Zero To A Hundred – Episode 32: Elevate Your Financial Game: Mastering Business Accounting For Success With Joshua Chananie

Accelerators! 🚀

Get ready for a financial masterclass! This week, we’re joined by Joshua Chananie, partner at Saxs LLP, who has over 20 years of experience helping small and medium-sized businesses clean up their financial data, prepare for growth, and create systems that support long-term success. From tackling financial chaos to preparing for a potential sale, Josh brings the tips and insights every business owner needs to thrive. 🎯

What’s on the Menu:

🧾 How clean financial data drives smarter decisions and growth.

💼 The value of outsourcing financial expertise to save time and money.

🏆 Why every business should prepare for a sale—even if you’re not ready to sell yet.

Why Tune In?

Josh shares practical advice on building a financial ecosystem that sets your business up for success while avoiding costly mistakes. Whether you’re looking to streamline your operations or prepare for the future, this episode is packed with actionable insights!

💬 Gem from Josh:

“Clean data isn’t optional—it’s the backbone of every successful business decision.”

Get in Touch with Josh:

📧 Visit SaxLLP.com to connect with Josh and learn more about optimizing your financial systems.

Don’t miss out—hit that subscribe button and let’s take your business from zero to a hundred! 💥

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Watch the episode here

Listen to the podcast here

Elevate Your Financial Game: Mastering Business Accounting For Success With Joshua Chananie

Hello, accelerators. I am very happy to introduce our guest, Joshua Chananie, an accountant extraordinaire. He’s a partner at Saks LLP who represents over 3,000 SMB clients and he’s been in the industry for over twenty years. Some of the topics that we will cover will be everything from how to clean up your financial data, outsourcing the right professionals who are going to help you grow your business, preparing to sell your business right now today, whether or not you’re going to sell it, and some key mindset you need to have as an entrepreneur that is going to impact the success of your business. I want you to listen to those.

For those who do not know me, my name is Jarrod Guy Randolph. I am the founder of BoxFi. We are the nation’s leading payment consultant, providing business growth solutions through payment processing. I’m very excited to share the network that I have built over my 25-year entrepreneurial journey to help you grow your business and become more profitable. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s accelerate together.

Joshua Chananie, thank you for joining us on Zero to a Hundred.

I’m happy to be here.

I’m excited for a conversation today because you’re going to give the audience a unique perspective on how they should be looking at their business, their accounting, and their financials. There’s something I want to start with first. When we had our pre-call, you mentioned something that I thought was cool and unique in terms of what I’ve heard from other providers in the industry around your entrepreneurial mindset. You describe yourself as an entrepreneur who happens to do accounting. How does that influence how you do your business and work with your clients?

Clean Data, Clear Decisions: The Foundation Of A Successful Business

It’s a great question. It puts me on the same level as them. Put the accounting aside. I run a business and you run a business. Let me put myself in your shoes. What that helps me do is to be honest. It helps me to be open. It helps me to be transparent and say, “If this was my money, this is what I would do.” That is what most consultants do not do today. It’s like, “Let me offer you a bunch of suggestions. Let me caveat as to why I can’t give you a straight answer. You’re a smart guy. You’re in business. I’m sure you’ll make the right decision.” That sounds terrible.

When you put yourself in the shoes of that business owner, how should they be looking at running their business most efficiently from an accounting standpoint?

The most important thing that a lot of people don’t realize and maybe it sounds simple is clean data. It’s amazing how many times you have conversations with folks and they think they know the numbers, but they don’t. A lot of times, we use this concept of garbage in, garbage out. If the information that’s coming from your system is not accurate and you’re using that information to drive your business forward, how do you make the best decisions? It’s so important to have clean, good, and I’ll even say historical. It’s like, “I’ll just clean the shit up today and it’ll be fine.” No. You still need to look at trends even if it’s 2 to 3 years. To me, that is the biggest myth that most people have. They think they know what they have, but they don’t know what they have.

