Vanover: 5-Star Firms Don’t Bill by the Hour | The Disruptors

Measuring impact—not hours—creates happier teams, better clients, and a stronger profession.

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<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start">?</span><span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start">?</span>Is your firm truly ready for tax season—or just hoping to survive it? Join this 90-minute webinar featuring an Accounting ARC Live panel with thought leaders who know what it takes to optimize performance under pressure.

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr

What will it take to kill the billable hour? Chris Vanover, founder of CPAClub, believes it’s not only “outdated and archaic,” but that today’s age of AI and automation “is a recipe for the death of the billable hour.”

MORE STREAMING: Kless: Profit Is a Result. Flourishing Is the Purpose | Whitman: Build Culture on ‘Progress,’ Not Change | Shein: No PE? No M&A? No Problem | Hood and Weber: Time to RISE | Proctor: Turn Dumb Ideas into Brilliant Solutions | Carter-Gray: How 1 Poor Review Strengthened the Firm | Hartman: Upwork to “40 Under 40” in 3 Years | Telka: Transform Fear into Fuel | Woodard: Move Past Reports; Deliver Results | Baker: Find True Purpose to End Burnout | Brolin: The W.I.N. Leadership Formula | Gertrudes: How EOS & “Unreasonable Hospitality” Reshaped GrowthLab | Vilms: The Power of People in a Tech-Driven World | Dickerson: From Diagnosis to Disruptio n | Kapilovich: Treat People Like People | Martha Yasso: From Wall Street to Main Street | Jackie Meyer: Tax Plans in 90 Seconds? Believe It | Erica Goode: Build a $200K Firm in 15hrs/Week |

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CPAClub, formerly AuditClub, operates under a different model. As Hervochon explained in his first appearance on The Disruptors, CPAClub operates as a subscription service, where pass holders have access on a monthly or annual basis to a team of highly skilled auditors and accountants. This innovative business model undoubtedly contributed to the firm’s recognition as CalCPA’s Firm of the Year for 2025.

Posted on November 11, 2025

Liz Farr

About the Author

Liz Farr, CPA, is a special contributor to CPA Trendlines, bringing an insider's clear-eyed view of the tax and accounting business and a passion for advancing the profession.

She's the host of the hit CPA Trendlines podcast series "The Disruptors," available everywhere: Apple, Google, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music and Audible, Player FM, Audacy, Gaana (India), and Boomplay (Africa).

As founder and proprietor of Farr Communications, she is the secret weapon that her clients use to get their messages out. She has written blog posts, web content, articles, white papers, case studies and books for accountants and accounting tech companies. Her specialty is ghostwriting for coaches and consultants who want to move accountants into the future. She can bridge the gap between the dream these visionaries have for the future and the mindset and reality that today’s accountants are living in.

Five of her past and current clients have been named to Accounting Today’s annual list of 100 most influential in accounting. She has written under her name for the Journal of Accountancy, Intuit’s Firm of the Future blog and AccountingWEB. She has also appeared in Forbes, CFO.com, and Accounting Today.

Farr has a broad educational background, studying biochemistry at the University of Munster, Germany, and obtained her bachelor's degree as a double major in biochemistry and German at the University of New Mexico. She also studied German, Spanish, computer science and linguistics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and continued her studies in linguistics at the University of Washington. She earned her master's degree in accounting in 2004 from the Robert O. Anderson School of Management at the University of New Mexico, qualifying as a licensed CPA in 2005.

Professionally, Liz began as a tax preparer at H&R Block before working at several local CPA firms in the Albuquerque, N.M. area. At her last assignment as a tax manager, she helped a team develop streamlined processes for getting tax returns out faster and more accurately.

After spending 15 years working as an accountant in the Albuquerque, N.M., area, she traded in her ten-key for a pen and has been writing full time since 2018.

She can be contacted at Farr Communications.

When she’s not writing or studying the accounting business, she’s hiking or skiing in the mountains of New Mexico.

Click here for more by Liz Farr

This is a preview. The complete 1-hour video episode, with commentary and transcript, is first available exclusively to PRO Members | Go PRO here

Sponsored by Tax Season Readiness: Practical Steps for a Smoother Busy Season | See Today’s Special Offer

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google/YouTube, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Player FM, Audacy, RSS

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