Scott Walley, the owner of Scott Walley CPA, LLC, is a certified public accountant (CPA) based in Bend, Oregon. He specializes in providing fractional CFO services to small and mid-sized companies.
Scott’s career began in the resort industry, where he held finance positions for a span of twenty years. This allowed him to gain valuable expertise from working in various resorts across the United States and the Caribbean. Motivated by his experience, he co-founded a CPA firm in Salem and took charge of managing the Bend office.
Leveraging his keen analytical skills and deep understanding of finance, he has established his own firm, which focuses on assisting businesses in making well-informed decisions and acquiring a comprehensive understanding of their operations.
Routine | Daily Goal-Setting Routine
Scott diligently adheres to his routines, utilizing them to maintain a balanced life and remains focused on his priorities. Here are just a few of Scott’s routines:
- Write down his plans for the next day
- Write down 3 goals a day
- Review calendar and annual goals in the evening
- Take dogs for a walk in the national forest for 30 minutes
- Listen to Darren Hardy daily
- Track time spent on everyday tasks
- Log off from work at a reasonable hour
Success
Scott understands that true success goes beyond financial gain. For him, it’s about the joy of doing a job well and serving his clients with excellence. His background in the resort industry taught him the importance of customer service, which he carries into his work. He believes that by prioritizing financial stability, work-life balance, and exceptional service, anyone can achieve a fulfilling and successful life. With over almost eight years of experience as a sole practitioner, Scott has garnered a reputation as a trusted professional in his field.
Book Recommendations:
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” by Stephen R. Covey
Sea Power by James Stavridis
Connect With Scott Walley
Email: scott@scottwcpa.com
Website: www.scottwcpa.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-walley-b402b410/
Phone: 541-771-2631
Transcript
Hannah Mitrea 0:04
Hello, everyone. This is Hannah, your host and you are listening to the Success Is Routine Podcast. Our show is on a mission to talk to leaders in life and business that have achieved success and to learn what their routine is. If you’re ready to create your routine to success, you’re in the right place. Now, let’s get started. Hello, hello, everyone. Welcome back to Success Is Routine Podcast. I’m Hannah, your host, and I am super excited to have Scott Wally with us today. Scott is the owner of Scott Wally CPA LLC. It definitely would be weird if somebody else owned your business and your name. But welcome to the show, Scott.
Scott Walley 0:44
Thank you. Great to be here. Yeah.
Hannah Mitrea 0:47
I’m super excited. I know we talked before. And there were some things we talked about that I think will be really good for our listeners. And but before we kind of jump into your routine and success and things like that, share with us a little bit about who you are Scott, and what do you do?
Scott Walley 1:01
Yeah. Oh, thank you. Yes, I’m, like I said I’m I’m a CPA, I’m in located in Bend Oregon. And I’m a sole practitioner, I’m on my own and been doing it about six or eight years. And before that, I spent about 20 years in the resort business doing finance jobs in different resorts and around the country and in the Caribbean and ended up starting a CPA firm with a couple of other guys who relocated to Salem, and I’m the Bend office and ended up being my own firm. So it’s all good. And I enjoy what I do. I do mostly providing fractional CFO services for companies small to midsize companies that can’t afford or don’t need a full time CFO, but they need that expertise to learn more about their business and make better business decisions. So that’s what I do. And I’m excited to be here with you today. Thank you.
Hannah Mitrea 1:58
Yeah, no, I’m super excited to talk to you. And you know, I hope you never get sucked into the timeshare side of finances. Resort side of it.
Scott Walley 2:08
A little bit. I worked a little bit with those but not like I tried to stay away.
Hannah Mitrea 2:12
I feel like that’d be somewhere I definitely want like red flags to get away from. Alright, well, it’s interesting that they moved literally across like we’re talking Salem, Massachusetts, or Salem, Oregon.
Scott Walley 2:25
Salem, Oregon. Yeah.
Hannah Mitrea 2:30
It’s rookie season right now in October. I am awesome. And so talk to us a little bit about like, Did you always have a routine in your life that you followed? Was that something that you had growing up?
