If you're a managing partner trying to spend less time in client work and more time leading the practice, I'd ask a second question alongside how many hours you've saved: how much of your attention have you actually got back?
I learned to separate those two things through trading.
There were nights when I'd wake up at two in the morning and lie there until the market opened. Sometimes I'd get no more than four hours of sleep.
At the time, trading was taking me less than an hour a day. During my peak, I was making roughly $30,000 to $50,000 a month, depending on the year. I'd picked it because I thought that combination would give me the life I wanted. Make good money, keep most of the day free, and use that freedom to do whatever I actually cared about.
By those measures, it was working.
But after a big loss, I'd think about it for the rest of the day. The trading session ended. The attention it took from me didn't. It affected my sleep and my recovery in the gym, and it followed me into hours that were supposed to be mine.
Then there was what I chose to do with the free time. I spent it building AI projects and consulting. I never actually liked trading. I liked what I thought it would make possible, and when I had time to choose, I kept choosing something else.
I eventually quit. What I got back mattered far more than the hour I'd spent in front of the market. I got my attention and my sleep back, so I could put more of myself into the work I actually wanted to do.
The goal had been measured in hours. What I wanted depended on how much of my attention I still had when those hours were over.
If you're a managing partner and want to grow your accounting firm without another overloaded busy season, we'll identify the biggest bottleneck standing in your way, build the plan to remove it, and implement it in eight weeks* or less - guaranteed or we continue to work for free and you don't pay.
Find my bottleneck* Eight-week delivery, or twelve weeks when substantial data foundations are required, as agreed before work begins. If a covered stage fails its agreed benchmarks, we provide up to four additional weeks of remedy work at no charge, then waive or refund that stage's fee if it still fails. Successfully delivered stages remain payable. Agreed client-caused delays pause the clock. Delivery guarantee terms.
An empty calendar doesn't tell you how available you are
I think this is easy to miss when you're making decisions about your work, because time gives you something concrete to compare. A commitment takes a few hours. A hire takes meetings off your calendar. A change in responsibilities gives you your Fridays back.
Those can all be real improvements. But if the reason you wanted the time was to think about the future of the business, spend it with someone you care about, or enjoy something outside work, you still have to ask whether you're able to do that.
Imagine you've moved more preparation work to your team. You're doing fewer of those hours yourself, but the work still needs your review. You sit down to think about the practice's next year and keep going back to an engagement you aren't sure is ready. Later, you're home, still running through what might have been missed.
The preparation handoff may have worked. That doesn't tell you whether the review work is manageable, or whether you can stop carrying it once you leave. Those are separate questions.
I'd look at what keeps pulling me back. Is information missing when the work reaches me? Am I clearing the same review points again? Does this engagement need judgment that really does belong with me? Or am I reopening something the team has already handled well?
Those would call for different changes. More preparation capacity wouldn't necessarily resolve missing information or repeated review work. And if the work genuinely needs your judgment, the decision may be about what else comes off your plate. The aim isn't to drop necessary review so you can claim the hours back.
My trading experience doesn't tell you how to run an accounting practice. It does give me a reason to question a definition of success that stops at fewer hours doing the task. If the purpose of the handoff was room to lead, I'd want to see whether that room actually appeared.
That's the part of the comparison I'd pay more attention to now. What does this commitment require from me when I'm not actively doing it? And does what remains let me use the time for the reason I wanted it?
Give the goal a second test
If I were looking at a goal that was succeeding on paper but still leaving me dissatisfied, I'd start by finishing this sentence: “I want to achieve this so that I can…”
I'd keep going until the answer described something in my actual life. Moving preparation work off your desk might mean being able to spend a morning thinking through which clients and services the practice should grow. Or it might mean being able to take a few days away without spending them checking your phone.
Then I'd look for whether that consequence is happening as I get closer to the target. If the team is preparing more work but I'm spending that morning on review questions, one part of the plan may be working while the reason I chose it still hasn't happened.
That wouldn't automatically make the handoff a bad decision. It would mean I'd need to examine what still takes my time and attention before assuming the next hire will give me the freedom the last one didn't.
I'd also be specific about what would count as progress. “Have more freedom” is hard to judge. “Spend a morning deciding the practice's priorities without returning to routine review questions” gives me something I can actually observe. So does being able to spend an evening with someone without repeatedly pulling my attention back to work.
I wouldn't expect every week to look like that. A difficult period can be a choice you're willing to make for something that matters. But I'd want to know what I'm choosing, why it's worth it, and when I expect that tradeoff to change.
Some good opportunities still cost more than you want to pay
Trading paid well for the time I spent doing it, but that comparison left out the attention and sleep it took from the rest of my life. Once I included those costs, the decision looked different. Keeping the income meant continuing to give up things I wanted to put toward the work I enjoyed.
Before adding another engagement or hiring to free up more of my week, that's the question I'd put beside the target: if I hit this number, what do I expect to be different about my life, and is the way I'm pursuing it actually taking me there?
I had the hours I thought I wanted. It took looking beyond them to understand why I still wanted to leave.
If you're a managing partner and want to grow your accounting firm without another overloaded busy season, we'll identify the biggest bottleneck standing in your way, build the plan to remove it, and implement it in eight weeks* or less - guaranteed or we continue to work for free and you don't pay.
Find my bottleneck* Eight-week delivery, or twelve weeks when substantial data foundations are required, as agreed before work begins. If a covered stage fails its agreed benchmarks, we provide up to four additional weeks of remedy work at no charge, then waive or refund that stage's fee if it still fails. Successfully delivered stages remain payable. Agreed client-caused delays pause the clock. Delivery guarantee terms.