About Richard Messik

Background

Richard Messik’s been in Practice, as he says, rather more years than he cares to remember and during that time has seen some pretty exponential changes, which he’s always been one of the first to welcome with open arms. Once a technophile, always a technophile!

On qualifying, he joined his father in the well respected and established family practice, Bellman Messik set up by his Grandfather in 1921 and began to gently and tactfully usher it into the then twentieth century, a process he was able to speed up considerably when he took over as senior partner, overseeing growth from 3 partners to 10, relocating the West End offices from Bentinck Street to Marylebone and opening two suburban offices first in Pinner and then Barnet.

In 1995 he merged the West End Office Practice with Jayson Newman, joining them as one of the Senior Partners where he took the role of management partner innovating a variety of IT systems, taking the practice to the forefront at that time of online accounting both internally and externally and working on the creation, development and marketing of Easycounting one of the pioneer online accounting systems.

When Jayson Newman became one of the three founding practices of Numerica, subsequently Vantis PLC, Richard continued with his online development work establishing the London Outsourcing department and introducing the latest online accounting practices and improvements both internally and to clients.

Current

Richard’s first to admit he’s always worked with one foot in the accountancy camp and the other very firmly in the business arena, seeing as essential the growth and expansion of the Practice as a Business. Priorities are combining forward planning, ongoing development, cost effective inter-office communication and central administration with all that technology has to offer to our benefit. Last but as he emphasizes, certainly far from least, is good and effective people management, without which no business can optimize its growth and performance.

Forward

When you bang on long enough about something people start coming to you because they think you have all the answers, hence the decision to put his money where his mouth is and set up RFM Associates. The consultancy will allow him to focus on his main areas of interest and as he emphasizes, work with people who want to join him in thinking forward not back.

Likes and Dislikes

Likes:

All aspects of IT and communication within business.

Development of online accounting.

Continuous improvement of communications and team management.

Clarity of communication with potential clients.

Efficiency and development of Management Systems.

Dislikes:

Bureaucracy impeding communication which in turn affects efficiency, morale and productivity.