An AI engineer can help accounting teams tackle bottlenecks, streamline workflows, and build capacity.
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It’s Not Just the Numbers
With Penny Breslin and Damien Greathead
For CPA Trendlines
For years, accounting firm owners have treated the “next hire” question as a simple one: bring on another accountant. However, that assumption is starting to cost firms real time and money.
In this recent case study, MoneyPenny, LLC shares what happened when their newest hire wasn’t an accountant at all. She was a recent graduate with a degree in AI, and within her first weeks, she had built a tool that solved a problem the whole team had been living with for years.
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She graduated in the first AI cohort to come through her university and joined the firm knowing nothing about accounting. What she did know was how to watch a process and ask why it worked the way it did.
She noticed a colleague, bouncing between three monitors every time a duplicate transaction showed up in the general ledger, hunting down where it came from and which entry to keep. Following this observation and some discussion, she came back with working code: a tool that surfaced the duplicate, the memo field, the source, and the audit trail in one place, with a single click to resolve it.
Sponsored by Radical Pricing: Optimize Profits, Delight Clients, and Build a Top-Value Firm
Why an Embedded AI Engineer Beats a Consultant
Why? Proximity. As a team member, she sat with her colleague, watched real frustration play out in real time, and built a fix for the exact bottleneck she saw. A consultant working from a scoping call would have had to guess at half of that.
That embedded position also meant nobody’s billable work stopped while she built. She would take one manual piece of a process, automate it, and hand it back without interrupting the people still doing the job the old way. This is where an in-house AI hire can outpace even a strong outside consulting relationship: speed comes from sitting inside the workflow, not observing it from outside.
The Risk of Building an Unruly Tech Stack
An important caution, because what stops an embedded AI engineer from building tools nobody asked for, on top of the dozens of apps a firm already runs? An AI hire needs the same oversight as any other builder in the firm. Left unchecked, a helpful new hire can become another source of tech-stack sprawl instead of a cure for it.
Can AI Actually Shrink Your Tech Stack?
Most firms are already using only a fraction of what their existing software can do, while paying for dozens of apps that each solve one narrow problem. If AI agents can thread those existing tools together instead of adding new ones on top, firms may end up running fewer apps, not more, and spending less on their tech stack in the process.
That reframe matters for any firm weighing the cost of an AI hire against another line item in the software budget. The right hire, used well, can be the thing that finally makes the existing stack worth what the firm pays for it.
Are You an Accounting Firm with a lot of Technology, or a Technology Firm That Does Accounting?
Firms that stay in the first camp are the ones most exposed as AI reshapes the industry, while firms that make the second identity their own have a real shot at growing through the shift.
Transcript
(Transcripts are created using AI and are not edited for grammar and punctuation.)
Damien Greathead: [00:00:00] Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to the latest episode of It’s Not Just the Numbers, where my co-host, Penny Breslin, and I, we break down all things accounting. Obviously, the numbers play a very important part of the accounting process, but we know to get those numbers to where they need to be and to make them meaningful for the clients, uh, there’s a lot of work that goes into that, and this podcast is designed to break down things like CAS, client advi– client advisory services, client accounting services, the role that AI is playing in the change in the tech stack that’s happening today.
So we do break down all things happening in the accounting space, specifically in that client accounting and client advisory services. My name is Damien Grapeseed. I am sitting in a wintry… Well, it’s not really wintry in, in American terms, but, uh, a wintry Sydney. Penny, where are you today?
Penny: Wyoming, where it’s about 100 degrees.
Damien Greathead: So, uh, op-op-opposite scales today. Um, Penny, before we do go, a quick shout-out to our sponsors. [00:01:00] Uh, first and foremost, one of our sponsors is MoneyPenny, who we both work for. MoneyPenny is an outsourcing company, so we help accounting and tax firms in the US and Canada scale their services. So we’re able to help provide everything from write-up all the way through to tax preparation, trial balance preparation, and even your, your own back office accounting to help you stay on top of things.
