With nearly 300k subscribers on YouTube, Bill Hanna’s weekly videos on The Financial Controller Channels provide his audience with lessons over a 15-year career in Auditing & Corporate Accounting. He provides inspiration and practices in your accounting and finance careers in his videos and courses “Designed To Save You Years of Learning” (as one reviewer wrote “I have learnt more with you than 3 years studying accounting and finance”).
In this episode:
- How I stumbled into accounting
- Lessons in accounting leadership
- The power of mentoring teams about mistakes I make
- FP&A vs controller
- The accounting crisis affecting the CFO’s Office
- My accidental influencer journey
- Bringing practical explanation of concepts through one company followed across the course
- The accounting concepts needed to get to CFO
- Having a wife who is also an accountant
- Being a Mac user using Excel
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-hanna-cpa-7653a851/
YouTube channel (Financial Controller) https://www.youtube.com/@TheFinancialController
Courses: https://controller-academy.com/
Full transcript
Glenn Hopper:
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This is FP&A Today. Welcome to fp NA Today, I’m your host, Glenn Hopper. Today we have a fantastic guest who’s redefining what it means to be a modern finance leader. Bill Hanna is a CPA seasoned controller and the founder of the Financial Controller, an education platform helping finance professionals level up their careers with a background spanning public accounting, private industry, and leadership roles at high growth companies. Bill has mastered the art of bridging technical accounting with strategic finance. Beyond his corporate experience, he’s built a massive following, over a quarter million subscribers on YouTube, where he simplifies complex accounting topics and shares real world insights. Today we’ll dive into the evolving role of controllers, how FPNA and accounting can Work better together, and what’s next in finance leadership. Bill, welcome to the show.
Bill Hanna:
Thank you for having me, Glenn. You make it sound so good, man. I appreciate the intro.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah, it was easy one to write. You’ve done, uh, some, some pretty cool things that I can’t wait to dive in. We’ve heard my words. Let’s now turn it around and, uh, have you tell us about your background and kind of take us back and tell us what led you to a career in accounting and what attracted you to the, uh, the controllership path.
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So I actually stumbled into accounting. Uh, it wasn’t by any sort of design. Um, my first bachelor’s degree was in hotel management and travel agency work, so that was back in 99, 99, 2000. And back then, that was the beginning of the online travel agencies taking over the world and, and sort of the, the traditional travel agent, uh, model has is, is going away at that time. And so I wanted to jump ship because that wasn’t gonna work. That’s when I migrated to the US in 99, and I’ve taken a couple of college courses when I came to the us and just by chance, I’ve taken a course with an accounting professor, professor Dauer. I hope he is listening, and he is the reason why I got into accounting. Um, uh, and it’s a story that I’ve heard from others too, like where you see one professor you kind of admire, you know, their personality, the work they do, and how do you talk about the profession.
So he was talking about what he does, uh, with love. He ran a CPA firm and he taught accounting at the local college, and he just sounded like he was just having a good time with, with his job, and he just sounded like a really great guy. So I decided to do that. And then I went to work for, uh, PWC, um, right after college. Um, I did a couple of years, uh, there, and I just looked at how overworked and sort of tired, uh, you know, the professionals who kind of progress and stay till the partnership route. And I just decided that’s not something that I was gonna do. So I started looking around what to do next. And that traditional routes were either to go to, uh, private industry accounting or equity research. There’s also other things like internal audit and things like that.
Uh, so I wanted to do equity research at the time I remember, but then when I looked at the people who were doing that, I realized that they’re probably smarter than me and I just not gonna make the cut for this kind of work. And so I looked at private industry and then I, I took a job as an accounting analyst with a, a startup and then sort of take, you know, kind of took it from there, going from one industry to the other without any specific, um, plan to take over anything was more just like learning some skillset in this job and then go to the next. And I spent about maybe two to three years in each job. And I, I often speak about it in my videos on the benefit of, um, working in maybe seven different places in my career over the span of 18 years, um, where I’ve gathered, you know, from an accounting software standpoint, like I know how to work with SAP, uh, NetSuite, Sage, Intacct, QuickBooks. I would, I wouldn’t have learned all of these systems and, you know, different processes and philosophy of different controllers that I worked under if I haven’t done that. So yeah, that’s how I ended up in the controller route.
