Firm invests in leadership skills for accountants

Added by Love Business East Midlands | 13 February 2018

Midlands based accountants and business advisory firm, Dains, is investing in an 18-month programme to develop their next generation of leaders. The programme will be delivered by specialist consultancy, theGrogroup, which is based in Nottingham.

Dains is embarking on the programme as part of its strategy to develop practical leadership and management skills to create a high performing organisation. The firm has ambitious plans for growth, underpinned by building on its reputation for exceptional client service delivered by talented business advisers. It believes that investing in a leadership programme aligned with the business vision will enable their people to drive the firm’s ambitions.

Richard McNeilly, Dains, Managing Partner added, “We plan to grow our business by a further 50% over the course of the next 5 years and more if we acquire like-minded accountancy and advisory businesses. Without doubt, our greatest asset is our people and we are keen to build our leaders of the future, whilst honing the skills of our existing leadership group. Having invested heavily in IT and staff benefits, the leadership programme is a natural development and we look forward to working with theGrogroup.”

Starting in February 2018, the 18-month programme, will help leaders to understand what enables people to work at their best, how to empower people to deliver great performance, how to create more value in a working week, effective and flexible communication and the need to understand and adapt to differing behavioural styles.

Commenting, Dains HR Manager, Angela Millward said, “We all aspire to be the type of leader that people want to work for who is able to create a positive and supportive work environment from which a highly productive team can evolve. The programme is aimed at developing coaching skills and helping our leaders place people at the heart of what we do so that our teams, our clients and the firm can enjoy the benefits.” 

The programme will be delivered to around 60 Dains Partners, Directors and Managers by specialist consultancy, theGrogroup.

Kate Hennig, Director of theGrogroup said, “The usual route for most professional advisers is to take specialised qualifications and build a deep technical knowledge base to ensure that they can provide solutions to client needs. It is great to see that Dains are providing the opportunity for their people to access practical and focused development that will help them become better managers and leaders. Leadership in professional services firms is vital, however neither great leadership nor brilliant strategy matters without operational excellence. Through our programmes we focus on developing the skills required to be an operational leader and maximise individual and collective performance through a mixture of people management and leadership. Many programmes focus on top level strategic and ‘visionary’ leadership, but in our experience operational ‘management’ is essential.”

This view is backed up by a recent HBR World Management survey, with data showing that firms with strong managerial processes and highly skilled managers perform significantly better on high-level metrics such as productivity, profitability, growth, and longevity.

Dains operates from 6 full service offices across the Midlands region including: Birmingham, Burton on Trent, Derby, Lichfield, Rugeley and Stoke on Trent.

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