The firms winning with AI aren’t the ones implementing every tool they can find. They’re the ones being strategic about what actually moves the needle.
Rachel Ferris learned this firsthand when she built TaxStack AI, not because she wanted to start a software company, but because she needed a solution that didn’t exist. As a tax advisor specializing in Puerto Rico’s Act 60, she was spending hours researching complex state-specific cases. ChatGPT seemed like the answer, until it started citing Reddit and Quora as sources. When she’d call it out, it would cheerfully admit, “You’re right, that’s actually not correct.” That’s when she realized: if she wanted AI that actually worked for tax research, she’d have to build it herself.
In this episode, Rachel shares how she created a platform that sources directly from actual tax code, IRS forms, and treasury regulations, so you get accurate answers with citations you can trust. But more importantly, she breaks down the difference between firms that will thrive with AI and firms that will struggle: it’s not about adopting everything, it’s about adopting responsibly.
The conversation covers:
- Why ChatGPT’s fact-check problem makes it dangerous for tax research (and how to fix it by sourcing your own database)
- The cautionary tale of firms that went all-in on AI integration in 2024, only to abandon everything six months later
- Why now is the time to pause and evaluate rather than frantically adopt every AI tool that hits the market
- How AI should free you up for higher-value advisory work with existing clients, not just help you take on more volume
- Ed Kless’s “transformation economy” concept: moving from providing transactions to providing transformations
- The three-pillar approach to attracting and retaining young talent: technology + mentorship + entrepreneurship mindset
- Why mandatory mentorship programs fail (and what actually works instead)
- How being genuinely curious about people has opened more doors than any technical skill Rachel has learned
Rachel also breaks down why firms that use AI responsibly will win, while firms that use it to cut personality and human connection will lose clients. She explains why young people crave personal connection more than you think, why entrepreneurial-minded accountants connect better with business owner clients, and how spending three hours talking to a Pizza Hut franchise owner taught her more about business than any textbook.
Book Recommended in this Episode:
How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie
Disclaimer: The following is an unedited transcription of the episode and has not been combed for errors.
TRANSCRIPT
00:00:00:00 – 00:00:10:13
Unknown
I experimented with ChatGPT, but honestly, it just hallucinates, they were pulling things from Reddit. It was pulling things from Quora or blogs or chat forums.
00:00:10:15 – 00:00:45:05
Unknown
And I would reply back being like, hey, that’s not actually correct, and chat you because you’re right, that’s actually not correct. Or I would ask for a source and it would say, I actually don’t know where that source is from, but here’s some more information. So I started coming up with this idea. What if I just plugged in my own tax research database, plugged in all the forms that I’m actually using, sourced directly to the actual government websites, the tax code, everything necessary, regulations, treasury rulings, and we put it into one little form that I can directly reference it and then see exactly where in the text it comes from.
00:00:45:11 – 00:00:56:16
Unknown
I’m Brandon Poe, and this is the county’s Flight Plan podcast, where you can enjoy engaging conversations about mergers and acquisitions in accounting, practice management. Listen in on strategies
00:01:00:00 – 00:01:31:01
Unknown
Welcome to the Accountants Flight Plan podcast. I have an interesting guest today. You’re gonna love Rachel Ferriss. She’s a CPA and is an award winning accountant, recognized as one of America’s top 200 CPAs and one of the top 40 under 40 accounting and tax professionals. Congratulations on that. Thank you. She’s also the founder of her own tax advisory firm and tax stack ai.com, which is a company that builds AI power tools to help small accounting firms modernize and scale.
00:01:31:03 – 00:01:54:24
Unknown
Rachel is passionate about modernizing the accounting profession, inspiring the next generation of young professionals to join it. She has featured. She’s been featured on a variety of podcast, webinars and conferences where she speaks on tax law, the pipeline, and technology. And when you’re not working, you like to cook, bake, do puzzles and travel. Is that right? That is all correct.
00:01:54:24 – 00:02:16:21
Unknown
Big insurance talk about today we’re going to talk about a travel sim because I love to travel as well. All right. We’re going to just jump right in. Rachel. So, you’ve built both a successful tax advisory firm and also an AI powered platform, which is Tech Stack. I, want to get into what Tech Stack is.
00:02:16:21 – 00:02:42:19
Unknown
But what inspired you to merge this, you know, more traditional accounting expertise with tech? And how can other firms kind of start thinking about this, thinking this way? That’s a super great question. I think originally I didn’t actually set out to do this. As with most entrepreneurs, it kind of fell into my lap. I started my own tax advisory practice, and I was actually looking for a technology myself to bring into the firm.
00:02:42:21 – 00:03:08:04
Unknown
And I was shopping around, I was doing all the demos possible online. I was going to the conferences, talking to the people at the booths, and I really wasn’t finding something that fit my needs. As a small firm, I felt like oftentimes I was in a situation where either the dollar value was so expensive for a small firm, or alternatively, you’d get it and maybe about 10 to 15% of the services they provided would actually match what I needed.
00:03:08:09 – 00:03:26:20
Unknown
Right? And I felt like a lot of the things were for really big companies and maybe even mid-sized companies, right? Not for the under ten employees type of guy. And so because of that, I actually hired a developer to create this for my own internal purposes. So I just intended this for this to be something I would use on my own.