Glenn Hopper:
We’re gonna talk, you know, the, the technical part of this, but you mentioned, you know, it was a person, a professor that brought you into accounting, and then thinking about the different controllers that you worked with, and I guess before we dive into the technical part, 18 years in your career is there’s something that stands out as a lesson, uh, that you’ve learned in accounting leadership and, you know, to, to be, have these people who, uh, influenced your career and, and brought you into accounting to begin with. I think a lot of times we, uh, we overlook sort of the personal side of this or the soft skills and the leadership part. So I’m wondering if there’s anything that stands out to you on the leadership side from your career?
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, yeah. So that’s a benefit of working under many, uh, CFOs and controllers, you know, um, is learning their different styles and the different things that they prioritize and, and how they, they mentor and coach. One of the things I learn is talking to my staff about their career progression, often realizing that this is what they’re here for is really that mean. They’re here for what, for the paycheck and for their career progression. They’re not here because I am a great guy. They’re not here because this company is a great company. They’re, they’re only here for their career progression. So having that sort of become the focal, uh, point of discussion in our one-on-one, not every week, but maybe every, you know, couple of weeks, we’ll, we’ll kind of bring it back and like, you know, how are we progressing toward what you already trying to do teaching staff about advanced stuff?
So like, oftentimes your staff is doing the mundane, the daily stuff, but then taking some time to walk them through a more advanced topic like transfer pricing or consolidation or things that they don’t really do in a normal, uh, daily basis or at all, sometimes help them kind of realize, okay, here’s what’s waiting for me in the future. And, you know, this person cares enough to, to kind of talk to me about these things and, and get me exposed to them talking to my staff about mistakes that I make. Um, I think this is an important one because a lot of times some bosses that I’ve had, uh, their style is to talk about only the good things and not talk about the bad things, the mistakes that they’ve made. It makes you human, it makes you relatable, and it makes it easy for them to come to you when, when they made a mistake themself.
Uh, the other things too is that, um, and I wrote some notes here because I, I knew this question was coming, looking at the accounting function as a factory and sort of realizing what should be done by a robot. So like you can just look quickly and say like, you know, I don’t want my staff spending time on this because this is just gonna erode their, their self, their self worth just working on this day in and day out, right? So kind of have that ability to, to identify and then maybe you’re not gonna have the budget to invest in, in technology for all these things all at once, but at least if you identify ’em and keep them in a parking lot sort of thing, and, you know, get back to them sort of tackling the ones that you can as much as you can. So yeah, these are maybe the, the four things that I’ve learned in terms of like leading a team.
Glenn Hopper:
That’s great. You know, thinking about automation, that’s a topic that’s near and dear to my heart with, uh, with technology, whether it’s AI or just rule-based automation and everything that’s going on out there right now with agents and thinking about, you know, there’s a, there’s a quote, and I’ve gotta refer to it here. I used to have it memorized, but I haven’t used it in a while. Hang on one sec. The quote is by a guy named Clifford Stoll. And it is, um, data is not information, information is not knowledge, knowledge is not understanding and understanding is not wisdom. And I think about that all the time as sort of a pyramid that the, the value that we bring to a company. And so talking about that mundane stuff at the beginning, that that’s the, you know, the lowest level data entry, taking data, turning it into information, but then you’ve gotta kind of move it up the chain.
And I think as automation gets more accessible, and, and you mentioned budget, and they’re still, you know, uh, depending on the size of the company, what’s going on, we’re not gonna be able to have it all at once. But I do think the technology is quickly getting there where, you know, RPA used to take months to set up, but now you’re looking at these, uh, computer use agents that can go in and be set up in five minutes to do those mundane tasks. So that, I think that’s an important thing to, to focus on. And I, when I first started in finance there, we didn’t have a field called fp and a and a lot of the stuff that fp and a does was done by the controller back then. And I think that that as fp and a has branched off and and developed as, as a field, there’s, there can be this sort of chasm between accounting and finance. And I think for our fp and a audience, how do you define the role of a controller today, and how have you seen it evolve over the years?