Scott Walley 2:43
Not really, you know, I probably did early on, I think a lot of people do the same thing every morning, or is sort of and I think I was kinda in that. But not a real routine. And it was a really about fairly recently, five or six years ago, I guess, maybe that’s recent. But I had a business coach I hired to help me kind of get my CPA firm off the ground and helping a little bit of marketing and stuff. And she really helped me focus on here’s what you have to do. And, you know, some good, you know, metrics or practices, one of them. I do, she turned me on to watch. And I don’t know if you’ve ever seen guy Darren Harding and Darren Daley, and nearly got me going on that. And that’s now part of my routine. And a lot of the stuff that he talks about, and you know, he’s real motivating thing, and I listen to him. First thing in the morning for five minutes, maybe I get an email and open it up. And he’s kind of gets you going for the day. And then I took one of his courses and helped me further my routine a little bit from him. It’s really now it starts the day before the night before I try to write down. Three things I’m going to do tomorrow. And these are my three big ones. And they relate to my annual goals and the goals I have for myself. And you know if I can just focus enough to work on these maybe an hour a piece or something like that, in the day, that’s my routine and getting going through the day, if that makes sense. Or you know, summed it up. Well.
Hannah Mitrea 4:34
Yeah, and we’ll definitely dive into the routine side of it. But I want to backtrack to the business coach side of it real quick. And I know like hiring a business coach is kind of, you know, big steps. So what was something that like helping you make that decision to hire a business coach because I think a lot of people are afraid to make that step but coaches I know are super valuable in progress in life.
Scott Walley 4:58
Yeah, it was new to me. I’d never had one before. And, you know, I just started out at that time, you know, with my own CPA firm here, and, you know, I had some traction and had some clients, but I wasn’t really getting to where I really wanted to be. And to be, I think she contacted me. And, you know, said, Here’s in, she works just with CPAs. That was what really caught my eye of her, you know, she’s not a general, she is a CPA, she helped CPAs and that caught my eye. So it was like, Okay, y’all invest some, you know, money here and time, and she helped me quite a bit, I didn’t really get, you know, she got me to a certain level, and then we kind of split ways I wasn’t getting any more business than, you know, she helped me get to a certain plateau. And that’s about where she could get me and which was very good and very helpful. And, you know, and she turned me on to, I think, as much as getting new business, a good mindset of, hey, you can do this, you’re good. You can do it. Here’s how you do it. Here’s some tips along the way, you know, in some books to read and stuff like that. So it was very enlightening. For me to have a business coach, and it was very valuable. I don’t have one right now. But I’m thinking, well, I’ve got some other people I bounce things off of, it’s a business coach, and I’ve got a group of colleagues I keep in touch with. So they’re my business coach,
Hannah Mitrea 6:42
Yeah, that whole mentor group, I know mentors are a huge thing and having those just business associates that are all growing what with you together. So I’m glad that you really have something like that in place. But it sounds like so then the Darren Hardy, you may have been part of the switch for that routine, where you went from that routine to having routine?
Scott Walley 7:02
Yes, sort of that was part of it. And her the business coach, she helped out and got me down the right road. But yeah, the switch was probably right about then of, okay, if I can do these things every day. I think I’m better off.
Hannah Mitrea 7:20
Darren Hardy. So as soon as you mentioned his name, actually did some stuff, not with him, but around some of that kind of content for another client six years ago. And so the fact that he is still putting one video out every single day, and it’s been six years is incredible. He’s doing that. So talk to us about your team. What does that look like for you? How is it implemented?
Scott Walley 7:44
My routine of what I do is this a little bit of like what I said earlier, I, I start the night before and try to write down some things that I’m going to do tomorrow. That’s one of Darren’s things, he can sit down and it is good. It clears my mind. At the end of the day, I may be a total train wreck. But if I can sit there for 10 or 15 minutes and look at my calendar tomorrow, look at my goals where I write down my three things that has my annual goals right at the top of it. So I read those and figure out okay, what do I have to do? What can I do to get closer to those the next day and then when I get up in the morning, my routine morning routine is you know, I’ll get up take a shower, the one of the first things I do is not really related to business, but it’s clears my mind I take my dogs out for a walk in the national forest behind my house and totally unplugged. I don’t take my phone. I don’t take anything. I wandered around the forest for 30 minutes. And it clears my mind, it’s great. You can reflect on you know, great times in the national forests or being outdoors and, and then sometimes also think about, okay, here’s what I got to do today. And then I come home, you know, have a bite for breakfast, go to my office, sit down in, you know, listen to Darren daily, and then look at my this, see what I have to do and get on my way. It’s not a real huge thing I do. But I feel if I can do that, and do the steps. I can sit down and I’m ready to go in the morning. So it’s in the right frame of mind.
