Tout le poussait à quitter le cabinet comptable... Il est devenu associé (Flavien Fueyo - Numbr)

Summary

Flavien Fueyo describes joining the Lille accounting firm that later became Numbr as an apprentice in 2016. He progressed through production, client relations and leadership roles before becoming a partner. His account focuses on how the firm responded to uncontrolled growth by sharpening its client focus, strengthening training and operating systems, and building a culture of autonomy and transparency.

Growth strategy and operations

• Match growth to delivery capacity. Numbr’s early pace of client acquisition put pressure on service quality and team workloads. The firm paused to reassess its commercial approach rather than continuing to grow at any cost.
• Specialize before expanding. From around 2017–18, the firm focused new client acquisition on service businesses, whose needs fit its tools and support model. Existing clients remained, preserving a varied portfolio. After building capacity and expertise, Numbr broadened its sector coverage again roughly a year to a year and a half before the interview.
• Use specialization to improve advice, not just efficiency. A narrower client focus helped teams develop deeper sector knowledge and offer more proactive guidance. It also improved the client experience and made work more stimulating for staff.
• Build capacity before accelerating again. Numbr used work-study programs and structured training to prepare people to take on clients. Fueyo calls a two-year apprenticeship a “goldmine”: apprentices learn the firm’s processes and may move into permanent roles ready to support clients.
• Treat growth as an operating-system challenge. During its slower-growth period, the firm added training courses, internal processes and team structures so it could later serve more clients and sectors without repeating the same strain.

Management and organizational playbook

• Squads and tribes: Squads are designed to handle the full customer journey autonomously while remaining small enough to support close relationships and informal team cohesion. Squads set their own objectives. Several squads form a tribe, which supports coordination across offices.
• Local autonomy with central support: Tribe leaders share information, connect teams and spread useful practices, but avoid imposing uniform solutions on squads. Local teams are considered best placed to account for their office’s people, skills and clients.
• Intrapreneurship: Employees are encouraged to take initiative when they believe an action will benefit the company. They can seek support, act and learn from mistakes rather than waiting for permission at every step.
• Trust and accountability: Fueyo says he starts from a position of trust with new hires. Trust may change if results or behavior require it, but managers should not begin by looking for problems or treating employees like children.
• Keep leaders connected to the work: Fueyo retains an operational role so his guidance stays grounded in current processes and he can assess whether rules are practical. He cautions that skills and processes change, so leaders should not rely solely on experience from years earlier.
• Lead without excessive hierarchy: Numbr has moved away from titles and a conventional organizational chart while retaining leadership roles. A leader’s job is to give direction and help the team perform—not to control every task.
• Develop talent and delegate: Fueyo argues against making the chartered accountant indispensable to every client interaction. Delegation gives others responsibility and helps develop their skills, while freeing senior staff to focus on higher-value work.

Communication, culture and engagement

• Make transparency routine. Numbr shares strategy and performance information, including weekly results and monthly updates for the wider tribe. Teams discuss what went well, what did not, and what actions are planned next.
• Explain difficult choices honestly. In one Lille-office example, a departure left a staffing gap while an apprentice was due to finish in eight months. Managers explained the trade-off to the team, which chose to manage the temporary pressure rather than hire immediately and potentially jeopardize a permanent role for the apprentice. The office operated at 110–115% of capacity for eight months, with the expectation that capacity would improve afterward.
• Do not hide bad news. Fueyo’s view is that withheld information tends to emerge later and can damage trust. Communicating problems gives teams a chance to understand the context and contribute solutions. Managers should also tailor their communication, since people receive information differently.
• Make feedback safe and direct. Employees should be able to raise problems without fear of blame; managers cannot respond to issues they are never told about. Fueyo favors clear, respectful feedback focused on what happened and how to improve, rather than judging the person.
• Ask teams for feedback on managers. Fueyo planned to invite his teams to critique his management. The discussion emphasizes making one-to-ones bidirectional, rather than using them only for managers to evaluate employees.
• Lead authentically. Fueyo tries to behave consistently at work and outside it. He believes managers who are natural and open make it easier for others to be themselves and raise issues.
• Create positive shared experiences. Team events and activities are treated as part of the culture, not as a substitute for work. Fueyo’s principle is that shared memories and positive emotions can strengthen belonging and help sustain engagement.
• Use gamification to support engagement. Numbr runs challenges and an internal academy with badges and levels. The aim is to make learning and progress motivating and collective. Fueyo’s underlying principle is that engagement is not an entry requirement; leaders need to create conditions in which it can develop.

Talent, technology and client service

• Protect flexibility in practice, not just in policy. Fueyo introduced a rule that his team would not hold team meetings before 11 a.m., so flexible working hours were not undermined by routinely early meetings. Exceptions remain possible when genuinely needed.
• Invest in adaptable human skills. As technology takes over more routine accounting and tax work, the discussion highlights empathy, creativity, emotional intelligence, time management, problem-solving and communication as durable capabilities. Fueyo recommends developing these broader skills rather than focusing training only on rules likely to change.
• Make accounting advice human and proactive. Entrepreneurs may lack basic accounting or business-management knowledge, so accountants should explain concepts rather than assume they are obvious. Listening to a client’s personal and professional circumstances can reveal context behind the numbers and help the accountant give more useful advice.
• Use a gradual transition into client responsibility. Fueyo first handled production for the clients he was taking over, then moved into client relations while retaining detailed knowledge of their files. This allowed him to answer questions directly and transition away from production over time.

Efficiency, quality and metrics

• Match effort to value. Fueyo asks whether a task really needs to be done by him, whether someone else could grow by taking it on, and how to achieve the required quality efficiently.
• Avoid perfectionism without business value. He gives the example of a deliverable that is 90% complete after 15 hours but would need another 15 hours for the final 10%. The decision should depend on whether the incremental improvement justifies the additional time and resources—not on an abstract pursuit of perfection.
• Measure operating performance regularly. Squads set objectives autonomously. Teams receive a weekly results update, and the tribe reviews results monthly and agrees on next steps.
• Other figures cited in the discussion: Fueyo joined Numbr in 2016, had been there for more than eight years, and was 29 at the time of recording. He said he had completed the DEC about two and a half years earlier. A conference speaker’s estimate, presented as an observation rather than a Numbr KPI, was that skills now become obsolete in roughly three years, compared with 30 years in 1983.

Presenters and sources mentioned

• Presenter/guest: Flavien Fueyo, partner and chartered accountant at Numbr.
• Host: Nicolas, from Coonter Le Media; no surname is clear in the subtitles.
• Books and other references mentioned: Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker; Thomas Gordon’s communication and leadership training; Régis, Arnaud Wallon, Louise and Florent from Numbr-related discussions; and Arnaud Giro of Expert Entreprendre, cited as an example of squad-based organization.