Bill Hanna:
So the role of the controller, if you think of a traditional sense of a controller, you are running the accounting function, which breaks down broadly into accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll, and maybe the smaller processes that go along with these. Like, you know, if you talk on payroll, then you have like the employment tax and, uh, compliance and reporting and stuff like that. But then also you have the other side, uh, which is running an external audit. So typically a controller looked at to run the operational side of the audit, uh, to distinguish between the op operational side and the strategic side of the audit. So you have maybe, um, a VP of finance or a CFO running the strategic side of the audit, which is discussing with the auditors the presentation of certain items on the financials and things that will benefit maybe the, the, the, the way the, the financials are presented.
But the operational side is, is typically run by the controller, the accounting function, a PR payroll, um, audit, and then you have the development of the staff under you. How this have changed over the time period that I’ve worked as a controller with technology, obviously things have been, have been changing a lot. I’ll say that the role of automation has been such that the number of people that you need for a certain function would be reduced. And that’s, and that’s the statement. And, and I get that question sometimes from my audience and from people in general, what’s gonna happen to the profession with automation? So it’s not that their jobs will be less in accounting. My theory is that people who work in certain function will be less. So if you need two or three people to run accounts, people, you’re only gonna need one.
What is gonna happen to the rest of the work workforce that, that’s been doing? All of these tasks, if you look at new industries, like, um, you know, just to take one example, like flow cast, which is, uh, a software that’s used to to, to close the books. If you look at their headcount and the people that work there, many of these people who are now, you know, the sales, sales development reps and, and people who work for the solution team, these are all accountants, right? So I think with automation is just, you’re gonna see a distribution of the workforce from one area to another. Um, and not so much sort of, uh, jobs vanishing, it’s just that you’re gonna get shifted and redistributed. So that’s what I’ve been seeing in my career is, you know, if I needed my team, 20 people 15 years ago, you know, now I’m gonna need to just 10. The other portion, you know, will go to either system admin, uh, sales solution. This is sort of the shifts that have been happening over the last, um, decade and a half maybe.
Glenn Hopper:
And it’s interesting. I I agree with you on that right now, there, there’s a shortage of accountants as the older generation of accountants is retiring and the pipeline, there are not as many accounting grads as there were, you know, a few years ago. So there is a shortage, but at the same time, there’s this balance with the automation, and it feels like, you know, it’s, if you let market forces sort it out, the fact that there are fewer people coming into accounting, more retiring and not being replaced, and the technology moving right now, I mean, maybe the, the, the crisis is, is overblown and maybe it’ll sort out, I don’t know, are you seeing or hearing from any of the people you talk to, is there a sense right now that there aren’t enough accountants to do the work? Or do you, do you get a sense of that?
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, a hundred percent. You see that in the data and, um, um, like I was looking at, uh, Robert half salary salary guide for, uh, 2025, and the numbers went up by maybe like 10% compared to 2024. And that’s not inflation. Inflation is just maybe three or 4%. And so that represents, um, the shortage in the market. And it’s a funny shortage because, um, it’s like a funnel where like the entry level jobs are diminishing because of automation and ai, and I will say automation only because AI haven’t seen AI taken over sort of, or reducing the, the number of headcount needed. It’s more automation.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah.
Bill Hanna:
Um, I, and I sort of distinguish between the two because automation has been around for maybe 15 years, whereas AI is just a, a new kid on the block. But, um, this shortage is a, is an interesting kind of uneven shortage because you have on one hand the high demand for the talent that has experience and then sort of lower demand on a talent that is entry level. And so this is one to watch and to see like, where are we gonna end up here? Because, um, yeah, it’s an interesting one. Like, how do you get experienced staff if you don’t get them to become entry level to begin with? Right?
Glenn Hopper:
That’s what I think about. Yeah. So nobody goes and gets a master’s in accounting because they wanna do data entry, but it’s sort of when you come in, you, you’re learning as you’re doing this, the, the lower level stuff, and it’s, you know, started, you’re internalizing it and it’s making sense. And now if the expectation is we don’t need you for the lower level stuff, we’re gonna throw you in at a higher, you know, dec decision point and, and kind of moving up that pyramid, I was just talking about that, that’s a stressful situation to be in where you’re just, you know, straight out of
Bill Hanna:
<laugh> Yeah.
