Meet Ivana Petrovic, MPAcc | Accountant / Bookkeeper

We had the good fortune of connecting with Ivana Petrovic, MPAcc and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Ivana, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
Growing up my dad always told me that my end goal in my career should be to open my own business and the older I got the more I felt the desire to make that happen. After college I went into public accounting doing tax and the days and weeks are very long half the year and I enjoyed it when I was fresh out of college but then I started to think about my future and what I wanted out of it and spending late nights at the office didn’t fit that dream so I was forced to start thinking which lead me to my business! I knew that owning your own business came with it’s cons but having control over some of them gave me a piece of mind. I realized I had been doing bookkeeping since I was an intern in college and I could really make a career out of it, so I jumped into it and never looked back! I also wanted to be able to create my own hours to make time for the things I loved. I wanted to be more present with my friends and family, travel, be outside, etc. Now I get to show up to events in the middle of the day to support my loved ones, travel and work on the road, and still be able to make money without the stress of being “online” at a required time.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I own a remote bookkeeping firm that helps small business, local and across the country, with organizing their income and expenses and pretty much all things small business. I come from a tax background so I am able to set myself apart because I know tax law well and I know what a company’s books should look like. In my time in tax, I noticed that so many businesses weren’t getting the product they deserved when it came to their finances, and I wanted to help. I also have always been a huge supporter of small business and people chasing that risky dream which made me want to be a part of their story and journey to watch them grow and succeed.

As far as was it easy…I would say yes and no. When I quit my corporate job I was in an unhappy spot of my career but also very safe spot with a decent salary and benefits, so it took over a year of going back and fourth with myself and my friends and family to justify leaving such a safety net, which is probably one of the top reasons people don’t take the leap. Leaving the corporate world was the easiest and hardest decision I made. My first day being self-employed I had only one small client and I sat at my desk and cried thinking “how in the world am I going to find clients and how in the world am I going to pay my bills?” But then it all just kind of happened. I sat down said some prayers and started making social media posts, reaching out to businesses, friends and family and somehow it all just happened, and my business has been growing ever since!

My lessons learned would be to take the leap and kind-of have a plan. I think lessons learned are going to be different depending on your business and industry, but you’ll never know unless you try and the worst that can happen is you have to go back to your job. I went into this with a loose plan because I knew that I was going to have to learn what was working and what didn’t, so every week I wrote down what my goals were for the week and if one thing I did was working then I would do it again the next week. Being an accountant, I am very used to needing a consistent plan on what to do but being an entrepreneur, I realized that wasn’t going to be the case. The best piece of advice my boyfriend told me when I was in the middle of questioning my decisions in doing this was 1. you’re going to have to be your own cheerleader. No one else is going to understand what you’re doing, and you need to be prepared for that and 2. you only need to make xx amount of money every month, don’t worry about saving right now, only focus on paying your bills and feeding yourself. Those two pieces of advice were really what calmed me and made me realize it would work out.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
Ooooo so many fun places! for a week long trip I would say camping in Crested Butte. We do a camping trip there every year with friends and it is the most peaceful and brilliant place to go to clear your brain.

As far as food, I would say Barcelona in Rino is top tier atmosphere and food! While still in the city catching a sporting event, really any of them – Broncos, Nuggets, Avs, Rockies – all are a blast!

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
The first person that deserves to be recognized is my dad. My parents are immigrants, making me a first generation American, so my dad always told me that anything I dreamed up was possible as long as I worked hard for it. He also was the one that planted the entrepreneurial seed in my head at a very young age so without him I probably wouldn’t even have thought about doing something like this.

The second person is my boyfriend, Mike, who is also an entrepreneur. When I first met him I admired him so much for the non-traditional path he was taking in building a career and having so much control over his career and it sparked in me that it was something I wanted to do as well.

Website: bookkeepingincolorado.com

Instagram: coloradobookkeeping

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/colorado-bookkeeping/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100077904446977