If you’re having trouble finding and keeping good people, if you’re wanting to scale, uh, MoneyPenny might be able to help. So moneyPennyllc.com is where you can find more information, and obviously you can reach out to Penny and myself on LinkedIn. Our next sponsor is Twine Apps. So Twine Apps has just released their first app called Twine Biller, and if you buy software on behalf of your clients, uh, through the accountants programs, through wholesale rates, and then on-sell it to your clients, Twine Biller is here to help you, uh, recover that revenue, recover that expense, and actually make some money on it.
So, uh, software subscription management [00:02:00] is what Twine Biller is all about. Check it out at twineapps.co. So Penny, today we are talking about building the accounting team. One of the things that we’ve spoken about ad nauseam on previous, uh, podcast episodes is the, the next hire, and a lot of accounting firms think that the next hire needs to be an accountant.
But we’ve often said that the next hire is, is probably better suited to be an administrator, better suited to be a client services-type role, a customer success-type role. But actually, we’re going to put another, uh, another, uh, job description or, or, or role in the mix in terms of who your next hire should be to deliver on what you’ve promised to your clients, and a-it’s actually happened in our firm at MoneyPenny, didn’t it?
Um, what was the latest role that we hired? Because it wasn’t an accountant. Who was it?
Penny: Before we start who we [00:03:00] hired, what did you hit?
Damien Greathead: On my head?
Penny: or who hit
Damien Greathead: Or who hit me? Yeah, who hit me. It’s not what I hit. I think it’s who hit me. So, um, uh, my nearly three-year-old son, uh, Wyatt, um, has an absolute aversion to getting his toenails cut, and one day on the couch, he just absolutely whacked me with his foot, and that included the mighty talon that was on his big toe.
So, um, so a bit of a scratch there from a, a kick to the head during,
Penny: a little kid that does enjoy that, man.
Damien Greathead: watch-watching,
Penny: oh
Damien Greathead: watching the World Cup and,
Penny: Yeah.
Damien Greathead: whack to the head. But,
Penny: Hey, a future soccer player?
Damien Greathead: Well, potentially. I th- I think this one’s a future rug–
Penny: excuse
Damien Greathead: rugby player. I think the other one might be a, a future soccer player or a future football player.
But, uh, Wyatt, I think, is more of a rugby. He’s got a rugby build. Uh, the other one might be more of a,
Penny: he? He’s
Damien Greathead: a footballer.
Penny: “Hmm.”
Damien Greathead: Yeah, he’s thick, yeah.
Penny: Yeah.
Damien Greathead: So yes,
Penny: played rugby.
Damien Greathead: thank [00:04:00] you for, for noticing. Um, and it couldn’t be in a, a more obvious place. So,
Penny: Yeah, it’s okay
Damien Greathead: y-you love them dearly, don’t you? But anyway, um, who did we just hire?
Or not just hire, but who was our most recent hire?
Penny: yeah. Uh, I, uh, uh, Swati, she is a young graduate, uh, uh, who majored in, uh, AI at
Damien Greathead: And wasn’t, wasn’t she one of the fir- like she graduated and that was the first AI cohort to come through her university. I remember her telling me when we were in Chennai. So,
Penny: Yeah.
Damien Greathead: interesting. She’s a graduate and this, uh, of the first cohort of AI majors, which I think is really cool
Penny: a, from ITNs. Yeah,
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: Yeah, yeah. I just, uh… And you know, when I remember when I was interviewing her, I was like going, “Wow, I, we have been there’s no way we can get a female ITN uh, in AI,” and we did. [00:05:00] Um, and I asked her, I said, “Unusual field for A female in Tamil Nadu. And, and she said, “My father told me it was the best move for me.” And, uh, I went, “Your father’s a smart man.” she didn’t know anything about accounting. She was afraid. She had her projects, her, her, uh, graduate project was, uh, building an AI model for medical industry. And, um, I said, “You didn’t know anything about medicine when you started th- with that, did you? And I saw what you built.
You showed it to me. It was well done.”
Damien Greathead: And you know nothing about medicine
Penny: yeah.