Glenn Hopper:
College first time in the workforce and having the expectation is higher.
Bill Hanna:
Yeah. And, and, and also to, to add insult to injury, um, the move that, that’s been the decision that has been made in the US to increase the requirement for the CP, uh, license 10 years ago. You know, now, thankfully, it’s been reversed where like now the AI CPA is looking at it and saying, listen, like we, you know, we’re gonna have a real crisis here if we don’t, um, reduce the barrier to entry. So I think that that’s gonna help somewhat alleviate the, the pain. And I see that in the comments. I have this video that I created, and I, I have comments on, on it that keep coming in every day where people are saying, you know, now I’m taking to to go the account route and take my CPA now that we’re back to 120, um, hours, or potentially back. It’s, it’s not really fully back in, in only maybe a couple of states, but I think slowly it’s gonna get there. But that’s a really helpful thing to see and, and, and, and it, I have some hope now that, um, you know, people will, will begin to take that route.
Glenn Hopper:
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I had this question I was gonna ask later in the show, but I think this is probably a good transition point to what you’re doing now with the financial controller and the videos and the, the education platform and everything. Because I’m thinking about, you know, whether someone is brand new in their career or mid-career or, you know, even, uh, someone that has experience. But just trying to level up in a way, tell me about what led you to start it, how long you’ve been doing it, and the kinds of, uh, the kinds of courses and, and videos you’re doing for the financial controller.
Bill Hanna:
I started completely by accident. Um, I was taking a, um, executive coaching training with someone, and this lady, I, I wish I remember her name, she was really good. She came out of California to, uh, coach us here in New York City. And, uh, part of the coaching was each of us would have to do a presentation on a whiteboard. And when I was doing mine, she just made a comment and she’s like, gee, like when you’re up there with on a whiteboard, you just seem like you’re in your element and you are really enjoying it. So I went home and, and I came out with the idea that I, I’ll do a video on, I think it was Enron or, or one other firm. Um, and I didn’t even do that good of a job, to be honest. Like now when I’m looking at that video and I’m like, I missed some of the things that Enron did, that was pretty big, and the video was not that awesome.
I would do a much better one now if I do. I checked and I got like many views, so I said, you know, I’ll do some of these explainer videos and whiteboard and, and it kind of took off from there. My concept with, from the channel and my courses was that maybe I’m not gonna teach you something that is completely new to you, because frankly, a lot of the stuff that I teach is, is stuff that it is either public knowledge, like it’s available somewhere. I’m not inventing anything. It’s just the same stuff that I learn and I’m teaching. But the feedback that I’ve gotten was that it’s really helpful to see someone doing and confirming a, what you already know. So like, Hey, I’m good. Like, you know, I’m, I’ve been doing this for years and, and this guy is showing it and it’s, I’m good.
Like this is the same way I’ve been doing it, then I’m right. Or B like, hey, like, you know, there’s a a slightly different way to do things. Maybe I’ll check it out. Um, or c like, oh crap, I’ve been doing this wrong, you know, let me kind of revise and do things and look it up and see maybe I can correct. So that was the YouTube channel. And then I, I came up with the idea like, you know, if people are enjoying my 10 minute videos, and, and someone said like, Hey, in your 10 minute video, I learned like a semester of college. So I’m like, you know what, maybe I’ll, I’ll do something then that will be like a more involved, like a, you know, six to eight hour course that that visits everything to do with the controller function. And that’s where the Controller Academy came.
And I wanted to do it in a way that’s different than any of the other courses out there. So I created a company and I called it Spa Booker. It’s like a SaaS company. And I said, the entire course is centered around this company. So we will record the equity, the stock options, we, we record, uh, we create a chart of accounts from scratch, we’ll set up payroll, how to operational, operationalize, you know, payroll, accounts payable, the receivable, all of these things using a company, because I noticed that the other products out there are just really talking about the theory of accounting and not so much like how to apply it on a, a daily basis in an accounting, um, setting. So the reviews have been good. I’ve, I’ve gotten, you know, 4.9, you know, stars from, from many, many people. Yeah. So it’s been rewarding.