I’m a business owner. My books are a mess. My finances are a mess. I’m a mess. It’s in disarray. We’ve all been there as business owners. What should be the first step that we take to get everything sorted out so it isn’t overwhelming?

Building Your Financial Dream Team: Expert Advice For Business Owners

You have to find the right person, whether it’s a controller. Many times, people think they need a CFO. They can’t tell you the difference between the two but they assume a CFO is the right person. You need to find the right person, whether it’s your own trusted professional outside the organization or inside the organization. They need to get the books where they need to be. You certainly want to vet these people to make sure they have the right background and education.

What I find would be very helpful is if they know the industry or if they worked in the industry. There is a lot of inherent knowledge of how things work and how numbers flow by working in an industry that you’re familiar with. It doesn’t mean that you can’t adapt or learn. A lot of people are very smart and able to do that. You have to find somebody you can trust. You vet them properly, let others vet them, let them come highly recommend, check their references, and tell them they get to work and get the books up to speed so that you have a starting point for your business where now you can make decisions about what the future looks like.

Having the right team member is a given, but expertise in your industry is key. For the audience, find that expert who understands your industry and the nuances where you don’t have to teach them. Most small and medium-sized business owners don’t have time to spend teaching someone the business as much as they might like them or they are their friends.

I have made the mistake myself hiring people at all levels of my business who didn’t know it. They didn’t add value. They cost me time and money, and the business didn’t grow because of that. That is key. From a finance standpoint, tell our audience of business owners what their financial team needs to look like to ensure that they are going to be successful and grow their business.

At a very basic level, we need to make sure that we have enough people where we can have adequate segregation of duties, meaning that not too many people control too many aspects of the transaction cycle. I don’t do the purchasing, get the invoices, process the check, or reconcile the bank statement where I control all aspects of it. We need to protect ourselves. As a business owner, we need to make sure that our hard-earned money is very well-protected. That’s one way you do it.

You have to be realistic about the size of the company and what the staffing needs are. A lot of times, people will tend to say, “We’re doing X amount of business. We’re going to grow 20%, 30%, 40%, or 50%. We have to scale and we have to fill the bullpen with lots of people.” I don’t think that’s right. You have to understand what your capacity is. You have to understand what you can afford. As part of that, you have to also embrace whether hiring an outsourced professional is more valuable and more cost-conscious than hiring somebody internally.

Something that I struggle with all the time is this whole in-office versus remote concept. The reality is there are a lot of smart people out there who don’t work in an office anymore. What’s the trade-off? If I only have a certain amount of budget, am I better off buying expertise or am I better off buying a friend who comes in and says hello to me every day?

This is very important for business owners to listen to. It’s a mistake that I have made. Do not hire based on projections for your business. Hire where you are currently in the marketplace. Also, bringing in an outsourced professional could be one of the best things for your business especially when they are 1099 versus W-2.

You run into a lot of issues around taxes and legality when they are a W-2 employee. It’s not always easy, depending on where you are, to just fire that person. Until you get to the point where you truly need someone full-time, you should be looking at outsourcing. Josh, I love that you said that because I wish I had known that at other points in time in my career. We live, we learn, and we grow.

That’s all we care and it’s about embracing what’s in front of us today. There’s part of us that can be selfish and then there’s part of us that has to be realistic about what are the opportunities around us.

Money Matters: Overcoming Negative Financial Mindsets

We’re focused on this conversation on talking about what your financial ecosystem looks like. I have four pillars in life in general. The first pillar is conscious awareness. It’s determined by imagination, constant spaced repetition, and getting emotionally involved. When you look at those four things, that conscious awareness is important when it comes to being a business owner and your business and personal finances. A lot of us have financial disconnects and have a negative mindset around money. Do you see this with some of the business owners that you work with? How do you help them get over those financial challenges of having negative energy around money?