Damien Greathead: the medical industry
Penny: yeah. And I know nothing about accounting, so we’re equals,
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: Swati. Um, so yeah, but she, uh, she’s catching up fast. She, [00:06:00] had… You know, basically she was a sponge and, uh, you know, she had access to women working in various aspects of accounting and 307 apps and just up, what do you have a problem with? Where do… Wh- what’s, what’s blocking you? Now, there’s some things that we can’t, we don’t have control over. but the things that she felt like she could help with, it was how fast she goes, “Oh, let me think about that.” And then the next day would come back with code that would go, a fix for that.” Like duplicates. Oh,
Damien Greathead: I’m, I’m impressed with how quickly she works in, in terms of what she produces. Like, I’ve worked with engineers and, uh, working with engineers now and, and the, the speed with which she builds and turns things around and, and then it’s not perfect the first time, but then just iterates and iterates and iterates is, is quite, [00:07:00] um, impressive to say the least
Penny: I kept on saying, “Am I asking you to do too much? I just gave you, like, 20 tasks.” She goes, “Nope.”
Damien Greathead: Yeah. Yeah
Penny: And, and it’s like, she’s… She is using AI technology to speed up what she does,
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: it around, let us look at it, and then we can adapt it. And, uh, so yeah. A- and, a- and at first, like, the accountants kept on saying, “Hey, we’ve got billable hours we gotta fill.
Leave us alone.” And right before I left, you were, you were seeing in that, right? She pulled me aside, and I thought she was gonna quit on us. She had a look of fear on her face. She goes, “Can I just show you this one thing before you leave?” And I, “Okay, yeah. Got to get back to the hotel, pack my bag to catch a plane, but okay.” Sat down, and I’m like going, “Oh my God, how long did it take you to build this?” She goes, “Well, I did it yesterday.”
Damien Greathead: ??
Penny: I’m going, “What?” I said, “Have you shown this to anybody?” She goes, “Well, they say they’re too busy.” And I was like… [00:08:00] I turned around in my chair, ’cause I was in the middle of the workroom, and I spun around.
“Everybody stop. Stop the presses.” I said, “Billable time be damned. I want you to see this.” And, um, now they’re, like, fighting over her, who gets to use her next.
Damien Greathead: Well, I th– I, I think it’s sort of interesting and if, if sort of listeners are like, “Well, hang on, what does this AI person do?” Like I don’t, I don’t think I have enough to keep them busy, but I think we probably thought the same thing that, that, you know, like if we keep them sixty percent busy then, then that’s, that’s good enough.
But, but it turns out to your– to, to that final point is the f- the people in the firm are now thinking, “Hang on, how can I work with Swati to make my life easier or to make our clients more streamlined?” Or whatever it is. Yeah.
Penny: years struggle to get them to hire admin people [00:09:00] and to hire a, uh, AI person. not that they were, “Yeah, Penny, we’ll get around to it,” typical accountants.
Damien Greathead: But, but this particular project was, uh, it w- it was a du… Just talk us through that. It was a duplicate, basically a transaction duplicate finder, wasn’t it?
Penny: Yeah, yeah. A- and the thing is, there are a lot of apps that show us there’s a duplicate. Uh, we have some really good apps out there that do that for us. But then you have to go, “Okay, I know the duplicate’s there. I gotta go open the GL, and I’ve gotta find the two duplicates, and I’ve gotta figure out where they came and why it’s duplicated
Damien Greathead: Which one’s the right one?
Penny: which one’s the right one to use.” And instead she wrote a code that just says, “Here’s what happened. Here’s the duplicate. Here’s the memo field. This is where they came from, and this is who, on an audit trail, caused the [00:10:00] duplicate. Select which one you wanna keep and which one you wanna exclude.” Click, boom, done. And I was like, “My effing word, how much time is that gonna save?” Because it’s, it’s always the number of clicks that cause the time and cause the errors. So, um, it– frankly, she showed it Kokila, who Kokila had the wherewithal to, to just one day when Swati was standing there going, “Yeah, this is a problem.” She goes, “What do you mean?” I go, “Well, the app, this app us there’s a duplicate. Now I’ve gotta stop working in this app. I have to go over to the GL. I have to open…” And so she record- She stood there and watched that Kokila went through, and the next day built the app
Damien Greathead: And I think that’s– th-that, that is the critical thing, uh, a-again, for listeners. It’s sort of like these people integrate them into your team, and I, and [00:11:00] I, I think it probably took a little bit longer than what we wanted for her to inte– or that t-t-to be welcomed in, you know, AI, engineering’s, um, engineering versus be the
Penny: Little snooty. Yeah
Damien Greathead: accountants and that type of stuff.