00:03:26:20 – 00:03:42:12
Unknown
Me and my team would use this ourselves. And I started talking with people in my industry and they were like, wow, wait, can I start using that? Like, is there a way for me to log in? And it started getting my wheels spinning a little bit, and I realized there actually might be a really great opportunity for this.
00:03:42:14 – 00:03:59:24
Unknown
So that’s when I started actually marketing it out and providing as a service, and it’s blown up since then. That’s amazing. Well, a lot of good inventions come that way. Like, hey, I need something. It’s not really available in the market, why don’t I just create it? So it sounds like that’s exactly what you did, which is awesome.
00:03:59:24 – 00:04:21:20
Unknown
How? When did you create? When was this started? Oh, gosh. The process probably started over a year and a half ago. But we just started selling it on the market, this spring. So for a while it was just something we were internally developing, and now it’s out in the world. What was the pain point that sort of spearheaded this project?
00:04:21:20 – 00:04:40:14
Unknown
What was the what were you trying to solve? Yeah. So I’m in a very niche area of tax advisory where I’m focusing on people moving down to Puerto Rico under X60 and a lot of my services advisory based. Right. I’m not spending a ton of time doing returns or bookkeeping. It’s very advisory,
00:04:44:08 – 00:04:49:19
Unknown
when I was doing research, I was spending hours every single day researching for all these specific cases.
00:04:49:19 – 00:05:01:11
Unknown
I have people coming from all different states, not necessarily just California, and it was taking up a lot of my time. From there, I was kind of like, is there a way I can expedite this research with AI? And
00:05:01:11 – 00:05:11:24
Unknown
I experimented with ChatGPT, but honestly, it just hallucinates, they were pulling things from Reddit. It was pulling things from Quora or blogs or chat forums.
00:05:12:01 – 00:05:46:16
Unknown
And I would reply back being like, hey, that’s not actually correct, and chat you because you’re right, that’s actually not correct. Or I would ask for a source and it would say, I actually don’t know where that source is from, but here’s some more information. So I started coming up with this idea. What if I just plugged in my own tax research database, plugged in all the forms that I’m actually using, sourced directly to the actual government websites, the tax code, everything necessary, regulations, treasury rulings, and we put it into one little form that I can directly reference it and then see exactly where in the text it comes from.
00:05:46:22 – 00:06:11:24
Unknown
So now when I ask a question, I can click and directly and it’ll say, hey, it’s actually from this specific area. This is where we got this piece of information or advice. And it became a lot more streamlined. And we sort of just built it up from there. And it’s saved me hours every single day. I’m not an expert in all 50 like states, for example, right here, it’s a lot easier for me to get information like that and apply it directly.
00:06:11:24 – 00:06:34:10
Unknown
And basically be able to reference back in actual source documents instead of second guessing myself on ChatGPT. So. So Reddit is not a good tax, research platform. You know, I have seen some very questionable things on Reddit. I would not trust someone on Reddit to do my taxes, and I really wouldn’t trust it. As a CPA, you gotta use your own professional judgment.
00:06:34:12 – 00:06:57:23
Unknown
And I actually think that’s a really interesting point, is that a lot of people with I have just started using it is the end all, be all answer. I think as accountants, we need to remember that professional skepticism and judgment is extremely important here. You need to use take all the information with a grain of salt. Listen, tax AI is right most of the time, but maybe for your specific context there might be a little bit more nuance.
00:06:57:23 – 00:07:22:05
Unknown
So it’s important to actually still dig in yourself, but now it’s saving you the time of having to find the initial information. Now it’s all in your hands, and you can do with what you want. Kind of gives you that first 80%, if you will. Exactly. So is is, is the product, able to do tax research in other, areas or is it focused on the Puerto Rico?
00:07:22:07 – 00:07:42:05
Unknown
It’s all of us. Well, it does answer questions about Puerto Rico, which is why I originally built it. It is the entire United States. It can do a little bit internationally, but mostly relating to the US in terms of like credits, for example. You can’t be using it if you’re, I don’t know, up in Canada and you’re trying to figure out rules about Canada.
00:07:42:05 – 00:08:02:15
Unknown
We may be expanding it eventually. But it’s just the United States right now. So but it’s all sorts of tax law. So if I had a question about, you know, a 1031 exchange, for example, I could find information there about that 100%. And besides that tax tool, we also have a mini CRM system as well on it.
00:08:02:15 – 00:08:18:17
Unknown
So, I know a lot of small firms don’t need a huge CRM system here. You’re able to put it in, it’ll actually do document analysis as well. So if you want to upload a return and it’ll say, hey, you actually forgot to put your client’s last name or you forgot to check this box or hate the math’s not adding up, right.
00:08:18:23 – 00:08:36:11
Unknown
You can do it on there. And then we’re in the beginning stages of this. We still have some of it right now, but we’re actually doing client specific tax planning recommendation engines. So right now you when you research within a specific client, it actually holds that memory. And so let’s say I’m talking to a client named Joe.
00:08:36:17 – 00:08:59:08
Unknown
And I’m like, oh, he’s planning to move from California to Florida. Well, I put that in the system one time. And I don’t have to say that every single time I’m asking a new question about that client, it remembers the fact that, hey, big portion of what he’s doing this year, he’s planning on moving. And so we have a preliminary tax planning recommendation engine, but we’re stepping it up in the next few months where now it’ll be proactive, right?
