Primes' Numbers

From the January 2009 Issue

David Primes would probably be among the first to tell you that he’s not normal — at least not a normal accountant. No disrespect is meant by this, of course. But in many areas of his life, professional and private, his differing perspectives are evident.

The Los Angeles CPA is a shareholder in the firm of Sobul, Primes & Schenkel, CPAs, APC (www.spscpa.com), which specializes in providing accounting and business management services to the entertainment industry, high net-worth individuals and professional services firms, while also supporting clients in other industries. Due to confidentiality issues, we can’t cite their names here, but the firm’s clients include notable TV, film and music stars, as well as prestigious law firms and one of the largest talent agencies in L.A.

David manages the second largest book of business at the 32-person practice, handling client relationships and providing guidance on audit and tax issues. His real passion, though, at least professionally, is exploring business technologies and helping clients and the firm implement solutions that can help them achieve greater workflow efficiency and productivity. David holds the AICPA’s CITP credential, which signifies his expertise in the area; and, as the firm’s technology partner, he has helped shape its IT strategy.

Under his direction, Sobul, Primes & Schenkel has been an early adopter of many of the innovations we now take for granted, including paperless processes, automated workpapers and engagement management. The firm scored a 423 on The CPA Technology Advisor’s Productivity Survey (www.CPATechAdvisor.com/Productivity), a free tool on this magazine’s website that helps practices assess their use of technology and processes, providing actionable recommendations for improvement.

One of the challenges the self-described hardware junkie says he faces in evaluating technology is his firm’s size. “Many of the most productivity-enhancing tools like document management systems are either geared for very small firms or very large ones, so we sometimes have to follow a technology for a few years until it becomes better suited to mid-sized practices.”

Technology has always been a guiding force in David’s life. While at California State University Northridge, his original major was in engineering, and he did some computer programming on the side. But mid-way through his sophomore year, he changed his mind. “I usually tell people it was a combination of girls, calculus and bridge that drove me from engineering, so I looked for something that would allow a little more free time for those pursuits.”
For his new major, he narrowed the options down to psychology or accounting and, since he “didn’t want to write a lot of papers,” he chose the latter. In 1974, he started as an intern with the firm that would later become Sobul, Primes & Schenkel (after a split in 1981). Of course, having strong math and computer skills in the mid-1970s made him a perfect fit for the role of the “percenter.”

For those not seasoned enough to know the term, a percenter was in charge of running all of the math for financial statements and tax returns through a firm’s one large calculator. It may be hard to imagine now, but desktop calculators were not widely available in the mid-1970s, so the expertise at running the large computer-sized calculator was highly valued. Likewise, desktop computers were nearly a decade away, which meant that practices were completely run with pencils, pens and lots of paper.