So my philosophy is to use, um, you know, company examples and, uh, to tell a story. Um, because, um, my experience from in college and, and any other course that I’ve taken is that if I’m not engaged in, in, in what the instructor is saying, I will lose interest really fast. And so, um, uh, I’ll make it engaging. Um, I’ll give you, uh, practice. So I’ll give you then access to the accounting software in the course, or I’ll give you the Excel file and, and you know, and I’ll tell you in the video, okay, here’s what you need to do with this. Do it as a practice and then submit it back, um, you know, have quizzes. So you go in there, you are expected to take quizzes and, and, and earn, really earn your certificate of, of, uh, of graduation. So, uh, yeah, it’s been fun so far. That’s
Glenn Hopper:
Great. And how long has, uh, controller Academy been around?
Bill Hanna:
2023 is when it started.
Glenn Hopper:
Wow. You, you’re the single professor on this. Um, are these all all your courses or have you brought in others to help with it or?
Bill Hanna:
So I brought in, I brought in, um, recently we just launched the fp NA Academy. Um, so I brought, I brought in, uh, uh, Connor Beck, who is, um, the fp NA manager or senior manager at the, my previous company at Forter. And we worked together, you know, we kind of joked about it when I was a forwarder. I’m like, Hey, you know, maybe we’ll do a course together on fp and a. And he is like, yeah, sure. Ha ha ha. But it was really just like a comment. Um, but then we, we sat down and, uh, at the end of, um, 2024, and we outlined it and, and got it done in about maybe three months. And it’s the same concept. So we’re taking one company from the beginning and we’re saying, okay, how do we create a five-year plan? How do we create an annual budget?
Um, what is the three step model look like? Um, how do we present to management what is important to present, and how do he create those PowerPoint slides? And, um, all of the things he really wanted to mimic, uh, his function as an fp and a manager in, in the course. And, and so, um, it’s been good so far. I think we have about a hundred people in that course in, in just a month, month and a half. Um, so it’s been fun. And then I’ve also brought in my other friend who does, uh, corporate taxation, and we created the Tax Academy, um, as well, which is more of a US centered course because of the nature of the, of the tax. Um, but, um, uh, the other courses are, are, are, I have students from, from all over the world. Um,
Glenn Hopper:
So That’s great. That’s great. Well, I was checking out the website before the show, and it’s, uh, looks like a lot of great content out there. So, uh, so very, very impressive, uh, website there. So, and, and we’ll put a link to it in the show notes too, now that you have fp and a at the Controller Academy as well. I think that, again, you know, taking it back to our fp and a audience, what’s the key to a strong relationship between fp and a and the controller’s team and like thinking about where that handoff is and sort of the expectation in, in both directions between, between both departments? Yeah,
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, that’s a, that’s a really good question. So I think, um, you know, these two, um, functions are like, you know, like buddies really, like really these two kids playing on the playground and they really should be friends. I think that the, the key here is building enough rapport and, and, and friendship to the point where feedback, like you get feedback and you get good insight from your counterpart in fp and a. So for me, as a controller, I remember this once where, um, we were doing, um, a presentation. The company was small enough where when we did accruals on the employee bonuses, we just accrued the annual amounts and, you know, or the quarterly amounts and, and just had the accrual in there. So after the meeting, my fp and a counter counterpart, I know, she came to me and she’s like, listen, like the way my previous company done it is that not only that you accrue for the bonus, but you’d have to look at the, um, taxes, the employer taxes associated with them in the accrual as well.
