Michelle Myrick
Founder of Myrick Balance Bookkeeping·Creator of The Financial Check-Up™
I didn't create The Financial Check-Up because I thought small-business owners needed another accounting course.
I created it because I kept seeing smart, capable business owners sitting across from financial professionals and not always understanding the conversation about their own businesses. They weren't bad at business. Nobody had taught them the language.
That bothered me. So I decided to teach it.
I came to this from the business side
Before starting Myrick Balance Bookkeeping, I spent more than two decades working in medical practice management and business operations. That experience taught me something worth holding onto: a business does not exist inside a spreadsheet.
There are employees, customers, and vendors. Unexpected expenses. Taxes and deadlines and decisions that have to be made before anyone feels ready. Good months. Genuinely terrible months. Somewhere underneath all of it are the numbers, quietly telling the story of what is actually happening.
Today, through Myrick Balance Bookkeeping, I work with small-business owners to organize and make sense of that financial story.
But bookkeeping exposed another problem. Sometimes the books were fine — accurate, current, nothing wrong with them at all. The business owner simply didn't understand what they were looking at. That became the beginning of The Financial Check-Up.
More than two decades inside real businesses
Before starting Myrick Balance Bookkeeping, Michelle spent more than two decades working in medical practice management and business operations in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Her professional experience included roles such as:
- Office ManagerDermatology Medical Group of San Francisco
- Practice ManagerKwan Dermatology
- Office ManagerAesthetic Dermatology, LLC
Together, those roles represent approximately 22 years working inside the day-to-day financial and operational realities of medical practices.
That experience shaped the way Michelle teaches financial literacy today: from the perspective of the person actually running the business, not from a purely academic accounting perspective.
Professional training & certifications
- QuickBooks Online Level 1 CertificationIntuit
- QuickBooks Online Level 2 CertificationIntuit
- QuickBooks Online Payroll CertificationIntuit
- Intuit Bookkeeping CertificationIntuit
Michelle is a bookkeeper and financial educator. She is not a CPA, an enrolled agent, a tax professional, or a financial advisor.
"Okay… but what does that actually mean?"
Business owners would ask questions. Real ones.
- What am I supposed to look for on this report?
- Why does my Profit & Loss show a profit when I don't feel like I have any money?
- What exactly is my Balance Sheet telling me?
- What should I be asking my CPA?
- How do I know if my bookkeeping looks right?
After a while I realized the problem wasn't a lack of intelligence, and it usually wasn't even a bookkeeping problem. It was an education problem.
There is an enormous amount of information available about accounting. There is much less designed specifically for the person who owns the business and simply wants to understand enough to participate confidently. That gap is what The Financial Check-Up was created to fill.
You don't need to become an accountant
I don't think every business owner should do their own bookkeeping. I don't think every business owner should prepare their own taxes. And I certainly don't think reading a few articles makes someone a CPA.
What I believe is much simpler than that. If you own the business, you should understand enough about its finances to participate in the conversation.
You should be able to look at your financial reports and know what questions to ask. You should understand the difference between revenue, profit, and cash. You should know when something doesn't make sense. And when your bookkeeper, CPA, or banker explains something, you should have enough financial vocabulary to take part in that conversation rather than nod along and hope you caught the important part.
"They're your numbers. You deserve to understand them."
What I can help you understand
Financial statements
How to begin reading a Profit & Loss statement and a Balance Sheet.
Cash flow
Why profit and cash are not the same thing.
Bookkeeping fundamentals
What good bookkeeping is actually doing behind the scenes.
Financial habits
What business owners should be reviewing regularly.
Financial conversations
How to ask better questions of bookkeepers, CPAs, and other professionals.
Business financial confidence
How to become a more informed participant in financial decisions.
Knowing the limits matters too
Good financial education should also teach you when to ask someone else.
I'm a bookkeeper and a business financial educator. I am not a CPA, an attorney, an investment advisor, or a tax professional. The Financial Check-Up doesn't replace any of those people — I hope it helps you work with them more effectively.
There is a tremendous difference between understanding a financial concept and receiving professional advice about your particular circumstances, and I want Financial Check-Up learners to understand that difference clearly. Knowing what you know matters. Knowing when to ask for help matters just as much.
This started with real businesses
I'm the founder of Myrick Balance Bookkeeping. The Financial Check-Up grew directly out of that work — out of seeing the same gap appear again and again between having financial reports and actually understanding them.
The two are related, but they are not the same thing. Myrick Balance Bookkeeping provides bookkeeping services. The Financial Check-Up provides financial education. One keeps the records; the other teaches you to read them.
Myrick Balance Bookkeeping
Bookkeeping services for small businesses. Founded by Michelle Myrick.
About the practiceThe Financial Check-Up™
Self-paced financial education for small-business owners. Created by Michelle Myrick.
Program overviewI want better financial conversations
The goal here isn't to make business owners independent of financial professionals. It's to make that relationship work better for everyone in the room.
Imagine walking into a meeting with your CPA and understanding the terminology. Imagine reviewing your reports with your bookkeeper and already knowing what you want to ask. Imagine talking with a banker and understanding why they're requesting what they're requesting.
That's what financial confidence means to me. Not knowing everything — knowing enough to participate.
Start with something useful
You don't need to enroll in anything to start learning. I've made some of The Financial Check-Up's educational resources publicly available, because sometimes you just need someone to explain something in normal language.
How to Read Your Business Financial Statements
A plain-English guide for small-business owners
Learn what your Profit & Loss statement, Balance Sheet, and cash flow information are actually designed to tell you — and what questions to ask when something doesn't make sense.
Read the free guideBrowse all free resourcesAnd if you want the whole picture…
The Financial Check-Up™ is a self-paced financial education program for small-business owners who want to understand their business finances without becoming accountants. It takes the concepts we've talked about here and puts them into a structured learning path.
You'll learn in plain English, work through practical examples, and meet Molly — our Financial Guide — along the way.
Where to verify Michelle's professional identity
Last updated:
"You built the business. You don't have to know everything about accounting. But you shouldn't have to be a stranger to your own numbers."
— Michelle Myrick