Continuing professional education. We all need it, not just for licensing requirements, but to help us provide the best service while dealing with the ever-complicated internal revenue code. But finding the time to meet hours requirements is not always easy.
Combine that with the cost for small businesses and this can be a big challenge, no matter how committed your firm is to education.
Here are three ways you can making education hours more manageable without breaking the bank:
No. 1 — Be the educator
You can earn CPE credits for being the teacher! See your state licensing board for rules and requirements, but in most cases you’ll earn credit hours for the time it takes you to prepare and present your piece. The beauty of creating your own education piece is not just that you can earn credit hours, but you can most often receive compensation for presenting it to others in the form of a webinar or a class for your state society.
This is a great way to get hours in without a cash outlay, and even potentially be compensated for your time so you don’t feel like you must choose between CPE and billable work.
No. 2 — Knowledge share
Don’t send everyone in your practice to the same class or conference. Instead, request that everyone spread out their time. This will first help alleviate too many people being out of the office at the same time, but second will help your team garner more knowledge as a whole. Then ask your team to come back and provide a summary of their key learning points to everyone else. You can host your own in-house lunch and learn CPE classes during the workday and your whole team will benefit from the knowledge shared.
Make sure to follow your state board’s requirements to give everyone credit for attending the in house sessions.
No. 3 — Get a subscription
Getting a subscription to CPE training banks like the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants (AICPA) webcast pass can be a lower cost way to get access to a bigger bank of knowledge. To get group viewing certificates check the requirements with your state board or with the webinar presenters. This is also another great tool to use for the knowledge share avenue suggested above.
Webinars are definitely a different learning style than conferences where they don’t provide networking opportunities and other in-class benefits, but these can be one of the best ways to meet your learning requirements without putting too much pressure on your calendar.
As CPE season is coming post-tax season, Tax Practice News always wants to hear from you. If you have suggested learning topics that would benefit your team, please feel free to submit them to us and be sure to subscribe to our newsletter to get the most up to date announcements of learning opportunities.
