PASLEY COMMERCIAL INTERIORS
Welcome to design to help your business grow. I'm your host, Randi Lynn Johnson. Each episode will bring tips and insight into how to make sure your interiors are working for you and growing your business.
www.pasleycommercialinteriors.com
In an increasingly competitive market, the merits of using interior design as a strategic growth tool can make all the difference in not just surviving, but thriving,
FEATURING: ROBIN PASLEY, NCIDQ
Founder & Design Principal
PASLEY COMMERCIAL INTERIORS
Design to help your business grow
PASLEY COMMERCIAL INTERIORS
Music, Law, and Business Growth: How Creative Collaboration Drives Success
Vince Varunni, tax attorney with Harbor Point Associates, shares his collaborative approach to solving complex business tax problems while working harmoniously with clients' existing advisors and team members.
Rather than displacing existing advisors, Vince seeks "just an extra seat at the table" where he can contribute specialized tax expertise while respecting established relationships. This refreshing philosophy stands in stark contrast to the territorial, siloed approach many professionals adopt.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when Vince draws parallels between his background as a classically trained musician and his professional methodology. Like skilled jazz performers who can seamlessly incorporate others' playing styles, Vince strives to work harmoniously with any advisor his clients value. This musical metaphor perfectly captures true collaboration – maintaining expertise while adapting to complement others' strengths.
Design principal Robin Pasley echoes this sentiment, sharing how her previous career in music taught her to "give up your ego to make the better song." She applies this lesson directly to client projects, focusing on telling the client's story rather than imposing her creative preferences. The discussion explores how this mature artistic viewpoint creates design work that authentically serves the business owner's vision.
Business owners facing upcoming tax changes will appreciate Vince's timely advice to stay informed as potential legislation moves through Congress. He recommends maintaining open communication with all advisors – CPAs, financial planners, bankers – to navigate uncertainties successfully.
Whether you're assembling a professional team or seeking to improve collaboration within your existing advisors, this episode delivers practical wisdom on finding professionals who prioritize your outcomes over their ego. Listen now to discover how removing territorial barriers creates superior results and why the most valuable experts are those who, like great musicians, know when to shine and when to support.
For tax assistance, contact Harbor Point Associates at 866-405-1615 or visit harborpointassociates.com.
We welcome your questions! If you would like to learn more about us or connect for a conversation, please visit www.pasleycommercialinteriors.com.
It helps. I would prefer to be on a team that we're driving in our lanes but we're feeding one another the information that makes the whole thing work better.
Vince Viruni:I think it touches on kind of what we talked about earlier about music. You're so good that you can incorporate someone else's playing style into the tune you're playing.
Randi Lynn Johnson:Well, everybody, welcome back to Design to Help your Business Grow. I am your host, randi Lynn Johnson, here as always, with our fabulous owner and design principal, robin Pasley. Hello, and today we have a very exciting guest, vince Varunni. Vince, your name. A reminder about the point of this podcast. It is to help business owners grow their business, and so we have the design and branding piece covered from this firm. But we always like to interview other professionals in the city and see what you have to offer business owners, and so you are an attorney, specifically a tax attorney, with Harbor Point Associates. Is that right? Okay, what is the problem? How do you help business owners? What do you solve for them?
Vince Viruni:I think there's no one answer I can provide there. It really depends on what the client's immediate problem is and what the ultimate goal is. My multidisciplinary background if I can use a $6 word is in tax matters and how to mitigate the tax impact, whether that's prospectively for a business owner looking to grow or in any sort of succession planning, or retroactively if they have tax problems and they want to get out of that mess.
Vince Viruni:So that they could continue growing, and I also assist in situations where it's a close call between criminal and civil investigations, so trying to keep people towards the civil side and away from criminal investigations with federal and state tax agencies. So it really depends where the client wants me.
Randi Lynn Johnson:Sure.
Vince Viruni:And I usually ask for just an extra seat at the table and if there is something I can see or value I can provide, I'll comment and if not, I can provide. Usually I can provide somebody who will be able to meet the business owner's needs.
Robin Pasley:Yeah, that's great. I know that you have been in this business for quite some time, but you just transitioned into the Springs.
Vince Viruni:We moved from Maryland and I was back and forthing it for a little while. With being on both coasts and in transient cities, you get to see a lot of different types of problems, and so one of the things I'm looking out for here are okay, well, what does the local market here need? And to assess the local market's needs and see how I could position myself to be valuable for the local community.
Randi Lynn Johnson:What is one of the things that you see kind of come up more often than not across the board here.
Vince Viruni:So far, I think it's when dealing with federal tax issues. You're dealing with basically similar questions. I'm running a business. What can I do to mitigate some of the tax impact? Am I structured properly as a business? That seems to come up everywhere. I think there's a varying levels of advice people get, depending on who they work with, and navigating through those conversations with their existing advisor is sometimes the challenge that I look forward to because, you want to keep the client's team intact while trying to be the new guy on the team.
Vince Viruni:And well, we've done it this way.
Robin Pasley:So I find that to be something else that we kind of share. When we come to the table with our client and all the other advisors they have with them, finding our seat and then knowing how to best help the client Cause there are, there are focus we have to play well in sandbox, so to speak, with the other team, but without, like you said, unseating anyone but being able to assess what's going on and bring the right kind of advice to them that may even sometimes be contradictory to what they've been receiving, which is really difficult sometimes. I can see that's part of what you do too is bringing that kind of fine-tuned perspective for the tax situation.
Vince Viruni:Yeah, and I think it changes You're absolutely right Case by case. So sometimes they're sitting on resources that maybe may not be immediately apparent to the business owner and even guiding them to ask those questions to their existing advisors. And when the client or prospect tells you about their existing relationships, you'll know it's safe enough for the client to to reach out to them.