And so… But there was, there was that moment where Swati was observing Kokila. Kokila was able to verbalize what the frustration was. Swati saw the clicking and, and, and sort of moving between, you know, they’ve got three monitors there, and then all of a sudden, work ground– grinds to a halt because we’ve got to jump onto this monitor and that monitor and open up other apps to go and find things.
Uh, Swati as the engineer, as the observer, looked at this and then sort of then, then went back to the draw– then went to the drawing board to be like, “Well, how, how might we be able to solve this?” Or, “If we can connect to all of these sources, can we just be running something in the background the entire time?”
But that all just came– that came about as a result of Swati and, and [00:12:00] Kokila sort of sitting side by side and, and really sort of
Penny: Yeah,
Damien Greathead: Kokila…
Penny: now
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: Nirmala and Shamila, when I called them over and I went, “Did you see this?” “Uh, well, she mentioned she did something.” Like, you fucking … La, la, la, la, la. You know, I mean, Swati literally grabbed me by the hand and said, “Before you leave,
Damien Greathead: I know, but let me show you this. I know. I guess one question that… Yeah, go on, sorry
Penny: A- a- and, and, and the thing is, the other thing that, that Kokila did is she m- she gave Swati the problem. yes, this is a problem, and it’s also an additional problem to have to go fix it because it takes me far off the task I’m on. we all know that if you go from one task to the other and try to go back and forth, you know, you can…
We can all just go, “Oh, [00:13:00] well, I’m a multitasker. I can do this.” You’re like, yeah, do that eight hours a day, se- six days a week, which these ladies do, and not be exhausted. Excuse me, I don’t care what your age is. And it’s not a badge of honor.
Damien Greathead: Mm.
Penny: a badge of honor to say, “I have all this work in front of me.”
You
Damien Greathead: Well, I got through another tax season, worked 80 hours this tax season.
Penny: I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. you know, it’s like, come on, stop it. There’s only so much time. And here’s the… And this is what we’re working with a lot of, a few AI developers who have asking us to test this stuff. In fact, one of them couldn’t duplicate what Swati did, which impressed the hell out of everybody. Anyways, um, so but the, the thing is AI can give you the space to make that transition from one task to the other, to give you the human space. AI can [00:14:00] be your assistant in that. I find that’s the be- one of the benefits of it, is that… Somebody asked me today, “Do you think AI is gonna, um, your business?”
I said, “No, but it may make some people opt out, and that’s okay.” They didn’t probably wanna be there in the first place, right? But the other thing I said is that debits and credits you can learn in school. It’s a very, it’s a very linear, equation aspect. But if that’s all you learned and that’s all you do, you don’t get what’s, what Coca gave Swati, which is not only is this a problem for me as far as moving between applications to try to figure out the duplicate, why it’s there and who did it, and which one I need to, to use keep and which one I need to ex- ex- [00:15:00] uh, um, exclude. But she also gave Swati, who didn’t know anything about accounting what the problem would have been if we had left it in there. And so Swathi understood that this was a critical issue to getting a accurate set of books. And that’s sometimes not given even to the client as to what’s the value that account- accounting gives you. And the value is seen in getting not only a closed set of books, but a closed set of books that you can trust. And
Damien Greathead: I think what’s really interesting is you’ve got an accountant explaining the problem, and then you’ve got an engineer understanding the problem, delving into the problem, thinking about how to solve this pr– They both wanna solve the problem, but they have two very different mindsets and two very different toolkits [00:16:00] to approach it.
And that’s why I think that’s a really interesting idea of bringing a, an AI engineer or an AI analyst into, uh, into your accounting firm, because accountants are wired differently to engineers, just as salespeople are wired differently to marketers, et cetera, et cetera. It’s– And so now you have two sort of sets of, of, of mindsets and two sets of education looking to how, how we can solve this problem.