Um, so when we were small enough as a company, this was not an issue. But her insight is that as we are growing now and, you know, we are approaching an event, most likely in, in the near term, this can come up as a material weakness. And so you get these nuggets of experience from other people, um, if you have the relationship with them. And that’s why I think that that’s why you need to foster that relationship in a way that it becomes like just a really good bond where the other person feels like it’s easy to talk to you and just tell you what, you know, share their experiences, strategic partnership, uh, you are presenting information up month end or at your end. And, uh, they need to have that trust in your numbers, uh, because that’s what they’re working with. And you need to have their numbers as well to kind of soundboard and, and, and be, and be, be sure that you have good numbers as well to compare to their budget and their plan and see, see where you fall short or maybe extra and, and make corrections. Yeah, I think that relationship is really important, talking
Glenn Hopper:
About the opportunity to work for so many different controllers and how much you learn. And I think that you also learn from the other departments, whether it’s business partnering, you know, in the business unit or just within the office of the CFO, you know, the controllership and accounting side and the fp and a side and treasury and tax and all that. Like, you, you learn from working with the others. And I think what you’re doing at the Controller Academy is very interesting to me. I kind of came into finance through a side door <laugh>, like after my MBAI was in marketing and I, anyway, I ended up in, uh, coming into finance, but I didn’t roll up to the CFOI rolled up to the COO, and it was just, I was kind of outsider looking in, and I, I ended up, you know, if, if I had a weakness in the beginning it was, I’d never worked in accounting, I’d taken the courses of, of course, but it’s a lot different <laugh> between what you do in academia and out in the real world.
So it was a lot of learning on the fly for me. And, and there weren’t, this was a million years ago, so there weren’t all the online courses out there and everything. Uh, but like I’ve really appreciate what you’re doing with the Controller Academy that you are now adding the tax and the fp NA in that. And I’m thinking, again, bringing it back to our fp NA listeners, you know, I, I talk to people all the time that come in, first they do accounting and then they move into FP NA, but a lot of ’em are just, you know, straight into finance. So if someone were looking for a, to kind of round out their whole finance and accounting skillset and soft skills and everything that they needed, because they wanna move up, hopefully, to become A-A-C-F-O someday. And you know, it used to be if you didn’t have a CPA, forget it, you’re not, you’re not gonna move up that. And that certainly has, has changed in in recent years, but you still have to have this skillset and you have to be able to round out that whole picture. So what would you advise someone who, maybe they’re an accounting manager or, uh, you know, or entry level accountant, and they, they, they tell, you know, you’re talking about career progression before. If they know they want to move up and move, uh, you know, to CAO or CFO or whatever it is, ultimately, what skills do they need to start working on to get that full picture?
Bill Hanna:
I get that question sometimes where like, um, you know, what are, what do I need to learn to to get to A CFO? Yeah, I think it’s real easy, right? Because when you look at A CFO, the the know accounting, do, you know, financial analysis, um, they must have gone through a period where they learn excel. And so when someone is asking me like, should I learn accounting or financial analysis or Excel or, or what else? And my answer is like, learn ’em all. Because, you know, it’s really like when I look, think of the CFOs that I worked with in the past, right? Um, on a higher level, they’re all strategic thinkers, right? That’s what, it’s what, that’s what makes a successful CFO. Um, you are able to scan the environment and identify risks. Uh, <laugh>, I was, uh, just a quick example, driving up the road today and I saw a truck, a fresh direct. Do you remember, do you, have you, do you remember Fresh Direct these deliver food
Glenn Hopper:
That’s vaguely at Yeah,
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, so exactly right. Fresh Direct. Um, it was the biggest player has did their CFO scan and see that the Amazon Fresh was gonna come in and take their market. I don’t know. But that’s, that’s exactly the kind of thing, right? And now me running a small company like the Controller Academy, I’m like, you know, what’s the biggest thing? That’s the next thing that’s gonna come and just like, take the market away from me, right? So that’s what the CFO should be doing is what is the, what is the risk? And so if your goal is to be a CFO, you need to be that strategic thinker that doesn’t come from one course or one skill that comes from real life exposure to problems and their solutions on a daily basis. So you need to get your hands dirty with, with actual work and talking to banks and raising money from either debt or equity and understanding how to remedy certain situations like that.