00:08:59:08 – 00:09:18:04
Unknown
It’ll tell you, hey, have you thought about using the Augusta rule for their business? Or hey, you know, they’re moving to Florida. You might actually want to look at taking advantage of certain energy credits or something like that. There’s a lot of different parts to it. So very interesting. Fascinating. Wow. Well, congratulations on coming up with this idea and following through with it.
00:09:18:04 – 00:09:37:06
Unknown
Because a lot of people get ideas. They don’t, they don’t do anything with it. They just kind of like, well, I guess it doesn’t exist. And they go on about their day. So that brings me to my next question is like, what sort of habits or strategies do you feel have helped you scale your career and get your business to be where it is?
00:09:37:06 – 00:10:00:00
Unknown
And if I’ve been successful with this. So, yeah, what’s what’s the foundation of that? I think the first thing for me, and this isn’t the key to success for everyone, but I’m a huge people person. Very outgoing. My friends and family always joke that I could talk to a brick wall if I wanted to, and I think I’m good about asking questions and really getting to know someone.
00:10:00:02 – 00:10:20:10
Unknown
I think some people are outgoing in the sense where they talk a lot about themselves, but they don’t actually get to remember what the other person’s about. And so I like to try to remember important things about people. So I follow up regularly. How’s the dog? How are your kids? Oh, your daughter just started first grade, and you’d be surprised how much that personal interaction actually means to people.
00:10:20:12 – 00:10:38:07
Unknown
And that’s actually opened up a lot of opportunities and networking for me. I think personal branding, and it’s more about who you know, right, than what, you know, a lot of the times and as CPAs, I mean, you take the exam, you pass it or you’re an E, you take the exam, you pass it, you have the what to know.
00:10:38:13 – 00:10:59:03
Unknown
Now you just need to supplement it with the who do you know. Right. And so I think that’s been really, really powerful for me. I reach out to people that I don’t even think will reply to me, and sometimes they don’t, sometimes they do. But you’d be surprised when you are genuine, vulnerable, and you reach out to someone CEO of a big company, you say, I’d love to pick your brain on these topics.
00:10:59:03 – 00:11:21:12
Unknown
Let’s go out for coffee or lunch. Maybe only 10% of them say yes, but if you’re reaching out to a lot of people, that 10% could make a really big difference. And for me, it actually has. That’s great. Yeah, I think, you know, I really like what you say about genuinely being curious about people and what’s going on in their lives.
00:11:21:14 – 00:11:47:11
Unknown
And what I think that does is, for one thing, you’re going to uncover information that you wouldn’t have uncovered otherwise. And if you ask successful people very open ended questions and you follow your curiosity, you’re going to get some answers and maybe pointed down some roads that you hadn’t thought about exploring and that can take you all kinds of places.
00:11:47:13 – 00:12:06:06
Unknown
Is that 90%? I fully agree, you don’t have to just be talking with people in your industry, or just people that are higher than you, since you’re always looking to kind of punch up, right? Talk to anyone that seems moderately interesting. Those people that I know, people probably reach out to you on LinkedIn also that are like, I love to talk about your career and it’s a college student.
00:12:06:08 – 00:12:22:20
Unknown
I still take those calls because I don’t know where they’re going to be five, ten, 15 years from now. I don’t know who they know. So it’s not just about always leveraging things up for yourself. You also need to be providing benefit and actual value to someone else. You can’t expect this to be a one sided transaction, right?
00:12:22:22 – 00:12:52:22
Unknown
I totally agree with that as well. Well, great. That’s, it’s clearly served you well. Next question is, what do you think are the biggest opportunities and challenges for traditional firms? In there, you know, as we, as we navigate this new AI are the tools, what are the challenges, challenges with firms adopting these tools? Like, what are you seeing out there?
00:12:52:24 – 00:13:11:07
Unknown
Yeah. So I can touch on challenges for some. We can go to opportunities after I think the big challenges one, finding AI that actually works for you. I think that AI is a huge buzzword right now. And I think what we’re going to see in probably the next five years is very similar to kind of like the internet boom, the dotcom bubble.
00:13:11:07 – 00:13:28:14
Unknown
Right, is that you’re going to see people falling off. And I think there’s a pressure right now to just adopt everything possible. Oh, you should be using AI for research. You should be using AI to automate things. You should be using AI for this and I yeah, for that I don’t think AI is a one size solution, one size fits all model, right?
00:13:28:16 – 00:13:49:23
Unknown
Your firm needs to evaluate where you’re excelling, where you need help, where you could grow. And it’s very individualized. And I think that’s one thing that we’re seeing here is that people aren’t thinking that way necessarily. They think that, okay, well my this guy down the block is now automating a bunch of things I should start automating. Well, maybe that’s not the highest value for you, right.
00:13:50:00 – 00:14:11:03
Unknown
I think another big thing is balancing efficiency with a healthy, sustainable work environment, too. I think there’s a lot of buzz. I’m sure all your audience has heard accountants are going to become obsolete. AI is going to make us redundant and I don’t think that’s the case at all. And I think unfortunately, we’re actually seeing that in some firms where you’re seeing mass layoffs because of AI.
