Strategic Review.

• Author: Hoffman, Gary D.

Is your firm languishing in the new economy? Do you have great ideas, but don't know how to implement them? Do you wonder about your competition? Are you losing staff, but can't figure out why? At the close of your peer review, do you question your reviewer firm for extra management advice? Are you flirting with new service additions?

These are just a few of the questions firms need to be asking themselves if they are to adapt and compete in today's fluid economic environment. PCPS has developed the strategic review program, which is designed to stimulate this kind of reflection and then help you create the processes for identifying and implementing the best new directions. Reviewer PCPS firms have always been available to provide informal advice on management issues not covered in the peer review, and now they're available to provide an entirely new type of review experience.

What is strategic review?

The strategic review is designed to help firms assess and improve their strategic planning capabilities, as well as to make recommendations on the direction and focus of firm services. It will help to empower smaller firms in the new market by identifying appropriate new types of services that will allow these firms to compete successfully.

The strategic review is not a peer review. It is optional and its results are not posted in the Public File. The strategic review can be administered as an independent event or as an add-on to the peer review. It is designed more to examine company culture and direction than to identify professional practices. The review gives insight into the firm's planning processes.

Why now?

Why is now the right time for PCPS to introduce strategic review? Because they heard loud and clear that many firms want to change and adapt, but do not know how. The introduction of strategic review coincides with the AICPA Vision Project, designed to help CPA firms reach success in the 21st century. (For more information on the Vision Project, visit www.aicpa.org or call (800) CPA FIRM.)

Key steps for a successful strategic review

There are several steps to an effective strategic review. The first step involves identifying key players--managers, partners, and administrators--as well as the rest of the reviewed firm's team. This team is surveyed to find the firm's impression of itself from the inside. This allows the reviewer to determine cultural aspects of the firm and come to some preliminary conclusions about the type...