Helping new founders struggling to grow their business was the motivation for Chartered Accountant Hitesh Mohanlal to volunteer his time at a co-working space and accelerator in Brisbane through the CA in Residence program.

Mohanlal has always specialised in delivering business advisory services at the Brisbane-based firm, WOW! Advisors, that he founded in 2011. Volunteering at River City Labs, a space for tech entrepreneurs through the CA in Residence Program made sense.

“I know that most tech entrepreneurs are focussed on their product, rather than getting their structure and finances set up correctly. Capital is also usually tight, so they are grateful for any pro bono help.”

During his three-month residency, Mohanlal went to the labs every Thursday for the whole day. He particularly nurtured his relationship with the reception staff who knew all the residents well and especially those in need of financial help. They would also inform the residents know when he was available for meetings.

Tech people are like accountants,” Mohanlal says. “Many of them are introverts so the most fruitful place to make connections was in the co-working kitchen space. I built a lot of relationships in the kitchen.”

Mohanlal also connected with the labs’ legal advisor. “Mick would be talking with a tech founder and then all of a sudden, just pop his head around and say, ‘Oh, Hitesh can you come in for a second? We just have a question.’ And that relationship continues today and I still get referrals from him.”

The labs ran numerous networking sessions that Mohanlal joined in, including a monthly coffee meet-up on Thursday mornings, which coincided with his residency days, an occasional monthly evening drinks session and founders’ information sessions - where founders shared their successes.

He also presented two online webinars to the lab residents, the first on ‘Knowing your numbers’. “You might think this sounds boring but I do it slightly differently,” Mohanlal says. “I never actually show a profit and loss or balance sheets and have a lot of cricket references.” The second webinar was ‘How to run an effective, monthly board meeting’.

His biggest takeaway from his experience as a CA in Residence was understanding how tech clients operate. “I also established relationships with many entrepreneurs and some of those have become our clients,” he says. “Although I didn’t go into the program with the expectation of getting clients.”

One of his firm's focuses is medical clients, particularly in health prevention, and some of the labs’ clients were a good fit. Even though he is no longer a CA in Residence, Mohanlal continues to visit River City Labs once a month to stay connected.

His advice to other potential CAs in Residence is: Be proactive and don’t have the expectation that the entrepreneurs are going to come to you and ask for your help.

“It’s up to you to get yourself known and start conversations. You have to offer them something that they're not used to, because they can get tax and accounting advice from any accountant.” 

CAs in Residence should offer something different, he adds. “They want you to offer something novel, useful and with a different twist. Most people want to work less, earn more and build wealth. It’s simple.”