A lot of them don’t understand finance, especially in our world. We’re talking about your small to medium-sized family-owned privately held businesses. You’re dealing with people who, in most cases and my world, are entrepreneurs. They’re good at building a product. They’re good at buying materials and putting together something to solve somebody’s needs. They know nothing about finance. They know nothing about sales. They know nothing about HR. You name it.

They don’t know it but they know how to make a good product. That’s the challenge. Some are very good at making this good product but have no idea as to the bigger picture. When you say money makes people evil, I agree. Money is what makes people go. It’s what makes businesses go. If you don’t understand what you have, you don’t understand why you make money and you don’t understand why you lose money. It’s incredibly frustrating.

It takes someone like me who is an accountant, who sits around numbers, trying to explain numbers to somebody who doesn’t know numbers. You think they hate money. They make me hate money, but you have to find common ground and equate it back to them. Help involve them in the process, but help them to understand that they need to have money-people around them for the business to be successful. In the end, it’s not enough for profit. They’re not doing this for charity.

In some cases. This is their entire livelihood. We have a lot of clients who we work with where the entire nest egg is in the business. If the business fails, that’s pretty bad. It’s pretty bad for the family. It’s pretty bad for the kids. Who knows what it does to the next generation? Money can suck but money can be good too as long as you understand the bigger picture around you.

I read a book recently that has changed my mindset as an entrepreneur around how I’m operating my business financially. It’s called Profit First by Mike Michalowicz. Have you ever heard of that book?

I have not.

It is a good one. We’re familiar with the equation of revenue less expenses equals profit. His equation is revenue less profits equals expenses. He’s flipped it on. You take your profit first. You’re not taking 50% of the profit out of the business. It’s just learning to budget. It’s almost like going back to the old days when your grandparents or even your parents used to do the cash envelope budgeting. They go, “This is what we’re paying for the mortgage. This is for the car.” They would put it in envelopes and then once that money was gone, the spending for that month for that particular thing was gone, or they had to adjust. I like that mindset and that mentality.

From the standpoint of creating better money management for your business, what are some of the challenges that business owners face? How do you help them overcome the money management to get their business back on track? If you could give us an example, it would be awesome.

You made an interesting point at the onset. It was about people not even understanding their financial situation. If people can’t manage their finances, how are you going to manage a business? A business is 10x, 100x, or 300X in some cases your net worth. A lot of your bad habits that translate from your personal life translate over to your business life. We say to people, “If you can’t get your own personal house in order, how are you going to get the business in order?”

There’s a simultaneous clearing of the air here that needs to happen. It’s almost like getting your shit together at home and then getting your shit together inside the business. You’re right, budgeting is a very valuable tool. Do you know what happens with budgeting? People said, “I’m going into 2025. I need a 2025 budget. I’m going to prepare that budget and I’m never going to look at it.”

Every month, I’m going to go back and say, “How am I doing against that budget?” A budget is not a static thing. A budget changes as the business changes. You get new customers. You add a new business line. Those are all things that budgets need to be modified for. It’s a very effective planning tool if it’s used effectively. A lot of people said it and forgot it. You talk about your fantasy football lineup like you talk about your budget. Set it and forget it. That’s wrong. If you have a budget, then stick to it. Modify it and make sure it’s right.

The Digital Dilemma: How To Stay Accountable In A Cashless World

One of the things that I’ve had to personally learn about budgeting is the idea of the master account where everything goes into it. No way. That does not work for me because I’m going to spend and spend until there’s nothing left in that account. I have an account set up for my taxes, expenses, and personal payments that I make to myself or my salary. I have six different accounts which all have money that is going to be allocated for what I’ve budgeted for.

When that account that’s $10,000 is down to $2,000 and I’m halfway through the month, I’m going, “What happened here?” I’m not going, “I’ll borrow from this.” We have plenty of money left in the account. By splitting it up, it has helped me focus and it’s back to that cash envelope budgeting. I do not have this in front of me for any pitch. It happens to be sitting in front of me.

