Why Relationships Still Drive Career Success

Connections create career opportunities, resilience, and leadership growth.  In the accounting profession, technical excellence is expected. However, according to the latest episode of Accounting ARC, relationships — not just work product — often determine who grows, who leads, and who thrives.  In a candid and deeply personal conversation, Liz Mason, CPA, and Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP, explore how relationship-building shapes careers, creates opportunity, and provides stability in an unpredictable profession.   … Read More

AI Can Fix Your Workflow—or Break It in Seconds

Deliberate experimentation can unlock value—without creating costly mistakes.  Artificial intelligence is moving fast—fast enough that even the people experimenting with it daily admit they’re still figuring it out in real time. On the latest episode of Accounting ARC, Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP, and Liz Mason, CPA, take listeners inside that reality: a profession eager to unlock AI-driven efficiency, but still learning how to manage the risks … Read More

AI Isn’t Just for Big Firms: Why Smaller Practices May Have the Real Advantage

SMEs are better positioned to experiment, deliver value, and redefine what AI success actually looks like. Does meaningful AI adoption require scale, budget, and the dedicated innovation teams embedded in large accounting groups? In this episode of Accounting ARC, Donny Shimamoto, CPA.CITP, CGMA; Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP; and Liz Mason, CPA, take on a familiar—but increasingly flawed—narrative in the accounting profession: that large accounting teams will define AI success  The reality, … Read More

The Caregiving Reality Facing Today’s Accounting Professionals

ARC hosts explore how the MOVE Project is addressing workforce challenges across all career paths. The accounting profession is confronting a growing reality that cuts across roles, industries, and career paths: more professionals are balancing demanding careers with caregiving responsibilities. In a recent episode of Accounting ARC, Donny Shimamoto, CPA.CITP, CGMA; Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP; and Liz Mason, CPA, explore how the … Read More

From MVP to Meltdown: Why Accounting Tech Struggles to Scale

ARC hosts examine how venture capital, sales pressure, and scalability challenges shape which solutions survive.  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 … Read More

Recognize When You Need to Recharge Before You Burn Out

Sleep, sunlight, movement, and self-knowledge help professionals recharge before stress turns into burnout. In accounting, exhaustion does not always look dramatic.  Sometimes it looks like irritability. Sometimes it looks like staring at a spreadsheet that suddenly makes no sense. Sometimes it looks like mental fog, poor focus, a mild headache, or the sense that even small decisions take too much effort.  In the latest … Read More

Trust but Verify: AI, Innovation & Accounting’s Next Generation

Young professionals bring adaptability and media literacy that firms need in an AI-driven era.  Student-Led Conversations opens its second season with a conversation that reflects a larger shift underway in the accounting profession: rapid technology change, accelerating adoption of artificial intelligence tools and an increasing push to bring younger voices into the discussion.  Arpan Grewal, a Center for Accounting Transformation … Read More

The Accounting Reset

From shifting licensure pathways to AI acceleration and new expectations around governance and culture, the accounting profession is entering a decisive new phase. In this featured analysis from Accounting ARC, Donny Shimamoto, Liz Mason, and Byron Patrick unpack what’s changing, what it means for firm leaders, and why the next wave of opportunity may belong to those willing to rethink how their firms are designed.

Who Gets to Be “Professional”? Accounting vs. the DOE

The Accounting ARC trio Liz Mason, CPA, Byron Patrick, CPA.CITP, CGMA, and Donny Shimamoto, CPA.CITP, CGMA, react to the U.S. Department of Education’s move to treat accounting master’s programs as non-professional for federal loan limits.

Accounting ARC: Beyond the Bot – How Firms Operationalize AI

Firms set goals, build guardrails, and train relentlessly so AI creates measurable value.
Large-firm CIOs are buzzing about Copilot and other AI—but should you flip the switch for everyone? Liz Mason, Byron Patrick, and Donny Shimamoto unpack what effective rollout looks like, compare agentic AI vs. plain automation, talk prompt discipline, and explain why “start now—but be strategic” is the only path.