CPA Trendlines Podcasts

The DisruptorsWith Liz FarrChris Vanover is on a mission “to make accounting and auditing better.”Initially, AuditClub helped firms mainly with quality control, but over time, that grew into offering fractional support on a subscription basis to audit firms that can’t find the talent they need.  MORE: Chris Vanover show notes here MORE: Disruptors MORE CPA TRENDLINES PODCASTS and VIDEOS:  Jason Deshayes: What We're Doing Isn't Working | Heather Satterley: You've Got To Meet People Where They Are | Bill Penczak: Stop Forcing Smart People to Do Stupid Work | Sandra Wiley: Staffing Problem? Check Your Culture | Scott Scarano: First, Grow People. Then Firm Growth Can Follow | Jody Padar: Build a Practice that Works for You, Not Vice-Versa | Ira Rosenbloom: With M&A, Nobody Wants a Fixer-Upper | Peter Margaritis: The Power Skills Every Accountant Needs | Joe Montgomery: Find the Sweet Spot of the Right Clients, Right Services and Right Prices | Marie Green: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You | Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance | Clayton Oates: One Way to Keep Clients for Life | Randy Crabtree: Follow These Three Rules to Keep Employees Happy | Erik Solbakken: Yes, You Can Work Less and Make More | Donny Shimamoto: Future Firm Growth Requires a Mindshift | Jennifer Wilson: Empower Young Workers to Build the Firm Everyone Loves Audit firms are challenged to plan a year or even a month out, so AuditClub offers members weekly access. This weekly flexibility allows AuditClub to take a concierge approach to help their member firms out a week at a time. Plus, Vanover may have the secret sauce to getting employees to perform at their optimum levels daily. 

The DisruptorsWith Liz FarrBy age 35, Jason Deshayes, CPA/PFS, CFP, CKA, was already co-owner of a CPA firm in Albuquerque. He “hit the magic Shangri La that we’re all working for.” But it wasn’t right for him. He was bored with the long hours and felt he wasn’t growing. He wasn’t able to think about his firm the way he wanted to. So he and his partner sold their firm.   MORE: Jason Deshayes show notes here MORE: Disruptors MORE CPA TRENDLINES PODCASTS and VIDEOS: Heather Satterley: You've Got to Meet People Where They Are | Bill Penczak: Stop Forcing Smart People to Do Stupid Work | Sandra Wiley: Staffing Problem? Check Your Culture | Scott Scarano: First, Grow People. Then Firm Growth Can Follow | Jody Padar: Build a Practice that Works for You, Not Vice-Versa | Ira Rosenbloom: With M&A, Nobody Wants a Fixer-Upper | Peter Margaritis: The Power Skills Every Accountant Needs | Joe Montgomery: Find the Sweet Spot of the Right Clients, Right Services and Right Prices | Marie Green: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You | Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance | Clayton Oates: One Way to Keep Clients for Life | Randy Crabtree: Follow These Three Rules to Keep Employees Happy | Erik Solbakken: Yes, You Can Work Less and Make More | Donny Shimamoto: Future Firm Growth Requires a Mindshift | Jennifer Wilson: Empower Young Workers to Build the Firm Everyone Loves | Mike Whitmire: Re-Think Your Hiring and Training Practices  Today, he’s COO at Cook Wealth, a hybrid wealth management and tax firm. Providing both types of services means that they don’t deal with “this weird thing, where the client’s in the middle, and they have to be the conduit for information going both ways.” He says that getting his CFP has “been so enriching. I love what I do, and it’s because I was willing to drop stuff so other people could learn the stuff I learned and so I could do fun stuff.”  

Heather Satterley, accounting tech expert, discusses the importance of not only having great technology skills but also people skills and softer skills. Problem-solving is highlighted as a key skill for the future, along with the changing business models for accounting firms and the need for teaching soft skills and collaboration in universities.

Innovation InsightsWith Donny ShimamotoAdrian Hong's journey into the realm of environmental, social, and governmental (ESG) reporting has been nothing short of inspiring. As the founder of Hong Consulting, LLC, his dedication to assisting companies with ESG reporting stems from a rich tapestry of experiences, all pointing to one common thread – the desire to help. MORE Adrian Hong's conversation with Donny Shimamoto here MORE DONNY SHIMAMOTO: Cybersecurity Exemptions for Orgs with Less than 5,000 Clients | Safe Harbor Compliance Reduces Risk of Fines and Penalties | Unleashing the Power of Technology: Transforming Accountants into Trusted Advisors | Overcoming the Five Hurdles to Advisory Services | How Tax Practitioners Became Cybersecurity Risks | Why Compliance Still Matters. But It’s Not Enough. | How Hacker-Proof Is Your Firm? | It Takes a Village to Stop Cybercrime   After building a formidable reputation in auditing within public accounting and lending his skills to the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) for refining external taxonomy, life had other plans. Hong returned to his roots in Hawaii to steer the helm of his family's venture, Island Plastic Bags.

