This LIE About AI Will Hurt Your CPA Firm | Preston Cardwell Video

What if the secret to building a highly scalable, multi-million dollar practice isn't just growing an accounting firm, but surrounding it with banking, legal, wealth management, and insurance services? In this episode of Growing Your Firm, host David Cristello sits down with Tobby Kommer, CEO of Haga Kommer and President of Aspire Bank and Aspire Insurance. Tobby brings a unique background from the banking and M&A sectors, rather than traditional public accounting, allowing him to rethink the entire accounting firm business model. Over the last decade, Tobby has led over 35 acquisitions of CPA firms, growing his practice from a 12-person team to over 250 employees across 15 locations. He shares his exact framework for running an acquisitive firm, restructuring partner and staff compensation around production instead of billable hours, and preparing his company for a 100% Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) transition. In this episode, we explore: The Integrated One-Stop Shop: Why bringing banking, legal, wealth management, insurance, and CPA services under one umbrella creates the ultimate client retention engine.

Is your firm relying entirely on word-of-mouth referrals to grow? While client referrals bring in warm leads, they make controlling your growth trajectory nearly impossible. To build a high-performing advisory practice, you need a predictable, repeatable go-to-market engine. In this live panel session from the Growing Your Firm Summit, host David Cristello moderates a discussion with three firm leaders who have built, scaled, and transformed modern advisory practices: Shane Mason – Co-Founder at Nimble (led 8 years of hyper-growth)

Are your firm's internal processes starting to creak under the weight of new growth? When scaling a Client Accounting Services (CAS) or advisory practice, standardizing workflows, managing team capacity, and maintaining quality control become the ultimate operational test. In this live panel session from the Growing Your Firm Summit, host David Cristello brings together a "Council of Operations Experts" to discuss how to build sustainable systems that scale without causing team burnout: Amy McCarty – Director of Operations at Dillon Business Advisors (20+ years coaching firm leaders)

Can you run a half-million-dollar accounting practice completely solo without burning out? Most accounting firm owners and CPAs starting firms assume that scaling past $200k or $300k requires hiring a team of employees. But adding headcount often leads to higher overhead, management headaches, and less personal freedom. In this episode of Growing Your Firm, host David Cristello sits down with Angel Zhen, CPA—founder of Angel Zhen CPA and winner of the 2025 Digital CPA Innovative Practitioner Award. Angel shares how he built a single-person practice generating over $500,000 annually while taking 12 weeks of vacation every single year! Whether you're a bookkeeping firm owner, an operations manager, or a firm manager responsible for workflow, this episode offers a masterclass in pricing, positioning, tech selection, and firm design. In this episode, we explore: The Solo Firm Operating Model: How Angel scales past $500k without employees or managing a full-time staff.

Is the billable hour finally dead? While many in the accounting profession expected the competition for talent to end timesheets, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is delivering the final blow. If your firm is still pricing based on time and effort rather than value and outcomes, you are risking your margins in an AI-driven world. In this exclusive fireside chat from the Growing Your Firm Summit, host David Cristello sits down with Ron Baker, founder of the VeraSage Institute, author of 8 best-selling books, and co-host of The Soul of Enterprise podcast. Ron breaks down the core psychology of value pricing, why firms must transition from selling "services" to guiding "transformations," and how subscription models create predictable recurring revenue. In this episode, we explore: The Death of the Billable Hour: Why AI makes pricing by the hour obsolete—and what firms must do to adapt.