And so I, I think that brings in anot-another layer of creativity and another layer of curiosity as to how is it that we’re actually able to solve some of these problems. Um, I think the other thing that’s also quite interesting for accounting firms to be thinking about is, uh, this fresh set of eyes brings a completely new way of working, and it, and it sits within your firm.
I think a lot of, a lot of podcasts and, and everyone sort of talking and, uh, about accountants and managing partners, and everyone [00:17:00] needs to be building their own agents and, and in the tools and, and building that. But I, I actually think it’s probably… you’re probably going to move quicker if you bring the skill set into your office and work in collaboration with them, rather than you trying to become a Claude coding expert.
That just sort of doesn’t feel like it’s not the best use of my time, it’s not the best use of my, my skills and my training. But if I can sit side by side with somebody that does have that training, and then they understa-understand the problem, understand the, the, the issue at hand, and then sort of go, go into their world and build what they wanna build, I, I think that’s probably going to be a better way that firms can move more quickly than trying to get everyone in the firm up to speed on Claude, building agents left, right and center.
I– That, that, that feels to me like a, a, a more strategic way of getting AI into the firm quickly and successfully.
Penny: [00:18:00] Well, yeah, and, and you know, when you think about it, tech stacks are growing, you know?
Damien Greathead: Oh.
Penny: in 2013 it was like, I g- I’d s- “Here’s your little black dress of apps.” It’s a damn gown now. It’s not just a dress. I mean, it’s like, you know, it’s like one of those foofy prom dresses that’s out to here. Um, and you have to tighten it up. You can’t be, you can’t be looking for apps and looking for technology to fix one issue, um, and still run a business and run it effectively and bring new business in and manage the business that you have. You know, she’s kind of r- know, of, part of the pushback when I wanted to hire her from the accountants was, you said, “We’re not gonna be able to keep her busy.”
Well, not, that’s not a problem now, after that little demonstration. But, um, but it, it, it’s like we can set her aside and [00:19:00] give her information, and she has time to build on it
Damien Greathead: Mm-hmm.
Penny: work is still going on.
Damien Greathead: Yeah, good point
Penny: work while Swati’s over here doing this.
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: the, the dashboards for me, where, you know, nobody stopped their work.
They kept on doing things the way they were doing. But she was taking, “Here’s a pa- piece of it that manually has to get done. I’m gonna remove that manual aspect
Damien Greathead: Hmm.
Penny: this AI to it.” And it’s not interrupting anybody else’s work. And that’s, that’s really nice.
Damien Greathead: Question for you. Do you, you, you sort of talked about the, the tech stack ballooning from your, your little black dress analogy to the sort of the ballroom gown, the Met Gala gown. Uh, is, is there, is there a risk of something similar happening in an accounting firm with your AI engineer sort of running wild and building [00:20:00] this, building that and, and n- now all of a sudden in a…
Maybe we, we slim down a few apps, but in addition to the, the 17, 300, well, 307 apps you just mentioned before, now we’ve got another 15 of our own agents that we’ve got to be, to be running. Is, is there sort of the risk of, yes, it’s great that we bring this person in, but then all of a sudden you unleash, unleash a beast, so to speak?
Penny: So this is gonna age me, but the hell with it. I’ve alr- everybody… I don’t give a screw up. I don’t give a fuck. I don’t care. Anyways, um, in 2000, I was hired as a secretary to the manager of sales for an e-commerce new startup And about, uh, two weeks into my job, nobody knew how … In that day they were using Act, which is the, the CRM database,[00:21:00]
Damien Greathead: Oh, yeah? God, I haven’t heard that name for a while
Penny: I know, and it was all individual, and somebody had to merge all the Act stuff together, and I knew how to do that. That’s probably why I got the job originally. two weeks into it, like the CEO, head- the legal guy, uh, and the CFO came walking over to my desk, and I remember the, the CFO looking over going, “You’re not really a secretary, are you?”
And I went, “Oh, fuck. I’m gonna lose my job. They know I’m not a secretary. I’m dyslexic.
Damien Greathead: type for shit.
Penny: worth
Damien Greathead: I’m dyslexic.