00:14:11:05 – 00:14:32:19
Unknown
And I actually think there’s that’s kind of the wrong way to go about it. You should be upskilling the people that are working for you. AI is not oh, your job is no longer relevant. That’s an opportunity to train that person to now pursue a different high value activity. Right? Something that I can’t do. And I think that being able to find that balance is going to be a huge challenge.
00:14:32:19 – 00:14:53:21
Unknown
And I don’t know many firms that are striking the right balance right now. I mean, you see them layoff people immediately, go back and hire a huge group because they realize they need help. That’s not healthy. It’s not sustainable, and you’re not valuing the average worker. Yeah, I have an experience here on this recently. So I’m involved with EO, which is Entrepreneurs Organization.
00:14:53:21 – 00:15:16:08
Unknown
I’ve been a member for quite some time, and we have a retreat once a year with my forum. And we went on this retreat and we hired an AI expert to present, and he came and presented for eight hours. And this was last spring, spring of 2025. And you know, we kind of all there’s seven of us in the group.
00:15:16:08 – 00:15:41:09
Unknown
And we were like, wow, we probably should go home and figure out how to adopt AI in a meaningful way. And a couple of the guys really went after it. I mean, they tried to implement it in their businesses in so many ways. They put, they connected their, you know, different software stacks together and tried to and my CEO said, I think we should probably wait.
00:15:41:11 – 00:16:08:08
Unknown
I think this is a project we should postpone. And I’m really glad we did, because fast forward to now, there’s two that really went all in on all of those tools. They’ve abandoned them now because they realized, like it’s just too clunky. It didn’t work well. It was actually less expensive to hire administrative help to do some of this work.
00:16:08:10 – 00:16:31:05
Unknown
Now, five years from now, it may not be the case or two years from now that might not be the case, but as of this year, that was their experience. And so I was glad that we didn’t jump all in. And then what I’ve noticed too, is like a lot of the big software companies like Intuit, like, we use HubSpot for our CRM.
00:16:31:07 – 00:16:57:06
Unknown
They, you know, having their own AI internally. And that seems to be working better, you know? So no, no, no, no, I appreciate you sharing that. And your story is a story that I’ve heard countless times from people. Again, you feel pressure or time to dive right in and everyone’s making it feel like you’re not doing enough, when in reality, I think this is almost the time to take a little bit of a pause and adopt, as you see, necessary.
00:16:57:06 – 00:17:18:18
Unknown
And I’m not saying don’t adopt at all, but I’m saying evaluate what’s going to have the biggest impact for you first and bring it in there. It is so time consuming and exhausting to automatically start adding AI into every part of your company. And having all that change at once. Start small, grow big, and figure out what works for you and what’s able to actually grow with you, right?
00:17:18:18 – 00:17:40:09
Unknown
Yeah. I think that is one of the benefits to kind of what you’re saying with like Intuit or one of those that has AI built in, they’re able to scale as you scale a little bit easier when you’re dealing with, smaller platform, maybe they can’t always scale. Maybe they’re not always going to match your needs, and then you’re going to have to pivot and reintegrate and do all that all over again in a few years, and no one wants that.
00:17:40:11 – 00:18:01:07
Unknown
Yeah. So, opportunities. Let’s see. What do you what do you see as the opportunities? I mean, everyone talks about this, but the ability to scale. And I don’t want to say that just in terms of dollar amounts or just in terms of the number of clients you can take on. But I see this in terms of actually higher value tasks across the board.
00:18:01:09 – 00:18:21:20
Unknown
So if that does bring in more money or it does bring in more clients, that’s great. But I almost recommend focusing on your existing client base to begin with. You already have people that are sold on you. Use that extra time now with them to maybe upsell, right? Maybe. Hey, you haven’t been focusing on, you know, tax planning or you haven’t been focused on, you know, something really important for them.
00:18:21:20 – 00:18:38:20
Unknown
Maybe, you know, their kids are going off to school soon and you want to spend a little bit time in there. Maybe you want to focus on financial aid a tiny bit are ways they can structure things. There’s a lot going on that I think that accountants oftentimes get too bogged down with all the other work, that they’re not able to provide that additional value.
00:18:38:20 – 00:18:59:00
Unknown
And I think really good opportunity with AI is if it does free up that time, it’s not just cutting employees, it’s now, okay, what can those employees do? So we can be a better, I guess, service provider? I heard this from I believe it’s Ed class and he always talks about the transformation economy. And I actually very much believe in this as well.
00:18:59:00 – 00:19:18:21
Unknown
And the idea that we shouldn’t be providing transactions and just services, we should be providing transformations for our clients and providing more than just what a regular CPA would do. Oh, I thought a tax return once a year, right? Using AI to be able to assist with those kind of regular CPA tasks allows you to open up your service a lot more.
00:19:18:23 – 00:19:38:23
Unknown
I think there’s also more room for experimentation, as well. I think when you have more time freed up and you aren’t doing all the menial, everyday tasks, you actually do have the ability to check out something else that might be interesting for you. If you’ve always thought, you know, if I just had the time in the day to do x, y, z, this is the perfect time.
00:19:38:23 – 00:19:53:12
Unknown
And I don’t know anyone that hasn’t said that running a company, right? Everyone I know has said, well, if I just had a few more hours in the day, we’ll start marking down on the piece of paper what those few hours in a day would do for you, and see where you can open it up. It doesn’t necessarily even need to be within your business.