Hannah Mitrea 9:25
Yeah, and I hear a ton about being able to disconnect and getting outside and how beneficial that is to getting into that routine. Just because you’re taking a break. You’re taking time for yourself. It’s almost like that meditation you’ve created in a walk right?
Scott Walley 9:42
Yeah, exactly. You know, I mean, I see some people that walk in sometimes I get their phone and they’re talking. No, that’s not the point. For me, that’s great for them. I just want to disconnect. I also try to just connect as much as I can. Sometimes during the day, I check my messages. Occasionally, I don’t. I’m not a slave to the instant text or the email and I got to answer right now I get sucked down that road I, there goes another, you know, whatever, half hour an hour easily.
Hannah Mitrea 10:18
Yeah, I think that was one of the biggest shifts for me this year was I turn my notifications off on my emails. And as a business owner, we’re constantly getting emails, like, however, that also puts you in a place where you’re constantly working, and you’re not taking that time for yourself. And I think, you know, turning them off, and I still check them, like multiple times a day, but they can’t instantly access me constantly.
Scott Walley 10:46
Right. And the other part of what I do is my routine or whatever habit, I do have a worksheet that I jot down, and I tracked my time, which sounds terrible, but especially for a CPA and track time, but I track it, you know, it’s very simple, you know, just start and what I do, and it allows me to see how much I’ve worked every day, total hours. And then it also, lets me see, what did I really do? You know, I used to always get to the end of the day and go, Man, I know, I was really busy all day. What did I accomplish? It’s like a blur. So she had the resurfaces, but so now I look back at it. It’s a weekly calendar, and I will look back at the end of the week. Okay, Monday as well. That’s why I spent three hours on this. I did that and it helps me, I guess maybe even be a little more satisfied. Okay, that was on my list. I did it. There it is. And then you write down all the times that you did crap, emails, stupid stuff, like good. I don’t track it that close. But, you know, if you do, you know, three hours a day, you know, even a half hour in emails or doing stuff you didn’t need to do is like, Okay, I need to cut that out.
Hannah Mitrea 12:10
Yeah, keeps me aware that, I think it’s a really good habit to have created. And just to be able to see, where is your time going? Because I think so many of us get to the end, it weakens like, what did we do? And so just like you said, it’s like the satisfaction of I did do something. It wasn’t just another week spent doing random things. And then if you look at a lot of the social media apps, now there are like places in the settings to actually go in and see how long do I spend on tick tock this week. And I think that’s really eye opening for people to see, like, you know, maybe it was only an hour a day, but that adds up to seven hours a week that you just got on tick tock things like that.
Scott Walley 12:52
Right. Exactly. So, point, I do also track time a little bit, I have some columns out to the right of my big clients, and how much did I work for each client? You know, my CFO clients? Only see? Okay, yeah, yeah,
Hannah Mitrea 13:08
I was just gonna ask like, so. Okay, so you start watching the daily videos, you’re going for the walk? So you’re, you know, starting your routine in the evening? How long did it take for you to kind of establish that as a habit, like, was something that was hard to stick to creating that routine?
Scott Walley 13:27
Actually, I would almost go the other way. When I first started, I was really gung ho on it. And now I really don’t have to push myself because I know I’m going to do it or that’s just the way it is. But it’s easy to, if I got some I really want to do, maybe I just jump in and do that. And I don’t listen to the genitalia and I don’t do some of the you know, and it’s like, Oh, I know I got to do this. And so I really have to say no, no. Keep on the routine. This is what works. So it is difficult and you can get sidetracked and some days I don’t do it. I don’t do it every day of my life, you know, I try to put you know occasionally I do get sidetracked or something comes up and I’m not able to do the the plan but it is tough. But I think the more you do it, the more you know what to expect in you know how long it’s gonna take and what you’re going to do. So you’re, you’re on your way.
Hannah Mitrea 14:29
Is there any kind of like tool that kind of helped you do at the beginning like you said, you jumped right into it. So was there something there that helped you kind of jump into besides the coaching
Scott Walley 14:38
the writing down your goals and making your, you know, I’ve got a photocopied sheet I just pull one more out every day and write down. It’s got my goals already written into the top and I fill in the bottom and then then I got a little list on the right hand side of any little things. I really need to do that yard, obey one of my big three, but I really need to call this guy or do this, you know, and I can check the small to do’s, I call him and check those off and do those all at one time and sit down and, and trying to be efficient. You know, that’s probably my, my challenge is being efficient enough. And you know, then you get all the technical stuff thrown in there of things that help you do better, and some are more help than others.