Robin Pasley:I love that collaborative mindset that you have, because I find it to be. What I share with some of my favorite colleagues is, when they want to collaborate too. Too many times, I find that the modality is to silo up so that we can protect ourselves. I'm going to know what I know over here, but I would prefer to work with people in this way that you're describing, where you assess what's happening and then you go okay, I think he knows more on this. Call me back if you need help on this other thing, you know, because I think it's the best for the client ultimately, but it it helps. I would prefer to be on a team that we're, um, we're driving in our lanes, but we're, you know, helping one another, feeding one another the information that makes the whole thing work better.
Vince Viruni:Okay, I think it touches on kind of what we talked about earlier about music, because if you're so good that you can incorporate someone else's playing style into the tune you're playing versus and this goes back to the jazz versus classical mindset that there are performers out there. I don't claim to be an expert performer at all. But just the theory is, you have expert performers out there who can play with anybody and they'll make hits, they'll make phenomenal music live impromptu.
Vince Viruni:And one of the things I strive to be is so good at what I do that part of my personal challenge is to work with anybody that the client's working with and how to incorporate that and to be very open, even with the client that this is a tentative thought process. You know this is a tentative position. It's subject to review and we're going to have discussions with your other team members and if there's a better way, we're going to find it.
Randi Lynn Johnson:So you said that you are a classically trained musician. What did you play? Or do you play?
Vince Viruni:I was raised on the piano, okay. Then I shifted my attention a little bit and explored a violin and then guitar, but then I started to transition into other instruments as well Percussion, really.
Randi Lynn Johnson:Leave some for the rest of us.
Vince Viruni:Good grief. And then I don't play as often as I'd like to nowadays, but it's something that impacted me growing up.
Randi Lynn Johnson:That's really cool and it's cool that you've taken your experience and what was relevant to you and you apply it to your work and I think that's a very unique special skill set that you have. I know Robin has, and it's fun to see when that plays out.
Vince Viruni:But do you, Robin, do you find outside artistic talents that get incorporated into the business dynamics with a client or with a team? A?
Robin Pasley:hundred percent.
Robin Pasley:Matter of fact, in my previous career in music, the collaboration piece was huge for us.
Robin Pasley:We started out, as you know, a duo writing our own music, playing our own music, and then we folded the next you know large piece of our own music playing our own music, and then we we folded the next you know large piece of our career into collaboration efforts, and so all the albums we produced after that were collaborations, and what I learned in that process was having to give up your ego in order to make the better song and I think that's the same way in creating projects with our clients is giving up the ego of I want to do this one thing in order. You have to lay that down so that you can go. What do you need? What is your heart? What is what makes, what is going to make this project? Talk about you and not about me, and so I'm able to bring, I think, what is a more mature artist's viewpoint to design that can bring that creativity but really submits it to the will and the professional future of the business I'm working in.
Vince Viruni:Because, ultimately, the successful client or the happy client is going to be the ultimate success story for you as an advisor in your space, absolutely.
Robin Pasley:Plus it's why I get out of bed in the morning is helping them. That's my favorite stories to tell. We we create these books at the end of our projects that we share with our clients that show the project we did together before and after, and that stack of books.
Robin Pasley:Some days when I'm having a hard time I just sit down and look at it, Cause I think that's a stack of happy people. I got to help all of them and it's why we do what we do. I got to help all of them and it's why we do what we do so, Vince.
Randi Lynn Johnson:who do you love to work with? How would you describe your ideal client?
Vince Viruni:I think here's what it ends up being. Most of the time. They're large transactions dealing with a complex area of substantive law with unique personalities, oftentimes in conflict with one another. That, to me, is my ideal, so I have a transactional and litigation hybrid practice. Where I find myself thriving the most is where transaction and litigation typically meet.
Randi Lynn Johnson:So I'm curious you were not afraid of a challenge Like you seem like you like a challenge. You're a good problem solver.
Vince Viruni:And so that's basically it. Like you mentioned getting up in the mornings, to me that's when, I know I've solved a challenge like that for a client and they're better off today than they were, you know before they met me. That, to me, gives me value. That's awesome.
Randi Lynn Johnson:Is there anything federally or from the state level kind of coming down the pipeline that business owners should be aware of, anything tax or what that they need to make sure they have?
Vince Viruni:Absolutely the one thing I think I can say all business owners should keep their ears to the ground at this moment, because there are so many changes coming our way that we don't necessarily know of. There are lots of options presented at the congressional level, tax-wise, that will be subject to change as this one big, beautiful bill that we keep talking about makes its way through the different chambers, so things will be changing. I would say for all business owners to get their advisors, whoever that may be, their CPAs, their financial advisors, or bankers, whoever they work with and to just really keep their ears to the ground at this point, Because everything is subject to change.
Randi Lynn Johnson:We already have your contact information, but if our listeners are looking for help, a master problem solver, how can they find you?
Vince Viruni:They can call our main line, which is operating 24-7, 866-405-1615. And they can also find all of this contact information at harborpointassociatescom.
Randi Lynn Johnson:Well, Vince, thank you so much for your time and your expertise. And, just honestly, if I needed a lawyer, I would just call it like. You just have such a calming level head. I know I was thinking the same thing and, just honestly, if I needed a lawyer, I would just call it like you just have such a calming level head. I was like, wow, awesome, we need more people like you in this world. But yeah, thanks so much, and we'll see you around the city.
Vince Viruni:Thank you, thanks for having me.
Randi Lynn Johnson:In an increasingly competitive market, the merits of using interior design as a strategic growth tool can make all the difference in not just surviving but thriving .
Robin Pasley:Pasley Commercial Interiors Design to help your business grow.
