Business View Magazine | July 2020

50 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE JULY 2020 McDonald was hired out of college and came into the firm in 1991, when Abdo, Eick & Meyers had less than $2 million in revenue and fewer than 20 people. As the company grew, so did McDonald’s career. When he became Managing Partner in 2004, the firm was still doing $2 – 3 million in revenue. Currently, it’s budgeted for about $26 million for 2020. The head count of employees has grown tremendously over time, as have the types of clients. But the character of the company has remained the same. The firm currently has 170 employees with 20 partners and about 30 managers, 20 support, and the rest are accountant seniors. Thirty percent of business is serving local government, but the largest growth over the last five years has come from small to medium sized businesses that are mostly owner operated, or owner/board controlled. Territory-wise, for both offices, a 50-mile radius would cover 90 percent of the firm’s clients. McDonald reports, “We do have several individual clients around the country; quite a few in Florida and other areas where people retire to. As for primary revenue drivers, the core had always been compliance services – tax and audit. But that’s changed a lot in the last three or four years. I feel that clients are looking for a business partner, so we’ve had the opportunity to develop a greater consultant mindset. We strive to help solve whatever challenges our business owners are facing beyond just tax or audit issues. Profitability concerns, growth in their client base, those are things we’ve been fortunate to weigh in on. Mergers and acquisitions – if they’re looking to acquire a company, the work we can do on due diligence to help them through that process has been well received.” The company has done a lot of process evaluations, asking business people such questions as how they can improve through their technology and people processes. McDonald adds, “It’s interesting that in government, what’s really grown has been the advisory part of what Managing Partner, Steve McDonald