Penny: a…” God damn it. Exactly. And I go, “Ah, damn it.” So, um, they asked me … They were having problems with … This was fairly new technology. E-commerce technology back then was very new. It was 2000. I mean, it was January of And, um, uh, they sent me over to do a special [00:22:00] project. They had a different room where there were 20 programmers and, and developers, and they sent me over to the CTO, uh, to find out what was going on, and w- I discovered a lot of things.
The … First of all, the programmers liked me. They ‘Cause I understood their language, uh, whereas the sales guys didn’t, um, but also what I found was that those 20 programmers were building bells and whistles that nobody asked for
Damien Greathead: Hmm.
Penny: did nothing, and I asked them. I go, “Why are you doing this?” They go, “‘Cause we can.”
I go, “But, but it doesn’t benefit the app. It do-” or application, ’cause
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: them back then. We didn’t call them apps. doesn’t benefit the application, and it doesn’t go anywhere. It’s just a pretty little button, and it doesn’t do anything.” “Well, yeah, but it does, it does this.” I go, “But it’s no value in what you say it does. You just built this.” And, and I [00:23:00] think, yes, you do have to be concerned watch that all the time. And so, um, I do think that that’s what happens with apps. You go out onto a trade show floor, and there’s all these apps, and this app will fix this little problem, and this app will fix this little problem, and everybody wants one app that does it all, but no one app ever does it all. AI possibly be the link those linear apps to make them communicate to do them all with the
Damien Greathead: Or, or
Penny: back and forth for you.
Damien Greathead: one of the things I sort of f– yeah, uh, but one of the things I, I found coming back from Scaling New Heights and Accounting Business Expo here in Australia was sort of the app companies, they’re all adding another bell and another whistle. And, and I think that’s to, to ke- to keep you subscribed, to keep, “Well, no, don’t cancel,” or whatever, because we’ve built [00:24:00] another thing that, that does something that you don’t really need, but, but, but look at, look at what we’re developing and look at the, the, the rate of innovation that we’re bringing to the table.
And what I actually think is a lot of firms are using probably thirty to forty percent of an app’s capability. And not to say that they’re underutilizing it, they just don’t need the other thirty, forty, fifty, sixty percent. And so I think the, the other side of the AI sort of coin could be actually you can skinny down your tech stack because you have apps, the– be-because we can, um, thread the, the apps together more efficiently with Twine and get more out of a smaller group of apps than Tri– uh, not Twine.
So a smaller group of, uh, with AI, uh, agents. So if we can get agents getting more out of the, the core apps than adding all of these other smaller or niche [00:25:00] or we-we’re, we’re using this app for this particular functionality, I think it actually does present the opportunity for accounting firms’ tech stack to skinny down and the, the, the tech stack expense to come down as well.
Or maybe, maybe the funds are shifted over to AI, but there’s, there’s less moving parts
Penny: that big discussion about the cost of
Damien Greathead: Mm.
Yeah. Um, n-
Penny: AI. Um, that’s a, for another person to go through. I have my own thoughts about that since they wanna build a data center out here in Wyoming,
Damien Greathead: Yeah. Okay
Penny: thought it was gonna be 120 miles south, and I just found out it’s gonna be a lot closer
Damien Greathead: closer. Um, a lot of folks will sort of say, “Well, hang on, do I hire someone or do I just get a consultant to come in? My IT, my IT guy, if they still exist, they c- they, they can do this, or they’re now starting to, to do this.” Um
Penny: that you’re gonna find that there will be companies out there that you will become your AI, [00:26:00] uh, developers for you. that’s… I think that’s the next iteration.
Damien Greathead: Yeah
Penny: and it… The thing is, you gotta stick in your own lane, right? Um, I got a call today from a client. said, “I have to stick in my own lane.
I know what I like to do, and I don’t… I know what I don’t wanna do.” And she was the second one. We had onboarded a new client this morning sh- all she wants to do is fractional CFO work to get businesses organized and up and running, get their books clean, and then she can help with their operational system setup. So
Damien Greathead: Mm-hmm.
