at a million dollars. That’s for sure a goal. There, responsibly, um, if it is the Lord’s will, yeah, yes, yes. So let’s project forward a little bit at the end of 2026: you’re looking back, what are you most proud of?

[ 00:30:39,140 ]Most, most proud of? What are you going to be most proud of? What are you going to be most proud of when you look back? Yeah. What would make you proud? Being able to say, ‘We took a leap of faith in that, amidst the chaos of a startup, the chaos of having three kids, I would say. Amidst all that, I continued to serve my wife well, my children well. I was not.’ A workaholic I am in amidst all that, we just serve the community. Um, continued getting the firm off the ground. Okay. Um, so that’s not a specific answer, but I would love to look back at the end of 26 and just say, it was, it was a solid year. Yeah, we we serve, I served my wife well, I served my children well, my community well.

[ 00:31:37,870 ]And here we are. It’s good for me. Maybe a little vague, but no, not at all. You’re six months in. That’s okay. We want you to come back in about 12 to 14 months. Correct. And we’ll pull this recording out and have you watch it. We’ll see what you say, but no, I think what you just described is— you just, you want it, to survive to serve and have, you know, some stability. You want to have some richness to your life. Correct. Richness to your life. Right. And if you look back and you did that this year. Fantastic. So, yeah, I wish you the best luck. Anything we can do to help, let us know. Absolutely. All right. You can be good. Yeah. It’s going to be awesome. Thank you. Thanks, all. Let’s—