Hannah Mitrea 15:30
Yeah, I love that you like actually have a paper that you’re pulling out in writing it down. I think physically, writing always helps my brain at least, like conceptualize what I’m doing. So a question is, what do you do with all the papers,
Scott Walley 15:46
I toss him I checked the stuff off, I have something I need to take to the next day. I know if I have to push it out, I’ll put it on my calendar, you know, for okay, it’s Monday. And this isn’t going to happen till I can wait till Friday to do that. So I’ll put it on my calendar Friday. And I that’s kinda look into your calendar, looking at your list. Okay, here are the big things I got to do. You know, and while I was gone, the papers gone. Below noon, I got record of a lot of it in, you know, on my calendar on my phone, and, you know, computer, but I think it does help to have it written down right in front of you. Okay, there you go.
Hannah Mitrea 16:37
I know, we talked on our pre-call, just kind of like meeting each other for the first time, you also mentioned how you make sure you’re logging off at a reasonable hour, creating that balance in your life. So share with us how to like so many people, especially owning a business like you do, we get trapped into where we’re working 24/7. It’s about the business. So how did you create that balance? And that was that something you did from day one? Or where did that create from?
Scott Walley 17:03
It took a while to get there. And again, it’s I’m not perfect at it. But you know, one of my goals for the year is only to work so many hours a week. And you know, and that’s part of tracking my time, it tells me how many hours I really worked this week. And if it gets too many, it’s like, Whoa, you got to, you know, to really say this is that I you know, I do work some evenings, but I don’t work, tons of them. And I find if I can be efficient doing these, these other products we talked about, I have to be there. As long as that’s the real battle. If you can be efficient enough during the day, you can be done. And I like to, you know, cut out at five or six o’clock in the evening. And that goes back to being unplugged a little bit. I have my phone in the evening, but I don’t somebody calls in unless it’s critical. I don’t answer it and emails, I don’t really check it night. They can wait till tomorrow. That’s just the routine. And I think if you do that enough, good or bad people know. Okay, I’ll probably hear from him tomorrow. I don’t, they don’t expect. I like to say I’ve trained him well enough to not expect an immediate answer. There’s something of course, there’s something really big and huge. Yeah, that jumps in there. But for the most part, I’ve bet 95% of it can wait till tomorrow.
Hannah Mitrea 18:35
I love that routine, kind of, you know, planning the day ahead, looking at your goals for them, making sure that you’re tracking your time to create these efficiencies so that you’re not overworking. So let’s kind of jump into the success. And so how do you define success? Scott,
Scott Walley 18:50
it’s really a combination of a number of things, you know, money success, you know, making enough money to take care of my family’s success. I think the other one is those other things that we talked about, you know, the work life balance, one of my three goals for the year, like I said, is working X number of hours, not more than an X number of hours a week and being able to, I want to say success of feeling that you did a good job, that’s probably the best, you know, I feel like I provide good service to my clients. And that’s the best thing you can do is customer service that’s like, got drilled into me in the resource business. But, you know, if you can provide good service, you can have a work life balance, you make enough money. Hey, that’s pretty successful to me.
Hannah Mitrea 19:45
No, I think success is different for everyone. And I love your kind of definition of how you look at it as well. So how would you relate the success you’ve had back to some of these routines you’ve created in your life?
Scott Walley 19:59
I They get really, the routine gets me where I need to go and gets me started every day, on the right frame of mind, you know, it’s not like, oh, geez, I got all this stuff here, you know, there’s a million things I got to do and what am I going to do first and no, I’m going to jump over here and jump over there. And for me, it’s easy to get sucked down that road, if you’re not really kind of focused in have a plan for the day. And here’s what I’m going to do. Those are what I’m going to do. And those are my successes and the routine drives that is be a better, I would say a better chance of success. By having a good routine, it’s not perfect. That doesn’t happen all the time. But my odds are increased.
Hannah Mitrea 20:46
Yeah, definitely sets you in the right direction from the morning to get things that you need. So yes. That’s why I like asked two questions on every episode, and one is if someone’s listening to this that does not currently have a routine in their life. What is that one step they should take to start implementing some kind of routine in their life.