00:19:53:12 – 00:20:15:06
Unknown
Maybe you can just be a better family member. Maybe you can get back into fitness. Maybe you can use those hours for personal development or upskilling. There’s so many different ways to think about it that are not just business focus, but I think are great opportunities. Yeah, or you can invest in your people and training them and and really giving them the leadership and the knowledge they need to step up.
00:20:15:06 – 00:20:30:10
Unknown
And 100%, I know we’re going to touch on this a little bit later, but especially the pipeline, right. People are like, no, young people want to join, no young people want to stay. They do their few years and they leave. So why would I invest in them? Right? Yeah. Well, maybe you should start thinking about it the opposite way.
00:20:30:12 – 00:20:49:01
Unknown
What if you invested in them to begin with? What if that’s the reason they’re not staying is because you’re not putting in the time to upskill them. You’re not giving them high value work until five years into the company. Right? This is a really great way. And I’m not saying young people shouldn’t be doing any basic, original, you know, entry level tasks.
00:20:49:01 – 00:21:00:01
Unknown
They should still be doing that. But maybe layer on a little bit more of, you know, bigger ideas, high value impact, you know, things that get them excited. And you’ll also solve that problem for your firm with attrition.
00:21:00:01 – 00:21:26:12
Unknown
Yeah. I yeah I think the you know, I’m talking with more and more thought leaders about firm culture. And I believe one of the best things you can do for your culture is, you know, have time spent with more senior leaders in the firm to really, develop them, spend time developing those people.
00:21:26:12 – 00:21:46:13
Unknown
They want the challenges. They want to advance. They want more opportunity. And that’s still one of the best things you can do for your culture, which, like you said, it helps retain. But it doesn’t only help retain, it helps attract new talent like you get the culture right, then you can start attracting people. Just I mean, it’s like it’s like gravity.
00:21:46:13 – 00:22:10:17
Unknown
It just works. It really does. It really does. And I think you see that we’re a lot more people stay at mid-tier and smaller firms longer than the big firms, because I think they have a better mentorship and, you know, coaching program. It’s a lot more individualized because it’s smaller. And because of that, I know people that stick around their mid-tier firms much longer than the people that do their two years and big four and jump.
00:22:10:19 – 00:22:31:02
Unknown
Yeah. Well, you know, if you were to think about a five year time frame, we talked about five years. Or maybe that’s not the right time frame. Maybe you have a different thought about that. But what do you think will be the difference between firms that adopt AI and the ones that don’t in the next period of time?
00:22:31:04 – 00:22:52:16
Unknown
I think those that adopt AI, there’s going to be a lot of positives, right? I think at the very beginning that’s going to attract a certain type of client, and maybe they will see a better bottom line for a little while. Right. And I think also if they do it correctly, ethically, responsibly and really with long term goals in mind, I think they’re going to see a better bottom line.
00:22:52:16 – 00:23:13:14
Unknown
They’re going to make more money, they’re going to do better on their employees, do better for their clients, and do better across the board if they don’t use it properly. I think they stand at the risk of actually losing some personality. And I think as accountants, again, I think personality fit is a big reason why one people join and why clients also stay with us.
00:23:13:16 – 00:23:38:13
Unknown
People like to talk to you for the most part, and they could go find someone else that does very similar work to you, most likely, but they probably stick with you because there’s something about your firm that attracted them. And I think when you add too much AI, you lose a sense of that personality, especially if you’re getting rid of members and employees that have been around for such a long time that they’re used to talking to, all of a sudden they’re having to learn a new process themselves.
00:23:38:13 – 00:23:59:05
Unknown
So I think I see that on that side. For the firms that don’t adopt AI, I think you will see a difference in accuracy and efficiency in the long run. I think that as AI continues to improve, if you’re so against using technology and won’t adapt to the times, you’re going to fall behind. And I think even clients will see that as well.
00:23:59:05 – 00:24:21:20
Unknown
If you’re billing on an hourly basis. I know a guy they are still reviewing PDFs entirely manually. It was like 300 PDFs. They built him an insane amount of money for that. Right? Versus I would have made that a little easier. Yes, the firm’s not making as much money, but he was so upset that he actually scaled down the work he was doing with them because he decided to work with a company that was actually using AI.
00:24:21:22 – 00:24:47:24
Unknown
So I think there are parts of it like that. I also would say, I think you will see a better personality fit for the companies that don’t adopt. I think they’re going to stay kind of like they are now. That being said, though, personality fit isn’t always the strongest and the best thing in the world. I think you’re going to end up in a situation where, yeah, you’re a great person to work with, but we’re getting built a lot more here.
00:24:48:03 – 00:25:09:10
Unknown
We are in a situation where it’s running slower. You know, I can go down the street and find the next guy that can provide all these other services because he has more time. I don’t know how much. Just personality and vibe will take you. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Well, I think it’s an exciting time to be in this industry.
00:25:09:12 – 00:25:35:20
Unknown
You know, we talked about a little bit about attract attracting and retaining talent. Do you have any other thoughts about that? Oh, yeah. I’m super passionate about this. I like to call it the three pillar approach, in my opinion. Technology, which we’ve touched on a bit, mentorship and then entrepreneurship. Technology, not necessarily just because they’re not having to do all of the menial tasks that you have to do every single day.
