Who Will Do What by When?

six people around work table

How to implement your firm’s strategic plan.

By Matt Rampe

After laying out major strategic priorities for how the firm can move toward its vision, the natural next step is to refine and define those plans. This is the beginning of the Implement stage, perhaps the most important stage of all.

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FORTUNA ACCOUNTING CHECK-IN

Sal had been at Fortuna Accounting since the beginning, and Bill knew he wasn’t great at accountability. It wasn’t that Sal didn’t want things to be better; it just seemed like he would do a lot of talking without a lot of acting on the things expected of him. With all the work and hopes that had been invested into their strategic planning so far, Bill wanted to make sure it didn’t all go to waste in the execution phase.

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Concrete Steps to Imagining Your Firm’s Future

What is a vision you’d be proud of?

By Matt Rampe

You’re building momentum! If you were in an airplane, you’d be at about 10,000 feet and climbing rapidly toward your highest altitude. In the Imagine stage, we’ll take it all the way to 30,000 feet, where the big picture emerges clearly for all to see.

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If the Identify stage is about who we are and why we exist as a firm, Imagine is the exciting part where we create alignment around where we want to go together.
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Lisa Fitzgerald: Belonging’s No Longer an Option in Accounting | MOVE Like This

Effective leaders create connection, recognizing that human-centered leadership is critical.

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MOVE Like This
With Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk
For CPA Trendlines Research

In this episode of MOVE Like This, Bonnie Ruszczyk is joined by Lisa Fitzgerald, Chief Human Resources Officer at Eide Bailly, for a conversation about talent, leadership, and what it takes to build workplaces where people actually want to stay. With nearly two decades at the firm and a career spanning manufacturing, technology, and professional services, Fitzgerald brings a practical, people-centered lens to some of the profession’s biggest challenges.

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One issue keeping Fitzgerald up at night is the accelerating impact of AI on the accounting workforce. While Eide Bailly is approaching AI adoption thoughtfully and seeing real productivity gains, Fitzgerald is just as focused on the downstream effects, particularly how the conversation around AI may influence students deciding whether accounting feels like a “safe” career choice. With firms still recovering from talent shortages, she sees a real risk that fear and uncertainty could deter future professionals before they even enter the pipeline. READ MORE →

Kenji Kuramoto: Basis Moves to Close AI’s Biggest Gap

When accountants and AI agents work side-by-side

“The future of the profession is accountants and agents working together,” Kuramoto says.


By Seth Fineberg
For CPA Trendlines

“Managing partner-in-residence” is not a standard role in accounting, and that was the first point of friction when Kenji Kuramoto was asked to explain his new job at Basis, the accounting AI agent company. What does that actually mean?

The answer goes beyond one hire. It points to a shift now underway in accounting: artificial intelligence is moving out of experimentation and into operations, and firms are not yet prepared for what that requires.

MORE Kenji Kuramoto: Behind Sorren’s Roll-Up: $170 Million, 1,000 Employees, 85 Partners | Kenji Kuramoto: Rules? What Rules? | Getting Real: Accounting Tech Decisions You Need to Make Today
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Basis, at getbasis.ai, says that Kuramoto, founder of cloud pioneer Acuity, joined full-time to help firms transition to AI-enabled operations, working directly with customers and shaping the product. The company made clear this was not a symbolic role. “Kenji isn’t here to advise from the margins,” CEO Matthew Harpe says. “He’s a full-time member of this team… creating the product with us.” Kuramoto is embedded with the company, not observing from the outside.

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Pssst! Remember These Nine Tax Season Resources

Happy family of four outdoors in winter clothing on snow

You can’t afford to take them for granted.

By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide

We have many resources and need to recognize that. And we need to treat each with its own importance. Even if you did everything yourself, you’d still need to rely on your tax software company, FedEx and the Postal Service, stationery supplier, computer consultant, the internet and email, cell phone provider and copier/scanner machine. And that’s just a few of the resources we rely on. Managing your resources well creates an aura of security and consistency to your practice.

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But there are more. And they are often overlooked. Or taken for granted. Here are some more resources that need to be managed:
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