One of the things that helped me was this business cube money, which they do from a personal standpoint because what has happened with digital money in today’s market is we no longer have any physical contact or connection to money. If we spend $100 for lunch on our credit card, we spend $100 for lunch. You used to have to dip into your wallet and spend $100 for lunch, then when you thought about going to lunch again, you’re going, “This lunch might be $100,” and you look in your wallet and go, “I now only have $400 left in my wallet. Do I want to spend another $100 on lunch?”

You think three times before you spend that money, but we don’t in the world of digital money. That’s on the personal side, but how do we help business owners in this world of digital money, credit cards, and lines of credit to make sure that they’re sticking with the budget that they’re creating for their business?

That’s a good question. Just like your spouse holds you accountable, somebody has to hold the owner accountable and say, “Where’s the money going?” At the end of the day, you’re a business owner and your people still get paid even if the business is struggling. He doesn’t get paid if you don’t get paid. It’s very easy to sit there and point the finger and say, “The salespeople aren’t selling, the production people aren’t producing, the account has been on vacation for four months, and the books aren’t backed up.” Who’s fault is that?

You can always point the blame inward. If you are not a leader, then go out and hire one. It’s understanding your strengths and weaknesses. If you are a good producer, you’re able to make things, you’re a good salesman, and you know your shortcomings are in finance, then hire the right people. Don’t hire based on a number. We all try to save money. We all look for an avenue that takes shortcuts. You know what happens when you take shortcuts. Nine times out of ten, you wind up buying the wrong thing because you’re buying, you’re buying based on price and not based on the need that you have.

Part of this is looking internally, understanding what your real strengths are, understanding what your real weaknesses are, and building a team around you that’s going to watch out for your back and keep you accountable and say, “Jarrod, the sale sales guys aren’t selling? Do we need to replace them? Do we need to better incentivize them?” It has to be a team effort. You have to bring people in. You have to be transparent about what the vision is for the company, where you want to go, and how you’re going to get there. We need to ask them the tools that they think they need to achieve these goals that were that we’re putting in front of them.

If the audience takes away anything, what you said about having a financial accountability partner is important for your business. Maybe it is your spouse. Maybe it’s somebody who works in the business. Maybe it’s a best friend that you can be candid about. I do find that a lot of business owners are embarrassed by their financials.

They’re trying to build a business when you’re an SMB. You’re not at the level that you want to be. You’re getting there and you’re putting on a show. That’s what we do. If you have a small business, you are a salesperson because we’re all trying to sell our product and service, and if you can’t sell it, you don’t get to do it again. You’re a salesperson. For those of you out there who have an issue with it, get over it. You’re a salesperson.

Salesmen make the world go around. You’re right.

I don’t think there’s any profession where you’re not selling. An attorney is selling that they’re the best attorney to provide the service that they’re providing. The janitor at the local high school is selling the fact that he keeps everything to make sure he’s gainfully employed the next day. We’re all selling something at all points in time. Having someone that you can be candid and open with who’s not going to judge you is important for the management of your business. I’ve never thought about that because I’ve been at points in times in my business where I was like, “This is a mess. I don’t have anybody to talk to. I have to fix it.” That’s even more stressful when you can’t have a voice of reason.

If finances are not your thing and looking at a financial statement is tough, then you create a set of metrics that you can look at every month that will tell you how your business is operating. How long does it take me to collect my receivables? How long does it take me to pay my vendors? How frequently is my inventory turning over or not turning over? What’s my gross profit? What am I supposed to be making when we sell these products versus what it is that we’re making? You can break it down. The numbers don’t lie, whether they’re in a full financial statement or you pull out five key metrics that help you on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis run your business. I have people tell me, “I know how I’m doing purely based on the cash in the bank.”

AI In Accounting: Leveraging Technology For Efficiency And Growth

I’m glad you said that because I’ve run into those issues too. I’ll tell you what’s helped me is AI, and having a conversation with AI about what I should be doing and programming the AI to not be fluffy like, “You’re doing great, kiddo. You have $2 in the bank.” No. It’s like, “You’re a stupid idiot. You failed. Here’s how you failed. Here are three different ways that you could fix it based on what these market experts would advise you to do. That has been super beneficial to me. Can you talk about how you’re using AI in your business right now to grow your business and also to help the clients that you work with?