Penny: sh- she called us and said, “You know, you work with my third-party bookkeeper to clean up and do these special projects for I said, “Sure.” And she gave me the name of her third-party bookkeeper, and I went, “Oh, this is gonna be a wicked [00:27:00] easy…” And she goes, “What do you mean?” I go, “We are- They already outsourced to us. They’re already a client.” So we just, we… When she onboarded, she onboarded to the same team. Well, then three hours later, I have a call with a client who said, “I don’t wanna do this part anymore. Will you just take over and be the bookkeeper for my clients?” And I went, “No. It’s not my lane. You just told me you only wanted to be in your lane.
Well, that’s not my lane. My team does not call your clients and do this and that.” I said, “But I’ll bet you I can find
Damien Greathead: Find you someone who can
Penny: group of clients who are willing to do that, who were a- already outsourcing to us. And since they might, I will just put you with that accountant, and my team already knows you ’cause we’ve been doing the bookkeeping. And, uh, and you wanna bring in…” She goes, “I can’t bring on new clients because I’m not doing what makes me happy.”
Damien Greathead: Hmm.
Penny: that was interesting. she knows her lane. She goes, “I know what I wanna do. I know [00:28:00] the, the, the vertical I wanna focus on, and I know what I wanna do with these people and these companies, and I don’t wanna do the bookkeeping.”
I said, “Ah, second story the same thing.” Um, something to be said for that. Anyways, somebody can do something with that. I don’t know. so yeah. So I already sent out an email to three people who only in June at conferences told me, “Hey, I’m ready to take on more business. Now I gotta figure out how to market and… ‘Cause I’ve been busy taking care of the business I brought on, optimizing it, getting the systems in place, getting the technology in place. I gotta go back to the sell part.” those three I sent an email to going, “Would you like an introduction?”
Damien Greathead: Why, why don’t you three get together and look at, work out how you can solve each other’s problems, um, and work together as that unit? And I, I do like that ’cause I mean, a- a- again, it goes back to chapter one of, of It’s Not Just the [00:29:00] Numbers, the book that we, that we wrote, where it is what is it that makes you happy?
What is it that you wanna do? And then how, how do we make sure that we… everything else that we, that we know needs to get done is getting done. Is it technology? Is it AI? Is it a, a, a strategic partnership? Um, but if that allows me to focus on what makes me happy, what brings me joy, where I bring my, my best, uh, best value to the, the relationship, then that’s awesome
Penny: Yeah. I mean, she goes, “People keep on asking me when I’m gonna retire,” and she goes, “If I do what I love, I don’t want to
Damien Greathead: You don’t have to. Yeah. Yeah.
Penny: Yeah
Damien Greathead: I, I, I will sort of say I agree with you. I think that the– that there will be the rise of the consulting groups that come in and help your firm leverage AI and, and then probably charge you an ongoing maintenance fee to make sure that the agents are, are, are all doing what they’re supposed to be doing, et cetera.
I, I sort of think though that… I think Swati’s a really good example of a graduate first year out of– first job [00:30:00] out of university,
Penny: Yeah. She had just graduated the month before we hired her
Damien Greathead: And, and y- probably from the, from an expense perspective, it probably will work out to be the same thing as if you had a, a person in-house versus a consultant coming in on a, a semi-regular basis.
But I think you will move much faster with somebody embedded in your teams and sitting with the different teams and, and understanding your processes, understanding your, your challenges and, and where, where inefficiencies and bottlenecks happen in your business. And if they can sit there and, and fix it and build in your firm with your team, then I think you will move much faster, um, compared to, say, a consultant or, or you trying to work it out for yourself.
Penny, any sort of final thoughts on this idea of who, who, this idea of hiring an AI engineer as a part of your accounting team?
Penny: This is not new. have run into several accountants who [00:31:00] have done the same thing in the last month, who have hired that person to do that for them. got excited about AI. They learned enough to know the right person to hire. Which is
Damien Greathead: That it’s not me.
Penny: which is exactly what I did. I built the first initial dashboards, said, “Well, that’s somewhat okay, but somebody with better training than me could really make this sing.”
Damien Greathead: Yeah. Yeah.
Penny: And
Damien Greathead: well
Penny: she does is she starts building apps for the teams. I mean, you know, and she built one that she made sure she built something ’cause Coco had told her, she goes, “I’m not the only one that has this problem.” Ev- we use this app in about… It’s very ubiquitous in outcome. I, I don’t wanna name it,
Damien Greathead: Hmm.
