Why Advisory Is Broken—And What Comes Next
From Strain to Scale: The New World of Advisory
By Eric Eager
new clients
Make Clients Part of Your CAS Team | It’s Not Just the Numbers
“If they’re consistently uncooperative, they’re not a good CAS client, no matter how much they pay.”
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It’s Not Just the Numbers
With Penny Breslin and Damien Greathead
For CPA Trendlines
In the world of client accounting and advisory services (CAS), most firms focus on building internal teams, refining processes, and adopting the right technology. Yet, one crucial element often gets overlooked: the client.
In a recent episode of It’s Not Just the Numbers, co-hosts Damien Greathead and Penny Breslin explore why clients must be treated as integral members of the team, and what happens when firms fail to define the client’s role in the process. Their conversation, drawn from decades of working with accounting firms around the world, provides a blueprint for CPAs and firm owners aiming to elevate their CAS practices.
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Traditionally, accountants position clients as recipients of a service; for example, the client would deliver documents once a year, and the firm would produce a tax return. That transactional model doesn’t work in CAS, says Breslin.
Lang: The Right Clients > Revenue | It’s Not Just the Numbers
Tough client calls, tax planning, and better leadership turned hard knocks into growth.
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 “It’s Not Just the Numbers: How to Move Beyond the Numbers and Deliver Real Value for Your Clients”
by Penny Breslin and Damien Greathead – See Today’s Special Offer
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It’s Not Just the Numbers
With Penny Breslin and Damien Greathead
For CPA Trendlines
When Lang launched Upside CFO, he didn’t set out with a grand blueprint. “If we’re being honest, we started off with simple bookkeeping,” he says. Over time, his firm evolved into a multi-faceted practice offering fractional CFO services, tax planning, and even financial planning partnerships. Along the way, he admits to trial and error. “Sometimes I do smart stuff. Sometimes I don’t,” Lang laughs.
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Yet from that messy middle came clarity: the future of advisory services lies in translating numbers into strategy, choosing the right clients, and building processes that can scale without sacrificing value.
Clients Demand Niche Know-How, and They’re Willing to Pay for It
Expertise is the new table stakes.
Brands matter: Clients rely on business or personal referrals to find their accountants.
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines Research
U.S. business clients are willing to pay up to 25 percent more for specialized accounting services — and many are making niche expertise a non-negotiable.
MORE in Client Service Opportunities and in Advisory and Consulting, and
A TaxDome-commissioned survey of 353 small- and mid-sized business executives and owners across industries finds that as companies grow, they leave generalists behind in favor of firms that understand their vertical, speak their language and solve the high-stakes problems that come with scale.
Once they go niche, they rarely return.
Don’t Risk Losing Good Employees for Bad Clients
Keep the right KPIs and the right clients, and you’ll keep the right staff.
By Alan Anderson, CPA
Transforming Audit for the Future
Audit in the future will be much different than in the past. It’s going to require different skill sets. In the future, we need to teach more thinking and interpretive skills. The ticking and tying can be automated, but we’ll need people to interpret the anomalies that the bots and automation tools kick out. They’ll need to develop a deeper understanding of the industry, the client, and general business sense to discern whether an anomaly is just a mistake or a sign of something more profound.
MORE: Can a Service Center Model Solve Audit Staffing Shortages? | Don’t Take on Audits in an Industry You Don’t Understand | How ‘Business Expert CPAs’ Get Their Own Business Wrong | Exceptional Audit Client Service Demands Effective Communication | Five Ways to Prevent Audit Bottlenecks | How Do We Drive Relevance in Audit? | Lack of Relevance Drives Audit Commoditization | Four Basic Understandings Every Auditor Must Master | WANTED: Great Audit Mentors | Closing the Audit Expectations Gap
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As the owner of a business myself, I understand the need to ensure there is enough cash coming in to keep the lights on and everyone paid. But sometimes, firms take on work just to keep people busy all year round. A prime example of this is EBP audits, which seem quick and easy but have their own risk factors. Doing only one or two a year can be especially risky for your firm.