But in terms of sort of the core skills, if we’re talking about the things that you can take a course for, because risk management, there are courses for that, but I don’t think they really teach you what real life can teach you, um, on these things. But yeah, like just at least equip yourself with the basics that you, you need to know, like, you know, the accounting knowledge, the analysis, uh, the thought, just the basic thought process of where do you begin building a budget? How does an income statement connect into, um, a cash flow statement into a balance sheet? Like how do they work in harmony together? So these are the basic things. And I’ve been, I’ve been surprised to see, um, people enrolling in my controller academy who are CFOs of, you know, 10,000 employee companies and like, you know, why are you enrolled in my, that’s what I’ve been thinking. Like, why are you enrolled in my academy if you are already a CFO? And the thing is like, I know how to do the strategic thinking, but I just don’t know what my controller’s doing, so I need to learn what they’re doing.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah, yeah. As you’re trying to develop those skills. And I think you’ve really nailed it saying, you know, you’ve gotta kind of be in the seat and, and see what’s going on. And it can be difficult if you’re, if there’s an accounting shortage and you’re at a, you know, you’re understaffed or, or whatever, and you’re heads down and you’re, you’re just laser focused on the task at hand. And I think that you were talking about leadership earlier, I think that one of the great opportunities as a leader is if you can help your team to, we’re all busy, but we’re gonna pull out and we’re gonna, like you said, expose them to other areas of, of accounting that they may not have worked with before. Transfer pricing and, uh, consolidation. And you know, just getting them that broader expertise because especially with so, so many remote workers now, it’s hard to find that time to isolate and pick an employee and say, let me help, we’re gonna coach here and, and work on a new skillset and all that.
And that’s part of leadership too, if you want to move up to cfo, the being able to build up a team, you know, that’s just, it’s all part of it. And I think giving them access to tools like the Controller Academy or, you know, even if they have time to watch videos for <laugh> for the, uh, short learning experience and, and then they’ve gotta have the passion for it too that, uh, you know, why are we here? Yes. To get a paycheck, but also to <laugh> to move forward and, and sort of that continuous learning. So I, it’s amazing what you’re doing there. So tell me, let’s go back to the YouTube channel again, like thinking about those videos. ’cause I, you know, that’s the kind of content that is just, it’s easily digestible and you could almost take it for granted, but you’re putting a lot of effort into it and, and, uh, offering up some, some valuable lessons. So take me through, like, how, how frequently do you put out videos? What’s the normal length on the videos there and and what are some, uh, sample topics you’ve covered?
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, absolutely. So I try to post once a week. I try to make my videos around, uh, 10 to 20 minutes. I’ve been criticized by my viewers for making longer videos. So it seems like the, at least the newer generation, their attention span is like, keep it under 10 minutes. Okay, fine. We’ll try to keep it under 10 minutes. I started out with things that are searchable. So I would go into, you know, YouTube or Google search and, and find the keywords that are mostly most searched. But then I began to move away from that when I started doing videos on things that are not searched, but more like, you’re not searching for it because you don’t know it. So I’ll, I’ll kind of give you what I think you should be searching for almost kind of thing. And so like, I, I, I did did a video on how to turn a drive balance into a balance sheet.
Like, no, no one has really ever searched that topic before, but that video, you know, gathered a hundred thousand views in, in, in, in just maybe a month. And, and that gave me that concept of like, if you are thinking it as an individual who works in accounting, the chances are this, you know, plenty of other people are thinking it as well. And so I am trying to keep that going. I’m not sure how long it’s, I’m gonna keep it going where, like, I’m trying to think of inspiration from the problems that I’ve been facing throughout my career, and hopefully I don’t run out of ideas. So
Glenn Hopper:
I love your example of trial balance to a balance sheet, because someone who’s, like I said, started out in finance, not in accounting. If anybody ever hands me a trial balance <laugh>, I’m just looking at it like it’s, you know, it’s like a Greek scroll and I just, can we put this in a financial statement? ’cause I <laugh> Yeah. You know, it’s just that, that my brain just doesn’t work that way. And, uh, so yeah,
Bill Hanna:
And,
Glenn Hopper:
And that’s funny that you mentioned that.
Bill Hanna:
Yeah. And I, I really appreciate that. I think it’s, so we, we, I have some comments, especially that video, for example, like where people would see the video and, and then comment and say, Hey, like that’s a, such an easy topic. Like, why are you even like, bother presenting that? But that’s a fraction of it, right? Like, that’s a, maybe, you know, the, the one to 5%, but then you have an avalanche of other commenters who are like, thank you so much for that, right? So you gotta be able to stomach sort of the, the, the criticism of the 1% who’s gonna say like, you know, that’s, that’s such an obvious thing. Why are you even presenting this? Yeah,
Glenn Hopper:
Well, yeah, if you’re a CPA and you’ve worked in accounting for 15 years, it is easy. But then there’s people like me, <laugh>, that it’s like, this is a lifesaver. So thank you <laugh>. So now I need to go watch that video. I don’t <laugh>. That’ll be my, uh, my continuous learning project for today. So. Great. We are getting, uh, close to the end of time here. And there’s a, a couple of questions at the end that we’d like to ask all of our guests. And you know, we’ve, we talked about the, the, the technical side of everything, but we do like to dive in. And, um, the first one is, uh, what is something that not many people know about you? Maybe something we couldn’t find by just going on on Google and searching for, uh, for Bill Hannah.
