Written by Will McTavish & Reuben Sweeney (Founders of Link Solutions) this is nearly a decade’s worth of knowledge extracted from two minds that know all there is to know about Xero Practice Manager (XPM). Newly released in February 2021 this book really is a first of its kind. I am a big fan of any practical content which is going to help propel the reader to get from A to B in the most efficient way possible. This book seems to have been created simply with that in mind, cover to cover it is all practical implementation with a seasoning of theory on how to best run your practice.
Going from setting up clients to job management and profitability reporting, this book covers it all. As well as the practical setup and implementation within XPM it also covers some general best practices relevant for accounting and bookkeeping firms of all sizes. Each section is clearly laid out to give you the area of training but is always followed on by a practical example (see Fig. 1). The detail in these examples ensures that you’ve understood it correctly. Some key integrations are covered between XPM, Xero, Practice Ignition and Link Reporting (see Fig. 2). These are enough to ensure that you can start to automate the flow of data between systems whilst ensuring that you keep XPM as your single source of truth. The flow between XPM and Xero is a natural one but it is clear, and something I learnt during this read, that you still need to implement best practice when linking these together. Visual representation throughout this book (eg. as seen in Fig. 3)ensures that in whichever way you digest information - you should be covered.
As XPM is very much a like-for-like of WorkflowMax (WFM), I believe that most of the content in this book would be relevant to other service-based organisations using WFM. However, the content within this book itself can draw little criticism but I believe a follow-on deep-dive into the world of integrations and automation between software solutions (XPM being the cog in the centre of the wheel), would be a priceless asset for accountants and bookkeepers looking to build a scalable and efficient practice. We had a teaser of this but I was left wanting more.
The great thing about this book is that you don’t lose all of the knowledge when the expert leaves, like you do with training sessions. You can keep referring back to it and learning more. For any users of XPM, new or experienced, I expect this to be a must-have tool that will sit on your desk and constantly be referred to.
