AI

Why Strategic Planning Matters More Than Ever

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Ten benefits and ten challenges.

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Based on a concept by Eric Teller, director of Google X

By Matt Rampe

Our world is changing at an increasing rate.

Eric Teller, CEO of Google X research and development lab, says that “even though human beings and societies have steadily adapted to change, on average, the rate of technological change is now accelerating so fast that it has risen above the average rate at which most people can absorb all these changes.”

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This probably will not come as a surprise. Artificial intelligence, cloud-based solutions, automation and data analytics are rapidly advancing and changing the way accountants work forever.

And the rate of change is not limited to just technology. Barry Melancon, former CEO of the AICPA, said, “We faced a level of disruption none of us had ever experienced before,” at the end of 2020, but the changes have not stopped or slowed. Similarly, in an Accounting Today article, current AICPA CEO Mark Koziel said, “You’re going to hear, ‘Disrupt, disrupt, disrupt.’ I hate that word. How many people want to be disrupted? How many people want a root canal? But the whole marketplace is being disrupted – it’s not just us.”
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Built Fast. Sold Faster. Broken Later? The Truth About Accounting Tech | ARC

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MVP culture, investor pressure, and marketing—not product quality—often decide winners. 

Sponsored by True Advisor: The Definitive Success Guide for Client Advisory Services by Hitendra Patil |
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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

The accounting technology market looks crowded from the outside. New tools launch every month. Conference expo halls overflow with promise. And artificial intelligence is accelerating everything. 

But beneath that surface, the economics of building accounting technology tell a more complicated story—one shaped as much by venture capital and sales pressure as by innovation itself. 

MORE Accounting ARC: 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 | Savage: Using Your License as a Megaphone |  Baker: Interpreting Pricing Psychology | Don’t Get Fired by Your Own Automation | What Amazon Doesn’t Tell You | Royalties, Residuals, and Reality Checks | ARC-SLC 

In the latest episode of Accounting ARC, Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP, and Liz Mason, CPA, step back to examine how the industry got here—and where it is likely headed next. 

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Five Trends in Tax Advisory

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two seated businesspeople with glasses meet, window wall in background

How to continue providing value for clients.

By Jackie Meyer
The Balanced Millionaire: Advisor Edition

The tax advisory world is changing faster than ever before. When I first started my firm, technology played a limited role – mostly in the form of software that helped with basic data entry, compliance and tax returns. Today, however, we’re in the midst of a true revolution, driven by automation, artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing and client expectations that are continually evolving.

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The days of a compliance-focused practice being enough to keep you profitable are quickly disappearing. Compliance has been commoditized – clients see it as a cost to be minimized, rather than as a value-add service. If you want to remain competitive and thrive in the years to come, it’s essential to lead with advisory, embrace technology and position yourself as an indispensable partner in your clients’ financial success.
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Oz Demirdoven: Why U.S. Firms Lag the World in Advisory | The Disruptors

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Success breeds complacency – and obsolescence.

Sponsored by True Advisor: The Definitive Success Guide for Client Advisory Services by Hitendra Patil

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The Disruptors
With Liz Farr

Success, long the defining strength of U.S. accounting firms, is fast becoming their most dangerous liability, according to Oz Demirdovan, a PKF executive with a global portfolio.

Flush with steady profits, deep client rosters, and decades of compliance-driven demand, many firms see little reason to change—just as the ground beneath them shifts, Demirdovan tells Liz Farr in this episode of The Disruptors.

MORE DISRUPTORS: Candy Bellau: The $350 Pricing Mistake that Nearly Broke this Boutique Firm | The Disruptors | Poe: What P.E. Really Wants from Firms | The Disruptors  | Blake Oliver: Build a Biz that Runs Without You | Daiber: Use Succession as a Growth Strategy | Cannon: Busy Season is Self-Inflicted | Carroll: When One Person Can Break the Firm | Rampe: Build a Roadmap Even When the Road’s Not There | Chang: Killing SALY, One Agent at a Time |

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The paradox is stark: the very stability that built the profession now insulates it from the urgency to adapt, leaving some of its most successful players at greatest risk of falling behind.

Demirdoven has worked in accounting worldwide, spending more than five years at Allinial Global. From his perspective, the most striking difference between accounting in the U.S. and the rest of the world isn’t just our complex regulatory environment.

“The biggest difference isn’t only regulation, it is mindsets,” he explains. “I would say, in North America, especially in the United States, firms are still very compliance anchored.”   READ MORE →

Four Questions for Setting Firm Strategy

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businessman turning compass labeled "strategy" like a steering wheel

Which segment will you target?

By August Aquila
MAX: Maximize Productivity, Profitability and Client Retention

We’ve discussed marketing audits. Once we have some firmwide objectives, we need to select strategies. There are many ways to accomplish something, and it is necessary to select how you are going to go about doing it.

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Let’s look at four different strategies.

  1. Cost Reduction. As new forms of technology and artificial intelligence enter the workplace, it is increasingly possible to achieve a competitive advantage by using them to reduce the cost-of-service delivery. Tax processing software is a common example that firms have used over the last 20 years. AI could help firms reduce costs in multiple areas of the firm, from tax research to improving processes.

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