00:25:35:22 – 00:25:59:00
Unknown
But also young people like to work in modern environments. They like to see that what they’re using in their personal life is also being put to play in their work life. And so companies that are using technology, it makes it a lot more appealing. I also think mentorship is huge. We also touched on this super briefly, but I think we’ve ended up in this situation where mentorship hasn’t really become actual mentorship.
00:25:59:00 – 00:26:22:16
Unknown
It’s just performance reviews. So they think that a once quarterly meeting and, you know, a score out of five for a bunch of different categories and a paragraph written about you constitutes mentorship. But mentorship goes far beyond that. And my opinion is very personal and I don’t think it necessarily needs to be just a match career wise. It should be a match for interpersonal things as well.
00:26:22:21 – 00:26:43:14
Unknown
We want mentors that actually want to mentor, and I think too many companies have adopted a mandatory mentorship program where it is part of that person’s review as well. My personal take on this is it should be a volunteer basis, and then they get a little less actual work on their plate so they can spend active time mentoring and coaching as time goes on.
00:26:43:16 – 00:27:01:17
Unknown
And that’s huge. I mean, in an era where we are so technology focused, young people want personal connection more than you’d think. Like you’d be surprised how many young people are actually really craving that human connection. And when they’re not getting in the personal life and they’re not getting it at work, where else are they getting it?
00:27:01:19 – 00:27:21:15
Unknown
And I think the third point here is entrepreneurship. And this one’s a little bit more kind of out of pocket, I guess. And I’m not saying everyone should start their own business like I did, but it’s fostering the entrepreneurial mindset, instilling ownership in people earlier on. Too often young people don’t have ownership in anything until essentially they hit manager.
00:27:21:15 – 00:27:45:12
Unknown
And if it is ownership, it’s like over a single workbook or something like that. I’m talking areas where they can actually use creativity. So whether that’s, hey, organize a firm wide initiative or something H.R. Related our planet event or hey, figure out ways we can use technology in this area or what else can we sell this client on, yada, yada, yada, have them feel like they’re actually having their voice heard.
00:27:45:14 – 00:27:59:03
Unknown
Have them feel like they actually want to have an impact. And when you instill that sense of ownership, you’re going to have people stay longer. And it’s also going to be a lot more attractive when it’s a little bit more of a build your own career at our company. Right? It’s not hey, you fit into this box.
00:27:59:03 – 00:28:17:07
Unknown
So no matter how great you are at this, you’re still going to do staff level activities, and then you’ll have a whole new set when you hit senior and then a whole new when you hit manager, make it a little bit more flowy in between. You know, you have people that have strengths in different areas. Again, you can’t apply a one size fits all model to every single graduate that’s coming into your practice.
00:28:17:13 – 00:28:53:02
Unknown
Yeah, I’ll add something to that, I think I think people coming into this profession, would serve themselves well to take interest in entrepreneurial topics. You’re some, you know, you don’t just rely on the firm to help you with that sort of journey, like take some initiative and explore that side of your brain, basically. And if you do that, you will connect with clients, business owners much more effectively and it will serve your career very well.
00:28:53:04 – 00:29:23:01
Unknown
I think, you know, I’ve been in the industry a long time, and I can say without a doubt, the more entrepreneurial accountants, they connect much more genuinely and effectively with business owners, and they’re able to provide value because they share that similar perspective. So, it’s not just something that’s fun and interesting. It’s actually will very much serve you well.
00:29:23:03 – 00:29:48:16
Unknown
Wow, I really love that. Do you have any specific examples of that kind of coming into play at all? Well, I, I have an example from my early career, so I was always interested in entrepreneurship. And I remember I had this client who, I worked for a mid-sized CPA firm, and I had this client who was this kind of really interesting entrepreneur.
00:29:48:16 – 00:30:14:14
Unknown
I think he had I think he didn’t even have a high school education, but he was really smart, and he owned a ton of Pizza Hut’s. He’s like this major franchise owner and his bookkeeper quit, and they I was like two years. I was like a two year staff person. I was fairly new. And so they put me out there and the guy would just talk to me and I would, you know, I’d have these conversations with him.
00:30:14:16 – 00:30:38:13
Unknown
And I remember one particular afternoon, he probably spent three hours talking to me, and he had no care about, you know, what my firm was billing him or of any he was just really taking an interest because I was genuinely curious about how he operated and how, how he started the business, how he, manages, manage the business.
00:30:38:13 – 00:31:02:23
Unknown
He’s very successful guy. And, so anyway, I just found that personally, that was probably one of the most vivid examples I have of, you know, a client, like, forget the work for a minute. Let’s have a good conversation. And, you know, I think he and I both came away, you know, feeling really good about that conversation.
00:31:03:00 – 00:31:25:05
Unknown
Oh, yeah. You know, so that’s a great example. I think it even goes back to the curiosity thing that we kind of touched on earlier. Right. Being interested in what other people are doing. And I think we can sometimes get siloed. Right. Being an accountant where you only touch this area, only talk about this area. I think your story is a great example of there’s actually benefit in talking about more.
00:31:25:05 – 00:31:51:20
Unknown
There’s benefit in getting to know someone, being more entrepreneurial, being more innovative and creative. Yeah, yeah, I mean, and some of these business owners are I mean they’ve got really interesting stories I mean exciting crazy. Yeah. You’d be surprised at how how many entrepreneurs have gone bankrupt have had major problems. I mean all of it’s very interesting you know.