Bill Hanna:
I was born in Egypt, um, and I, um, I, I spent my teenage years there. The one thing maybe I’ve never mentioned is I, my dad has moved to Libya when I was in high school, so I went to Benghazi and, uh, that’s where I went to high school. Other than that, I think my, uh, life is pretty, uh, maybe a little bit too much public on some of the platforms, <laugh>, but I’m, I’m married and my wife is also an accountant, which makes four fascinating dinner combos, <laugh>, and, um, uh, I have three boys, um, aged, um, nine to 13. So, um, hopefully one of them will be like the next junior controller or something like that. Um, but uh, yeah,
Glenn Hopper:
Continue the family business. Yeah,
Bill Hanna:
Yeah, exactly. Just keep, keep it going. Exactly.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah. Oh, nine to 13, so you guys are busy. That’s
Bill Hanna:
<laugh>. Yeah. Less, less busy. I, I, I’ll have to say like, you know, for, for anyone anyone’s listening who is contemplating or have maybe young kids, um, it, it, it’s, it’s a breathe now for that age, to be honest with you. Um, you know, granted given thank God their health is good and everything else is good, that age is a lot easier than what I used to be before.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah, yeah. Well I’m, I’m fully on the other side. We’re empty nesters now, so we are, it’s just my wife and I in the house, and it is, it’s, it’s never been easier than it is right now, so That’s great. <laugh>. Yeah, I miss the kids, but, you know, it’s easy.
Bill Hanna:
Yeah.
Glenn Hopper:
Everybody’s favorite question. What is your favorite Excel function and why?
Bill Hanna:
Favorite Excel function is probably command. I’m, I’m a Mac user, so command open bracket, which takes you to the source of where the information is coming from, and that’s kind of like the closest I’ll ever get to teleportation. So
Glenn Hopper:
<laugh>, I love that you’re a Mac user. I’ve been a Mac user for 25 years and everybody thinks, how can you be a finance guy and be on a Mac? And back in the day, I used to run, you know, parallels dual boot and I’d run Windows within my Mac so I could get the full Excel. And honestly, as you move up, the, the level of complexity that I have to build into models is not what it used to be. So Excel on the Mac is fine for me, and, uh, I love not having all the, the popups and updates and everything that, uh, <laugh> come in the Windows machines. So I love, I love when I come across another Mac uses
Bill Hanna:
<laugh> a thousand percent. Me too. I, I, when I, we, when you see one, you’re like, Hey, like, that’s, that’s my, my tribe. Um, but um, yeah, try, try teaching an Excel course when you’re a Mac user that, that was a nightmare. But, um, anyway, like, I think because when you speak to audience who speak, who use pc, you’d have to have two brains of like the shortcuts and yeah, all that. But no, Mac Mac has just a lot, and it used to be in the past, uh, there was a lot of limitation on using Excel Mac, but it’s just not, not true anymore.
Glenn Hopper:
Yeah. Yeah. Uh, well this has been great. I, and we’ll put, uh, we’ll put information in the show notes too, but, um, how can our listeners connect with you if they wanna learn more and find out about the courses and all that? Where, where should we direct ’em?
Bill Hanna:
Go to YouTube? Um, the financial controller is my channel. Um, my website is the Controller Academy. If you put that into any search, you’ll find it and take a look. There’s, uh, you know, some stuff that I’m teaching on there that’s been valuable. So have a look at it.
Glenn Hopper:
Well, bill, this has been a, a great episode. I really appreciate you coming on. Thanks
Bill Hanna:
Glenn, really appreciate, um, being on the show.