The DisruptorsWith Liz FarrToo many accounting firms have “smart people doing stupid work,” according to Bill Penczak, a veteran sales and marketing professional. Think about the effort it takes to get an accounting degree and get your CPA, and contrast that with the years of mindless work that many new hires are required to do, especially if they go into audit, he said.  MORE: Bill Penczak here MORE CPA TRENDLINES PODCASTS and VIDEOS: Sandra Wiley: Staffing Problem? Check Your Culture | Scott Scarano: First, Grow People. Then Firm Growth Can Follow | Jody Padar: Build a Practice that Works for You, Not Vice-Versa | Ira Rosenbloom: With M&A, Nobody Wants a Fixer-Upper | Peter Margaritis: The Power Skills Every Accountant Needs | Joe Montgomery: Find the Sweet Spot of the Right Clients, Right Services and Right Prices | Marie Green: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You | Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance | Clayton Oates: One Way to Keep Clients for Life | Randy Crabtree: Follow These Three Rules to Keep Employees Happy | Erik Solbakken: Yes, You Can Work Less and Make More | Donny Shimamoto: Future Firm Growth Requires a Mindshift | Jennifer Wilson: Empower Young Workers to Build the Firm Everyone Loves | Mike Whitmire: Re-Think Your Hiring and Training Practices | Hector Garcia: Success Strategies of a Quickbooks YouTube Superstar |  “One of the reasons why there’s such a talent shortage is because the market has figured this out,” and no one wants to do that stupid work, Penczak says.

The DisruptorsWith Liz FarrSandra Wiley has been speaking with firm owners and leaders for nearly three decades and clearly sees the need for change in the profession. MORE: Sandra Wiley here MORE CPA TRENDLINES PODCASTS and VIDEOS:  Peter Margaritis: The Power Skills Every Accountant Needs | Joe Montgomery: Find the Sweet Spot of the Right Clients, Right Services and Right Prices | Marie Green: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You | Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance | Clayton Oates: One Way to Keep Clients for Life | Randy Crabtree: Follow These Three Rules to Keep Employees Happy | Erik Solbakken: Yes, You Can Work Less and Make More | Donny Shimamoto: Future Firm Growth Requires a Mindshift | Jennifer Wilson: Empower Young Workers to Build the Firm Everyone Loves | Mike Whitmire: Re-Think Your Hiring and Training Practices | Hector Garcia: Success Strategies of a Quickbooks YouTube Superstar | Blake Oliver: Why Tax Work Yearns To Be Free| Private Equity Explodes in U.K. | Brannon Poe: The Status Quo Must Go  | Accounting Nerds, Unlock Your Super Powers  | Disruptor: Jason Statts Shakes Up the Status Quo | Think Small to Think Big with Matt Wilkinson | When Financial Statements Go Extinct with Corey Schmidt | Can Geraldine Carter Save Accountants from Themselves? | Re-Inventing Accounting with Tyler Anderson “The business model that was built before cannot be the business model that you have going forward. It simply doesn't work,” Wiley says. “Now, we're still living in the old business model,” and we have to get out of it.

The 150-hour rule is facing harsh criticism in the accounting staffing crisis.With Steven SacksThe NEW Fundamentals: Thriving in DisruptionThere is a movement afoot by the state CPA societies to reconsider whether the fifth year of an accounting program that offers the student a Master’s in Accounting is worth the cost, not to mention the increased complexity of business requiring as much exposure and experience as necessary to groom the younger professionals.FULL SHOW NOTES: hereMORE STEVE SACKS: Sell Service, Not Hours | Fine-Tuning the Subscription Fee Model | When Cyber-Crime Hits Close to Home | How to Build a Winning Proposal | Six Ways to Fix Your Firm Agreement | The Great Resignation or a Reshuffling? | Listen to Learn | Build the Framework to a Solution with Five Answers | Try for Success, Not a WinHowever, there is a shortage of 300,000 CPA candidates entering the profession’s pipeline. That's why several states are seeking to eliminate, modify or enhance the educational/experiential model.Sacks discusses the dilemma of education versus experience with accounting expert David Bergstein, CPA, the chief innovation officer for Bergstein CPA and teaching adjunct for Valencia College.

Chad Davis, a CPA and co-founder of LiveCA LLP in Canada, joins the podcast to discuss embracing technology in the accounting profession. The panel discusses the challenges of choosing and implementing accounting technology solutions, the importance of workflow solutions and tools for firm management, Microsoft tools and app integration, the significance of strong support in a tech stack partner, the challenges of tech stack changes and AI in accounting, and valuable advice and encouragement for navigating the accounting tech ecosystem.

The DisruptorsWith Liz FarrCPA TrendlinesAl Anderson is out to change audit as accountants know it. Auditors, he declares, are spending too much time being busy instead of being valuable.  Get the free preview of his forthcoming handbook:  “The New Manifesto for Accountants," Instant Download (PDF) Anderson is preaching a revolutionary framework for audit leadership, described in his forthcoming handbook from CPA Trendlines.Auditors, he says, should be looking closer at transactions, instead of focusing narrowly on the balance sheet.  The transactional approach, rather than a balance sheet approach, provides more value to the client because it reveals the bumps in the road that happen as a transaction rolls up to the general ledger so that it can be recorded correctly. For example, consider invoices that could go out earlier, which causes clients to lose a few days of cash flow. Consider, for example, invoices that could go out earlier, which causes clients to lose a few days of cash flow. You're unlikely to notice it if you tie the receivable sub-ledger to the general ledger. 

The Disruptorswith Liz Farrfor CPA TrendlinesWhen Scott Scarano lost a few good people at his firm, he knew he needed to change things. Instead of continuing to grow for the sake of growth, he overhauled his management approach  More CPA Trendlines podcasts here.“And things are better now at the firm, because we're not focused on growth,” but instead on “growing everybody,” including himself. By building better habits and finding better ways to do things, his team is growing their bottom line, and a few of the people who left earlier have now returned. “That’s growth I like to see.”