00:31:51:20 – 00:32:20:02
Unknown
Yeah. So much to learn from. Right. I completely agree with you. And I find people that you connect with on a personal basis. They state your clients longer and they’re better clients too. So it’s a great way to think about it. So, let’s talk about future proofing a practice. If you were to give one piece of advice to entrepreneurial accountants about future proofing, what would it be?
00:32:20:04 – 00:32:38:24
Unknown
I think it’s invest in your young like younger people at your company, and also invest in yourself. I think too often we jump forward too many steps and never take a second back to, you know, upskill or develop our employees or even develop ourselves. I think you have to know where your strengths are and where your weaknesses are.
00:32:38:24 – 00:32:59:01
Unknown
And I always say, are you willing to spend the time to bolster those weaknesses, or do you need to hire someone for it? And I think having a really good touch on that evaluating, and then also just investing in what needs to be invested is the best way. I think people are afraid of spending money sometimes, and sometimes spending money can actually give you less of a headache.
00:32:59:03 – 00:33:17:05
Unknown
I always like to put a dollar worth on my time and if it doesn’t match up to the dollars that I’m willing to spend, or vice versa, not necessarily worth it. And that’s really what I see for successful entrepreneurs. They know where their limits are, they know when to bring people on board, and they spend time with people in their company.
00:33:17:07 – 00:33:34:06
Unknown
If you’re a solo entrepreneur as well, that’s spending time with yourself even. And it sounds really silly, I know, but trust me, you don’t know as much as you actually think you do. And when you’re doing the same things day in and day out, it gets a little repetitive and you’re not necessarily building. Spend that time. Take a course on something.
00:33:34:06 – 00:33:50:01
Unknown
Talk with someone about something you’ve never heard about, and you’ll get new ideas coming in. It’s not necessarily about knowing the tangible skills of, you know, let’s say you want to take a computer science class. It’s unnecessary that you are going to now build your own website yourself. But it’s knowing that and maybe it’ll spark an idea for you.
00:33:50:01 – 00:34:14:19
Unknown
Maybe you’ll find a niche from that. Maybe it’ll allow you to have a conversation with someone that then becomes the client, because you actually know a little something about computer science, and that’s appealing to them. Right? It’s so not linear. There’s so many branches to every type of opportunity. So investment is absolutely key here. Nice. All right I’m going I’m going to change the topic a little bit here to get into some kind of fun personal stuff.
00:34:14:21 – 00:34:42:18
Unknown
So you mentioned in your bio that you love traveling. How has travel impacted your worldview and by extension, your career trajectory? Yeah. I mean, I think in so many different ways I can touch on worldview first and then go into career, for World View. I mean, I obviously if you’re listening to this auditory, I am half Asian, so I feel like I grew up with an ethnic background.
00:34:42:20 – 00:35:11:19
Unknown
And because of that, I’ve always had a slightly different worldview than most people. But being able to travel and even seeing past that has made me realize all different ways to connect with people. You know, culturally it’s very different talking to someone from Japan than it might be talking to someone from the States. And even if you’re not dealing with international clients or customers, you take that same mindset back to when you talk to people, no matter who you’re talking to, there’s a slightly different approach you’re going to take to be able to kind of win them over.
00:35:11:21 – 00:35:35:06
Unknown
And I think that’s a really big thing. That’s kind of influenced my mindset towards what the world really looks like and appreciating differences in others. I think in terms of career, not necessarily in the work I do, but the way that I’ve structured my life style. I love traveling, so I wanted to have a career that really allowed me to travel and allowed me to have flexibility to see places.
00:35:35:06 – 00:35:56:03
Unknown
And I’ve been very lucky that my work takes me traveling for business, or I can work remotely and really go wherever I want and work from there. So my whole life I’ve really known I wanted to be an entrepreneur because I wanted to work for myself. And I think when you have those goals in mind and you find something you love, like I do, it really helps frame it out.
00:35:56:07 – 00:36:25:18
Unknown
You know, a job that gives 14 days off a year doesn’t really fit what I love to do in life. And so because of that, it was a huge motivating factor for me to do my own thing and not stick it out a few more years at a bigger company. Yeah, well, I’ve noticed the pattern that the firm owners who end up taking the most time to to go and travel and the US and the unplug from their businesses actually build way more successful businesses hundred percent.
00:36:25:22 – 00:36:42:17
Unknown
No one wants a micromanager. No one wants someone that’s on edge all the time. It’s important to even show an example to your employees. It is okay to take time off. A lot of people don’t feel comfortable. Oh, my partner never takes time off. The partners working every night until 11 p.m.. Is that the example you want to set?
00:36:42:17 – 00:36:58:04
Unknown
Is that the lifestyle that you want your employees to live? For me, it’s not. So I like to show, you know, you can live a life of indulgence and you can live a life where you’re able to make your own time. And I’ve really adopted that with people that work for me as well. You know, it’s not a traditional 9 to 5, right?
00:36:58:10 – 00:37:12:20
Unknown
You can kind of choose your own hours as long as the work gets done. And I think more and more people should embrace that. You know, a lot of other countries actually do that too. You people take siestas, two people take three hour lunches. You know, they get the work done, but they do it on their own time.