Scott Walley 21:08
Two things come to mind. One is probably try to write down three goals for the year, what do you really want to accomplish this year, and they can be personal business, whatever. And then what I would suggest every day, like I say, write down three things you’re going to do tomorrow, that will get you closer to those goals. And you know, that’s a one step routine or two steps. Once you get once you get the goals. Your routine is one step I’m gonna write down three things. And I’m gonna work my hardest to finish those. And that gets you into a routine, I think that’s would be where I would start. Yeah.
Hannah Mitrea 21:55
And I think that looking at the three goals for the whole year, even if they just start there, that’s a great way to get that motivation of starting that routine getting on those paths, because they’re looking at it, like a much bigger lens of how I need to get these things done this year.
Scott Walley 22:13
Yeah. What can I do tomorrow? What do I need to do tomorrow to get me closer to those, and there’s always the burning issues out there, you pretty much know what they are. But if you write them down, and yet, you look at him in the morning, Okay, I gotta get going here. Yeah, it’s satisfying to check off the list when you don’t you get a couple of three big things done in a day. It’s like, oh, man, this was great, man.
Hannah Mitrea 22:40
Definitely. And so my other question is, what book would you recommend for our listeners to read,
Scott Walley 22:45
I would go to the old classic, The Seven Habits of success, efficient people and highly successful. And I’m just reading another one. Now, it’s a personal book, and more than anything else, I do like to read, that’s part of my, the good and the bad of not working all the time is not reading a business book, when I go to bed. You know, some people are great at that. I should do more of that. But I don’t, I would rather read a pleasure book to go to bed and fall asleep by and I’m reading one right now. Sea power is the name of it. And it’s by James stratosphere, but see power. And he goes through all the oceans of the world, and talks about the history and the countries by him. And what you know, the old wars that have been fought and it’s it’s very fascinating book
Hannah Mitrea 23:38
Is it nonfiction, fiction?
Scott Walley 23:41
It’s nonfiction, a retired admiral from the Navy and this guide sailed Navy ships all over the world. Now he goes, Yeah, when I was in the Mediterranean, we evolved blah, blah. And he tells stories and knows and it’s very interesting, and he gives the geopolitical of the different countries around all the sea oceans and what their interest in impact is and like I say, it’s nothing to do with routines or business or anything like up but it’s a great read.
Hannah Mitrea 24:14
Ya know, I love reading. I read a lot of fiction. I read 52 books this year so far. I’m a reader. Most of them have not been nonfiction or girl. They’ve just been fantasies and things like that, but it helps your mind escape, I think and then it gives you that break. So when you come back to the work world, you have that creative juice, kind of the stuff you’ve been reading that is completely absurd. Alright, awesome. Well, Scott, I’ve loved having you on share with people how they can reach out to you and who is that ideal person that you know might need to connect to you?
Scott Walley 24:50
Yeah, my email scott@wcpa.com. And my website scottwcpa.com. The person that great person like say, do a lot of CFO services, I’m, you know, the best would be a small to medium sized business that the owner needs to know more wants to understand their business better, to make better business decisions. I spent a few years teaching at the university level of accounting. And I’ve taught hundreds of managers that were non financial people how to understand the financial side of what they do. And that’s real passionate for me is that, see the fruits of my labor and help somebody improve their own business by knowing more about their finances? So that’s kind of where I’m coming from. And that would be great. Thank you.
Hannah Mitrea 25:46
Yeah, definitely. And we’ll make sure to have all your stuff listed in the show notes. So anybody that’s listening, if you want to reach out to Scott, just check the show notes. We’ll have his website, his LinkedIn, his email, and I think his phone number because he gave it to us. Well, thank you so much for joining on the show. Thank you for listening to Success Is Routine Podcast. If you found value in this episode, share it with a friend episodes go live weekly on Sunday at 8am. Start your week with the right routine, like follow and review the podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music or wherever you’re listening, join the success as a team movement and get exclusive downloads and content from the guests go to www.successisroutine.com and follow the conversation there or on social media. Until next time, remember,
Scott Walley 26:36
my routine of what I do is I start the night before and try to write down some things that I’m going to do tomorrow. It clears my mind at the end of the day, I may be a total train wreck. But if I can sit there for 10 or 15 minutes and look at my calendar tomorrow, look at my goals where I write down my three things that has my annual goals right at the top of it so I read those and figure out okay, what do I have to do? What can I do to get closer to those if you can provide good service? You can have a work life balance. You make enough money. Hey, that’s pretty successful.