An immediate need for us from an AI perspective was to build an intranet. For us, one of the biggest challenges of the firm growing so quickly is that we’ve added a tremendous amount of resources, which from my standpoint is fantastic. The biggest problem with that is that not everybody knows who everybody is. With that, not everybody knows what everybody’s skill set is.

I may miss out on an opportunity or I might make a wrong decision because maybe I’m relying on my expertise. I know somewhere in this firm of 370-plus people, there’s probably somebody who knows what this is or has seen this before. Just the ability to connect people within this giant rocketship that we’re building or just as a second voice. Another opinion has been tremendously valuable. We’ve been using AI for years in different capacities.

The first time we embraced it was a couple of years ago when we started using the software to populate tax returns. People would send their documents, the AI would read the information on the documents, and populate the tax return. Was it 100% accurate? No. Was it 80% accurate? That’s pretty good. What is it doing? It’s creating efficiency between the amount of time when the documents come in and we can finalize and provide that tax return to the end user. We’re achieving economies of scale from it.

The next big wave for accountants is research. There are a lot of HR policies and everything out there about how you use AI and what you can say or not say to clients about it. As time evolves, the research will get better and better. You’re talking about research as it relates to technical ability. This is a service that people historically have paid a premium for that potentially is now at their fingertips. For me, working with the client base that we work with is alarming because there are always changes to business and there are changes to how you have to adapt to it.

It brings you back to if the information is readily available, what do they need me for? It goes back to the relationship and it goes back to the trust. Even more important than before, I look at the network of people that I have at my disposal that AI will never have. I can help you with your business from any aspect possible and I could show up but they can’t. Is it there? Yes. Is it incredibly important? Yes. Is it going to create more price sensitivity within my marketplace? 100%. Does it help me change the way that I do business for the better? 100%.

Exit Strategies: Planning For A Successful Business Sale

I love what you said and I agree with you on AI. You also have to learn to use it properly because the output is only as good as the input. People are frustrated with the output because they suck at creating input. You have experience in so many different aspects of business, especially around finances. When we had our first conversation, you mentioned something I thought was interesting. When you go into a business, you should be positioning that business for an exit or a sale.

Whether or not you sell it or exit it, you should have a long-term purview of what an endpoint could look like. Our audience is existing business owners. How can you create an exit plan, a sale plan, or whatever you want to call it, as an existing business owner to make sure that you’re meeting the benchmarks that you need to meet to show your business is successful and growing?

At first, it scares people a little bit because it’s like, “I had no intention of selling my business but are you telling me maybe I should or are you telling me there are opportunities to do so?” I’ll say if there’s an opportunity out there, why not listen? Look at the marketplace around you. The market is very hot. There’s one aspect of saying if I sit back and do nothing, I’m going to completely miss the boat. The other piece of it is I’m going to learn about what’s going on around me. I’m going to learn what people are doing to maximize value. You can do that without having to spend a lot of money. A lot of times, people attribute getting ready for sale to opening your piggy bank.

Think about it. You were going to sell your house. All of a sudden, you’re like, “The kitchen is old. I need to redo the bathroom.” Before you know it, you’re $150,000 in renovations. Will you ever get that back? I don’t know. Maybe, but it’s not necessarily saying, “Maybe I need to redo the bathroom. I don’t need to redo it right now, but I’m going to redo it a year from now. I need to redo that kitchen. Maybe we can change the appliances now, get a better benefit, and then change the cabinets later.”

It’s understanding that there is going to be an investment and not shying away from investment. It’s understanding that the investments you make and the changes you make today are all about maximizing value. I don’t know the number. I’m making this up, but I would say that 7 out of 10 businesses that sell were not ready to sell. A lot of these deals fall out of the sky, and the money is too good to pass up. Do you know what happens when you go through this due diligence? Somebody is coming in from the outside and they’re going to find every reason to tell you why your business is not as valuable as you think it is.