00:37:12:20 – 00:37:34:04
Unknown
And that’s something I love. Yeah, yeah. We see a difference even between like Canada and us. We, you know, we serve a lot of Canadians and, and Americans as well. And there’s definitely a little bit of a cultural difference around two. Oh oh it’s huge. I mean, I’m half Canadian, actually, so I have dual citizenship, so it works out really well.
00:37:34:04 – 00:37:55:04
Unknown
But now I completely see it with, you know, my partner’s Canadian and my family up there’s Canadian. And even seeing the way they approach retirement, seeing the way they approach PTO. You know, my partner doesn’t take his laptop on vacation. Right. That was something I was so unfamiliar with. I was like, what? I take my laptop with me on vacation on the off chance I have to do something.
00:37:55:04 – 00:38:14:06
Unknown
He’s like, no, that’s not my job, right? Yeah. And I think that’s so different than the American mentality of, like, you always kind of need to be on. Yeah, we actually wrote a book called The Unplugged Vacation. So if anybody wants to check that out, it’s, it’s a good way to unplug. All right. So I gave my I gave a book recommendation on my own book.
00:38:14:06 – 00:38:31:14
Unknown
I’m sorry. You have a book recommendation for our audience? Well, I definitely will need to check out your book at times. Very interesting. But my favorite that I would like to recommend to people is How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It’s been a lot of what I’ve talked about on here, too.
00:38:31:16 – 00:38:50:20
Unknown
My dad actually made me read it when I was younger, and it has stuck with me since. I like to do almost a yearly refresh of kind of just skimming the main things. But it really has helped inform how I interact with people and business owners and just clients in general. I think anyone that wants to achieve success in any capacity should read it.
00:38:50:20 – 00:39:07:05
Unknown
It teaches you how to be a better person and how to get to know people. Even if you’re not trying to run a business, even if you’re not an accountant, it is very valuable to learn how to really interact with people and get people on your side and get people excited for you. Do you see people struggle with that nowadays?
00:39:07:05 – 00:39:30:24
Unknown
So it’s timeless. I when was that book written? That was probably written in the 40s or so long ago, but that is a great classic book. Thank you for recommending that. Fantastic. All right, last question. What has been the most memorable or outrageous experience of your career? Yeah, well, I love this question. So obviously I do a lot of work in Puerto Rico.
00:39:30:24 – 00:39:50:15
Unknown
So luckily for me, that means I go down to Puerto Rico quite often. And I’m one of these occasions. The resort that I stay at has a bunch of events, and it’s always, you know, people come in on their golf carts or fancy cars and there’s catered dinner and things like that. So I was at this one event and I turn around and Brock Pierce is right there.
00:39:50:15 – 00:40:05:18
Unknown
And if you’re not familiar with who Brock Pierce is, he is a billionaire crypto investor. And I was like, wow. And I think he was also a child actor. But I was like, wow, that’s so crazy. And I look to the side of him, and Justin Trudeau’s brother is standing next to him, and they’re having a conversation.
00:40:05:20 – 00:40:27:23
Unknown
So me being me, I can talk to anyone. I just walked up and introduced myself. I was like, hi, I’m Rachel, like, I handle this. Oh, nice to meet you. And we talked for two plus hours through this conversation. Different celebrities, hedge fund managers, huge names in private equity. We’re walking in and out of the conversation, too, and it was such a surreal experience.
00:40:27:23 – 00:40:49:01
Unknown
Very outrageous. I never would have thought if you had asked me a few years prior to this, if that would ever happen to me, I would have paid $0. No bet on it. But being in that moment really made me reflect like, wow, this is insane, that this is what life looks like for some people. And it was cool to be able to kind of, you know, rub shoulders with everyone around me and just see what real success looks like.
00:40:49:01 – 00:41:08:13
Unknown
Yeah, people with bodyguards, they’re like, that is so crazy. I mean, that’s not something I see in regular daily life, you know? Yeah. Wow, that is so cool. Well, Rachel, this has been just a great conversation. I’m sure our listeners have not only learned something, but just had a good, good, enjoyable time. Listen to this. And thank you for joining us.
00:41:08:15 – 00:41:34:08
Unknown
If they want, if someone wants to reach out to you, what’s the best way to do that? What’s the best way to. Yeah. So two different ways. If you’re interested in anything, talk stock eye related. Feel free to go to Tech Stack A.com. We do free demos, and we’ll also do a free 14 day trial. For those of you listening, if you do want to get an extra month free, just use the promo code Course free and you’ll get an extra free month just for listening to this podcast.
00:41:34:10 – 00:41:51:06
Unknown
If you are interested in the Puerto Rico side of things or just want to ask me questions, head to Rachel Ferris, cpa.com. I have a contact form on there and a lot of information. I reply back to all individual emails myself, or you can just connect with me on LinkedIn. I’m very responsive so look forward to hearing from some of you.
00:41:51:08 – 00:41:54:03
Unknown
Awesome. Thank you again, Rachel. Of course. Thank you.
00:41:54:03 – 00:42:15:02
Unknown
Thanks for listening to the Accountant’s Flight Plan podcast. You can keep the momentum going by subscribing and sharing your thoughts with us. Visit our website at home. Group advisors.com for more resources and tune in next time for more exciting conversations like this one. This podcast was produced and edited by Liesl Eppes of her group advisors. Thanks for listening.
