There is a breed of optimism that only exists among accountants. Every year we convince ourselves that this financial year will be different, despite having decades of evidence suggesting otherwise.
Every year we crawl across the finish line of end of financial year. Most years we don’t even make it before the next one starts. Clients who vanish all year then resurface in a panic, software updates with impeccably bad timing and legislation that seems to enjoy changing mid deadline, all washed down with enough coffee to make our blood type debatable.
And still we don’t learn. This year will be different, we say. Not might nor hopefully but definitely. Somewhere between 30 June and 1 July we all decide we have finally figured it out.
The evidence says otherwise. Fortunately, optimism is not subject to substantiation requirements. Years of proof and zero reason to be this confident. If we gave tax advice with this much optimism, we’d all lose our licences.
Try that logic anywhere else in life and people would worry about you. Try it in business and we call it resilience and having a positive mindset.
Every year I tell myself I will only take on what I can actually handle and to stop checking emails late at night. Then someone calls, someone needs help, someone has a problem, someone says “it’ll only take five minutes.” And every time, we fall for it.
That thing we said we would sort out next month never gets sorted and we know this. We carry on anyway, fully confident. That is either madness or the best trick in business.
Anyone can be optimistic when things are going well but real optimism is finishing a brutal year, taking a breath on 30 June and saying “right then, let’s do it all again.”
Every new financial year we tell ourselves the same thing: this year will be different. One day we might actually be right…