The analogy that you gave about the house is important because many of our listeners are business owners and homeowners. They’ve bought and sold properties. When you go to sell a property, what’s the first thing the real estate agent tells you to do? Clean the carpets, refinish the wood floors, paint the walls, clean out the closets, redo the bathroom, redo the kitchen, replace appliances, and redo the landscaping.

You’re getting your home in tip-top shape to get top dollar because the buyer coming in does not want to perceive that they have to do the work. Everybody wants a new car. Nobody wants a 25-year-old car and it’s a great perfect car. I’ve had a 20-year-old car because I was stupid and thought they were cool. I wasted a lot of money anyway, but getting your home in order is going to help you get top dollar. Getting your business in order if you were to sell helps you get top dollar, but it helps you run your business more efficiently.

Think about how you feel in your home when you walk in and the living room has been painted, you have new carpet, new wood floors, and new furniture. Everything is in order. It’s not sticky from your sticky little kids. There’s no dog hair all over everything. You’re like, “I like my house. This is a great space.” Imagine if you could run your business like that.

You learn to minimize and eliminate the waste because you’re saying if somebody else were to come in and sit in my chair and work with my people, the first question they’re going to say is, “Is this necessary? Why are we doing this?” If we’re doing this because we’ve been doing it for 100 years, to me, that’s not the answer.

It creates a much different mindset. That is the way I look at it. How you come in and run your business on a day-to-day. By the way, to have a set of professionals who are in tune with that same approach means everything. The biggest knock on my profession and I’ll be the first one to say it is that people are afraid to lose clients because they lose the annuity. If you are working with an accountant who can’t be on us with you all over the fear of potentially losing the business because of an event that is the right thing to do for you and your family, you better find yourself another trusted professional.

I was on a call with somebody before. They said, “We’re very interested in working with you. We understand you don’t work with public companies. If we’re not around in a year or two from now, is that okay?” I know you going to make an investment in time in the relationship and I said, “God bless you.” I wouldn’t change that for the world. Why would I get in the way of your success? Going back to what you said before, you have to be a salesman. If I say no, I look desperate. That’s not the position you want to be in when you’re doing sales.

That is not at all the position that you want to be in. This is something that I learned recently. The SBA has a 7A program. You can sell your business to a key employee and the underwriting standards are far more lax. This is meant for smaller or medium -businesses because the capital you can get is up to about $5 million. If you have someone who might be looking for an exit and as an accountant, you say, “You have employees who might be good buyers for the business.”

They might say yay or nay. If they say yay, then there are actual programs where you can help your employees buy the business from you. As the accountant, you’re still retaining that business because they’re going to trust you as the person who created the opportunity for them as the key employee to buy that business. I love what you’re saying about you must have professionals like you, Josh, who are willing to create solutions that are unique for your business and that benefit you exactly where you are in your life cycle. Talk to me about how you work with businesses that are preparing for a sale.

There’s a common misconception that a buyer is only going to come in and look at my numbers and my financials. That’s going to be the only thing that they focus on. Sure, that’s important but it only gets you 50% of the way. There is a very important scrubbing of the numbers that has to take place. There is an understanding of what normalized EBITDA looks like. It’s pulling out those one-time or owner-type expenses that are non-recurring in nature, all with hopes of making the numbers look better, but then there’s a whole other side. There are policies and procedures.

If somebody new comes into the organization and you’re not there, are they going to be able to pick up and do your job? Policies and procedures are very important. Human resources are very important. Corporate documentation and structures are very important. Tax filing, sales tax, use tax, and income tax are all extremely important. Making sure key employees are happy and are going to continue with the business is very important., All those things that I mentioned could have as much of an effect on the value of the company as the numbers themselves.

