LEADERSHIP

The Most Expensive Promotion Your Firm Can Make | MOVE Like This

By

It may create costly leadership gaps that affect engagement, retention, and firm performance.

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 True Advisor: The Definitive Success Guide to Client Advisory Services by Hitendra Patil | See Today’s Special Offer 

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines Research podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google/YouTube, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Player FM, Audacy, RSS. 
Originally published May 13, 2026
True Advisor: Buy now | Learn more

MOVE Like This
With Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk
For CPA Trendlines Research

Promotions are meant to strengthen an organization. But when firms elevate top performers without preparing them to lead, those promotions can become some of the most expensive decisions they make. The result is often disengaged employees, overwhelmed managers, and avoidable turnover.

MORE MOVE Like This | MORE CPA Trendlines Streaming Network

In this episode of MOVE Like This, Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk talks with Megan Robinson, founder and CEO of E Leader Experience, about why leadership isn’t a natural next step for every high performer—and what firms can do to build leaders intentionally instead of hoping they’ll figure it out.
READ MORE →

Is Your Boss Really the Problem? | ARC

By

The hardest workplace lesson isn’t spotting a bad manager—it’s recognizing when you’re standing in your own way.

 

Sponsored by True Advisor: The Definitive Success Guide for Client Advisory Services by Hitendra Patil |
See Today’s Special Offer

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google/YouTube, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Player FM, Audacy, RSS
Originally Published May 28, 2026.
The step-by-step operating guide for firms building, pricing, and scaling advisory services that clients value—and pay for.

Accounting ARC
With Liz Mason and Byron Patrick
Center for Accounting Transformation

In a candid, unfiltered episode of Accounting ARC, Liz Mason, CPA, CEO of High Rock Accounting, and Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP, senior product manager at Karbon and co-founder of TB Academy, confront one of the profession’s most relatable—and uncomfortable—topics: bad bosses. 

But the conversation goes further than workplace horror stories. Mason and Patrick explore a more nuanced reality: sometimes the boss is the problem—and sometimes it’s the employee. 

MORE Accounting ARC: Most Accountants Are Missing This AI Shift | AI Can Fix Your Workflow—or Break It in Seconds | Efficiency Is the Wrong Goal for AI | Accounting’s Hidden Talent Risk: The Sandwich Generation | Built Fast. Sold Faster. Broken Later? The Truth About Accounting Tech | Recognize When You Need to Recharge Before You Burn Out | Valuing More Than the Balance Sheet | Accounting’s “Untalked-About” Frontier | Why Happiness is Hard-Fought for High Achievers | The Fastest Way to Lose Talent Is “Dick Leadership” | Post-Holiday Fatigue Isn’t a Failure; It’s a Signal | OCR, Research Bots & Meeting Assistants: What Actually Helps Now | Return Season is the New Stress Test | Small Firms May Have the Biggest Advantage in 2026 | Downgraded: What the DOE Said About Accounting |

“We wanted to talk about this topic because it’s really important to understand when you’re the problem, when your boss is the problem, and what acceptable boundaries are,” Mason says early in the episode.

READ MORE →

Chelsea Sowers: From Bitcoin Barbie to Crypto Auditor | MOVE Like This

By

A roller derby skater, crypto auditor, and accounting leader shares why belief, sponsorship, and community shape the future of the profession.

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 True Advisor by Hitendra Patil | See Today’s Special Offer 

Subscribe to CPA Trendlines Research podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google/YouTube, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Player FM, Audacy, RSS. 
True Advisor: Buy now | Learn more

MOVE Like This
With Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk
For CPA Trendlines Research

In this episode of MOVE Like This, Chelsea Sowers, incoming President of the Accounting and Financial Women’s Alliance, audit manager specializing in cryptocurrency assurance with The Network Firm, and “Bitcoin Barbie” on the Atlanta Roller Derby team, joins Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk to discuss leadership, retention, mentorship, and the realities shaping women’s careers in accounting today.

MORE MOVE Like This | MORE CPA Trendlines Streaming Network | JOIN MOVE 2026

At the center of the conversation is a recurring challenge within the profession: attracting women into accounting is only part of the equation. Retaining and advancing them into leadership remains a persistent issue. Sowers argues that women often receive access to the profession without receiving a roadmap for advancement. Flexibility, mentorship, sponsorship, and community increasingly matter to younger professionals, particularly those entering the workforce after major disruptions like COVID. Firms may focus heavily on recruitment while overlooking what keeps talented people engaged years later.

READ MORE →

Allan Koltin: What Elite CPA Firms Do Differently | Gear Up for Growth

By

The best firms build accountability cultures, develop climbers, and make tough calls.

Sponsored by True Advisor: The Definitive Success Guide for Client Advisory Services by Hitendra Patil | See Today’s Special Offer
Subscribe to CPA Trendlines podcasts anywhere: Apple, Google/YouTube, Spotify, iHeart, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Player FM, Audacy, RSS.

Gear Up for Growth
With Jean Caragher
for CPA Trendlines

“Some firms dream of being great but only are willing to make the commitment to be good,” Allan Koltin, CEO of Koltin Consulting Group, says in the new episode of Gear Up for Growth with host Jean Caragher. “Leadership is the delta that separates all.”

MORE Jean Caragher here | Get her best-selling handbook, The 90-Day Marketing Plan for CPA Firms, here | MORE Gear Up for Growth here | MORE CPA Trendlines Streaming Network here

MORE What $1 Billion Buys in Today’s CPA Market

Koltin says the gap between elite firms and average firms keeps widening, and leadership is the defining factor. Widely recognized as one of the profession’s top consultants, he argues that firms chasing high performance must stop avoiding hard decisions, embrace accountability, and rethink what leadership means.

“You can have the same clients, same talent pool, same market opportunities, and one firm ends up in the upper quartile while another struggles,” Koltin says. “The difference is leadership.” READ MORE →

Seven Things Your Compensation Model Must Accomplish

By

Take a hard look at your partners.

By Domenick J. Esposito
8 Steps to Great

Let’s take a deep dive into both a firm’s partner mix and its compensation model.

MORE by Domenick J. Esposito
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

In a “Good to Great” research study on high-performing organizations performed by Jim Collins, it was concluded that the method of compensation, as a causal factor for high and sustained performance, is largely irrelevant. The study concluded that whatever system is in use, it simply must be rational and equitably managed and that high sustained performance is largely the result of doing many things well.
READ MORE →