Penny: it’s very ubiquitous app, and it has the same function of showing a duplicate, but then making you do a deep dive to go find out who, what, when, where, and how
Damien Greathead: And, and,
Penny: the
Damien Greathead: know,
Penny: does it.[00:32:00]
Damien Greathead: well, but, but also if you think about, again, we talked about all of these apps that are doing multiple parts of the process. Th- they’re all sending data into QuickBooks or wherever it is. And so that duplicate could come from any, any, any of multiple sources.
Penny: It could
Damien Greathead: so
Penny: a human, it could come from a feed, it could
Damien Greathead: Yeah. Yeah.
Penny: Yeah
Damien Greathead: Um, okay, Penny, that feels like a, a really good place to, uh, to put a pin in today’s episode.
Um, I think we’ve gotta get s- get some firms on that are actually doing this, that are actually hiring these people, better understand what it is they’re working on so that listeners can sort of think, “You know what? We c- we can be doing that, and we should be doing that, and there’s no reason why our accounting firm…”
You know, I’ve sort of said this a bit, w- uh, are we an accounting firm that uses a lot of technology, or actually are we a technology firm that does accounting? And I think the, the future certainly of, of our business is we’re a [00:33:00] technology company that does accounting. Um, and I think back to your sort of original– one of your earlier comments of will AI, um, end my business?
I think if you stay as an accounting firm that does a bit of technology, probably. But if you make that shift to the, the, the technology firm, uh, that does accounting, then you’ve probably got a better shot at surviving and thriving, uh, in the, the, the strange new world as, um, as was, was discussed at Scaling New Heights recently.
Penny: And just one more little thing for people to think about. Has your tech stack the old Post-It note everything is hidden inside the tech stack and nobody has time to go retrieve it? Just something for, to consider for the next conversation
Damien Greathead: That sounds good. Well, Penny, uh, always a pleasure. Folks, um, if you are looking to expand your capacity, uh, f- and, and you need some assistance to do that, check [00:34:00] out one of our sponsors, MoneyPenny, MoneyPenny LLC. It is the, uh, the largest female-owned and operated accounting firm in India, and they support US and Canadian accounting and tax firms, uh, to help them grow and get their client work done.
Thank you also to our other sponsor, Twine Apps. Uh, their new Twine Biller is now publicly available, and it will help you manage all of those software subscriptions that you purchase on behalf of your clients, make sure they’re being billed correctly, and help you, uh, turn that expense into a revenue center.
So ladies and gentlemen, uh, if you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, like us, follow us, share it with your network, uh, and please don’t hesitate to reach out. You can find me, Damien Grayhead, on LinkedIn. I think there is only one Damien Grayhead on LinkedIn. Uh, Penny, where can people find you?
Penny: I guess on LinkedIn, Penny Breslin
Damien Greathead: Penny Breslin on LinkedIn and or somewhere in Wyoming as well, if you’re ever that way.
Penny: aren’t a lot of, there aren’t a lot of people in Wyoming, so you
Damien Greathead: You- [00:35:00] run into you.
Penny: Oh, no, I… Okay, quick story. kid sister came to visit me. This is when I was living in Gillette back 1979, ’80. And I was a bartender at the biggest saloon in Gillette at the time, and, um, she didn’t tell me she was coming. She was taking a Greyhound bus, and she ended up off the bus on a break at Newcastle, which is about 200 miles east, say a little less, was sitting around talking to people and somebody said, “I know somebody who sounds and looks a lot like you.” “Yeah. She lives in Gillette. Her name’s Penny.” She goes, “Oh yeah, that’s my sister.” I get home from work at 3:00 in the morning, and my sister is sitting in front of my house and about 20 people. She goes, all said they knew you.” And I’m going, “You f-
Damien Greathead: Oh, I wasn’t sure where that story was gonna go, but
Penny: Yeah
Damien Greathead: whene- [00:36:00] whenever your stories start with, uh, when I worked at, when I was, when I was slinging drinks in a bar, I’m like, “Oh, I’m not sure where this is gonna end,” but that one was lovely. Uh, Penny, always a pleasure. Um, have a wonderful day, and we’ll talk to you next time.