We’re going to have to do another episode and have you on and go over that list. I’m not in the position of thinking of selling my business right now, but you pointed out some things that I didn’t even think of. We all know you need to have the SOPs or standard operating procedures where you’re not the business. That’s one of the key things. Your business needs to be the business. If you’re the business, you don’t have a business that has tangible value to anyone. You’re just working a job.

The SOP and having the HR policy and procedures in place, your corporate docs, sales tax, use tax, income tax, tax returns, and making sure your key employees are happy. Those are eight different things that you gave us that you need to have in place and truly buttoned up before you go to sell your business as a business owner. Those are things that I would have been like, “Let me make sure my financials are buttoned up.” I would have those in order but the other seven, I don’t know if I would have those buttoned up.

That’s what happens. Some of those are easier to deal with than the actual financial metrics of the company. Those are areas that people disregard and see as unimportant. Somebody is going to come in and buy my business because they think it makes a lot of money or it fills a hole within their portfolio or whatever it might be, or they want my IP. That’s another thing you can add to that list too. A lot of people have their IP that’s not patented, which means your secret sauce is out there for the rest of the world because you didn’t want to spend a couple of bucks to do it the right way.

Future Trends in Accounting: Staying Ahead of the Curve

When you talk about someone coming in and asking the right questions, that’s what this is about. What we’re going to do is we’re going to have you come back on and we’re going to go through those nine steps, there might even be more, about how we should be looking at preparing to sell a business. I know what’s going to be valuable for our audience, whether or not you’re selling your business because these are all things that you need to have in order to have a true functioning business. Before we go into our fun rapid-fire section, I would love to hear from you about some of the future trends that you’re seeing in accounting right now and the impact that they’re going to have on our audience of business owners.

The accounting profession is evolving so rapidly. That’s being caused largely by the amount of consolidation that’s happening, whether that’s by strategic or private equity. The reasons why they want to get in this space make a lot of sense. They want a new annuity business. For a firm like ours, which is still very much independently owned, we’ve done the right thing and we’ve transitioned the business to the next generation. We’re poised and excited to do this for as long as we can. Even if you’re not owned by private equity or owned by a strategic, this translates very much to the business world too. You have to operate as if you are on that way.

Going back to the point we made before about running your business as if it’s going to be sold, I’m competing against private equity. What are they trying to do? Maximize the value of the investments they’re making. How do you do that? You incentivize people to work harder. You strip out the waste and you put people on the street. You tell them to go sell, work harder, and build value.

You tell them they better go cross-service. We could talk about that too, but this whole concept of cross-selling and being able to sell different areas of the firm. Even as a sales guy, I hate this term. I look at it as cross-service. If I have services at the firm that I’m not bringing to you as the client, then I’m not doing my job. Forget about selling. I’m going to get my money if I’m doing the right thing. If there are things that the firm can help you with and I’m not bringing those to your attention, I’m not doing my job.

This whole consolidation that’s happening in the marketplace has put the emphasis back on the client, and that’s delivering the best service you can and being able to provide them with everything at your disposal, more than just your mind and your industry expertise. It’s helping them with technology. It’s about helping them with wealth management and investing.

It’s about helping them identify what their success looks like within their business. It’s about helping them with their legacy planning. What happens when you leave the business? There are so many things that are not accounting. Accounting is almost a term of the past which is why I don’t use it. We talked about it in the beginning. What do you do? I own and run a business. I’m working with other people who own and run a business. That’s how we bond. For me, that’s the formula.

Rapid Fire Section With Joshua

Josh, you gave us so many good takeaways. I’m excited for the audience to get their hands on this because there’s a ton of value. Now we’re going to get to the fun stuff. Are you ready for the rapid-fire questions?

I can’t wait.

What is your favorite New York sports team?

New York Giants.

That was especially for you. I’ve never asked that question.

Thank you. As painful as it is right now for the New York Giants.

If it’s a zombie apocalypse and you have to get all the house and protect your family, what is your one weapon of choice that you’re going to take with you?

