FEATURED VIDEO

Marie Greene: Your Bad Apples Are Ruining You

By

Don’t be afraid to fire poor performers to appreciate great performers.

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).


The Disruptors

With Liz Farr for CPA Trendlines

Marie Greene founded Connected Accounting in 2019 out of a desire to create a new kind of accounting firm where firm culture and “reliable, reliable, reliable” customer service were the highest priorities.

“What is your culture? Who do you want to have on your team?” are questions leaders need to consider when seeking out new team members or deciding who to fire, says Greene. She advises firm owners to remember the message it sends when poor performers are retained because “the good people also leave because you keep the bad apples.”

MORE: 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

GoProCPA.com Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

Greene recognized that not everyone in a firm wants to be a partner, especially today when “we see partners work crazy hours” and rarely enjoy the benefit of a lighter workload that used to come with becoming a partner.
READ MORE →

Menlo Innovations: Improve Office Culture by Overhauling Internal Reviews

By

Focus on strengths and talents to determine areas of growth.

Click to play video | > Play the podcast and follow CPA Trendlines Podcasts on Apple Podcasts here or grab the RSS feed here.

Transformation Talks
With Donny Shimamoto
Center for Accounting Transformation

Center for Accounting Transformation
Center for Accounting Transformation

Staff and employee annual reviews help assess where teams need additional help, guidance and development. If only they weren’t so painful…

MORE: Dustin Verity: Keep an Open Mind and Constantly Learn | Secret to Success? A Growth and Abundance Mindset | O.D. Lanier: Stepping Into Advisory | From Tax to Transformation | Early Adopters Gain an Edge in Audit | Why the Future is in Risk Advisory | Four Strategies for a Future Ready Firm
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

Enter Menlo Innovations, an IT consulting firm and custom software development firm that appears to have found a better way to analyze team performance and deliver constructive feedback. In the latest episode of Transformation Talks, Dan Roman and Andy Burns discuss Menlo Innovation’s Prosperity Project, an innovative employee-driven performance review process.

READ MORE →

Megan Genest Tarnow: Hire for Curiosity Rather Than Compliance

By

Flip the org chart and put staff at the top.

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr
for CPA Trendlines

Megan Genest Tarnow is well-known in accounting circles as the go-to expert in using QuickBooks for the fund accounting required by nonprofit entities.  

MORE: 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

GoProCPA.com Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

Many of the best accountants she knows have come from non-traditional backgrounds like dance or philosophy. Megan herself worked in theater for several years before she was thrust into a finance role. Like her, these non-traditional accountants apply their native curiosity to understand how the pieces fit together. By leaning into the work and asking questions, they uncover an unknown aptitude for accounting, suggesting that perhaps we should hire for curiosity rather than compliance knowledge.  

READ MORE →

Dustin Wheeler: For Serious CAS Success, Hire Tech Teams

By

And six more success tips.

Click to play the video. Turn up the volume. | > Play the podcast and follow CPA Trendlines Podcasts on Apple Podcasts or grab the RSS feed here.

Transformation Talks
With Donny Shimamoto
Center for Accounting Transformation

Center for Accounting Transformation
Center for Accounting Transformation

Many accounting graduates dream of joining large firms right out of college. That dream became a reality for Dustin Wheeler. However, it didn’t last long.

MORE: Dustin Verity: Keep an Open Mind and Constantly Learn | Secret to Success? A Growth and Abundance Mindset | O.D. Lanier: Stepping Into Advisory | From Tax to Transformation | Early Adopters Gain an Edge in Audit | Why the Future is in Risk Advisory | Four Strategies for a Future Ready Firm
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

“Right out of college, I moved to Las Vegas and got a job with the largest local firm,” Wheeler explained. “And my job there was pretty much strictly tax.”

“After a short stay there, I left for an opportunity with a smaller firm of about 16 people, which was a good change for me. It allowed me to develop some other talents that I couldn’t use at the previous firm,” he explained.

READ MORE →

Twyla Verhelst: How Firms Get Creative to Compete

By

That includes hiring non-accountants.
.

.

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).

.

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr
for CPA Trendlines

You have to be intentional about creating the firm you want, said Twyla Verhelst, CPA. The head of Accountant Channel at FreshBooks and creator of Women in Accounting Mentorship said the first step is getting clear on your why, your firm’s why and your team’s why so you can approach growth more intentionally.

MORE: 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

GoProCPA.com Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

She said CPAs should be asking, “Why is it that a particular goal appeals to you?” “Is that the right thing to be working toward now?” “What will you do to get there?”

READ MORE →

Pros Filing 54% of Individual Tax Returns

By

data tableTotal refunds down 10 percent.

By Beth Bellor
CPA Trendlines Research

With 11 days to go in the tax season, the Internal Revenue Service was seeing red. Only two of its weekly data points were on the plus side, and those at less than 1 percent.

MORE: Average Tax Refunds Down 10% | Tax Pro E-filings Up 3% | Pros Handle 45% of Income Tax Returns | IRS Processing Returns as Fast as It Gets Them | Only 39% of Tax Returns Filed by Pros | Tax Season Opens with Refunds Up 85%
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

The IRS received 101.3 million individual income tax returns as of April 7, the latest data available. That’s down 1.9 percent from the same period in 2022.
READ MORE →

Chase Birky: Overcoming Paralysis by Analysis

By

Be the author of your own story and chart a path not subject to the control and opinions of others.

^ Click to play video | > Play the podcast and follow CPA Trendlines Podcasts on Apple Podcasts here or grab the RSS feed here.

Transformation Talks
With Bill Penczak
Center for Accounting Transformation

Center for Accounting Transformation
Center for Accounting Transformation

Entrepreneurs in the accounting profession are rare, according to Chase Birky, president and CEO of Dark Horse CPAs. And he should know.

He had to take an uncomfortable step outside of his own comfort zone to become one.

MORE: Secret to Success? A Growth and Abundance Mindset | O.D. Lanier: Stepping Into Advisory | From Tax to Transformation | Early Adopters Gain an Edge in Audit | Why the Future is in Risk Advisory | Four Strategies for a Future Ready Firm
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

After starting out in audit at a Big 4 right out of college, he decided it was no longer what he wanted to do.

“I started an audit specifically, you know, not really having a great idea of what audit truly was, you know, because you take the courses in your undergrad, and you know, you have a section of it on the CPA exam,” Birky explained. “But what that material is versus what the job is, you know, are two very different things.”

READ MORE →

Heather Smith: Try Not Growing Your Business

By

Heather Smith: We are the oxygen for the businesses around us.

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr for CPA Trendlines

Heather Smith has loved accounting since she was 14 and loves the flexibility the profession offers. Since the mid-2000s she has been one of the original cloud accounting nomads, with an accounting business that she says fits in a lovely Italian handbag.

MORE: 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

GoProCPA.com Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

In 2022, the ANISE Consulting founder based in Brisbane, Australia, demonstrated that nomadic lifestyle by attending all three live Xerocon events: London, New Orleans and Sydney. Heather is a tireless advocate for her small business clients and a fan of technology to improve our lives, including staffing. READ MORE →