I’m a hungry guy. I’m going to make sure I’m fed. I don’t know when the next time I may eat. I don’t know what. Maybe microwave or something else.

What is one book that you would recommend to our audience of entrepreneurs and business owners to read that will help them run their business more efficiently?

I love leadership. For me, every day is a new opportunity for me to learn how to lead better. One book that is written by a good friend of mine is Awaken Your Potential by Chad Reyes. If you learn how to lead and people follow you, everything else falls in line. You can relate it to all aspects of your life whether it’s your business or personal. We talked at length about if your own house isn’t in order, how is the business going to be in order? There are a lot of things that you can take between the two. I think it is very important.

I love that. Do you have a coach or a mentor?

I do have a mentor. My mentor was the first person I met when I joined this firm. That is Joe Damiano, who is the firm’s managing partner. He took me in as his mentee as a young punk-ass kid out of Binghamton University who didn’t pass a CPA exam right away. I wasn’t of the highest IQ but he saw my potential and helped me realize at an early age in the firm that even though I was in a profession that was heavily driven by IQ and that meant everything, it was the AQ and the EQ that was going to help put me in a position to be successful 20 years from then, 30 years from them, and be a future leader of the firm. While some people might say I wasn’t as smart as everybody else, I look at it and say I was fifteen years ahead of my time. Look at me now.

Well said. Let’s say you are a small business owner who’s doing $10 million in annual revenue. I walk through your front door and I hand you a $300,000 check. In general, how would you suggest that business owner invests that $300,000 to grow their profits over the next year?

I’m going to go hire the best salesman I can find because sales drives everything. The biggest miss of any CFO is they come in and they look at how to control costs and minimize costs. While that’s important, it’s the revenue in the top-line growth that is the main driver for business.

I love that. What is the biggest obstacle that you have had to overcome in your life to get to the level of success that you have today in your business?

The biggest obstacle I’ve had to overcome may be a knock on the firm, but it’s still worth saying. The biggest obstacle that I overcame in my career was not changing who I am, what I believe in, and my morals. I took the unpopular path in the firm and came up in an industry service group that maybe wasn’t considered as sexy or desirable as some of the others.

The person who took me to the Promised Land is one of the greatest thinkers, one of the greatest entrepreneurs, one of the weirdest dudes, but a tremendous person who I’ve looked up to this day. He was instrumental in keeping me on that track and saying, “If you believe in this, you love this, and you want to do this, then you only have to answer to yourself.” I took the unpopular route. It’s probably strange that I’m in the position that I am. I never changed to I was and I never always was me.

Josh, please tell the audience where they can connect with you if they would like to do so.

I’m right here in the beautiful Parsippany, New Jersey. SAX LLP is such a great place. I’ve been here for 21 years and I wouldn’t change it for anything. I’ve made the most of my time. I’ve worked hard, but I was fortunate to find a firm that invested in me like I invested in them. It’s been a tremendous run and we’re here to help.

Joshua Chananie, thank you so much for joining us on Zzero to a Hundred.

Thank you, brother.

Important Links

• Joshua Chananie on SAX LLP
• SAX LLP website
• SafeSend Exchange website
• SAX’s Consumer Industrial Products Conference 2024 website
• Client Portal – SAX LLP website

About Joshua Chananie

Joshua is a Partner with Sax and Leader of the firm’s Consumer Products Practice, concentrating on advising clients on the key areas critical to their success.

With more than 15 years of experience, Josh specializes in distribution and inventory management, shareholders agreements, profitability, succession planning, financial strategy, operational efficiencies, risk management and tax challenges.

Joshua is also an active member of the firm’s Nonprofit Practice, specializing in auditing and advisory services to some of the firm’s largest nonprofit clients (social services, religious organizations, and membership organizations). He specializes in governance and best practices on fiscal policy.

Joshua is a Certified Public Accountant in New Jersey. In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his family, playing golf, going to the beach and all things football-related.