Buying AI Is Easy. Rebuilding the Firm Is Hard. | Accounting Voices

So I asked these forty-eight people in a series of twelve-minute videos, and I gave them the questions in advance.

And these were a blend of firm leaders, consultants, podcasters, media people, influencers, tech experts.

The same five questions.

Question one was, what defined twenty twenty-five? Question two, and let's not pretend that it was a really great year for accounting and everything was fine and dandy and everybody's happy.

I asked them, what disappointed, challenged, frustrated you about the last year? Question three, I asked them what they changed their mind on, not necessarily done on what AT, but what influenced their thinking the most.

Question four, I asked them what skills attributes they felt leaders needed to adopt or upgrade on to stay relevant in twenty twenty-six.

And question five was a prediction that they felt pretty sure was going to happen this year.

And in the next five episodes of Accounting Voices here on all podcast channels and on our YouTube channel, which is growing by the day, I am gonna give you the answers.

They've all gone into Google NotebookLM and through ChatGPT and everything else, 'cause you, you can imagine this is a huge body of work.

Asking forty-eight people the same question, you get a lot of different themes and answers.

So in this episode, I'm gonna go through question one with you on, on what we found.

Because when we ask people what defines the year, an uncomfortable truth came out that twenty twenty-five was not a year of progress so much as it was a year of separation.

Because while many accounting firms were still navigating change, a smaller group was starting to operationalize change and adapt very quickly.

But that gap was huge.

The velocity gap, as it's being called, and it's defining a kind of a fault line in accounting.

So I asked these forty-eight people in a series of twelve-minute videos, and I gave them the questions in advance.

And these were a blend of firm leaders, consultants, podcasters, media people, influencers, tech experts.

The same five questions.

Question one was, what defined twenty twenty-five? Question two, and let's not pretend that it was a really great year for accounting and everything was fine and dandy and everybody's happy.

I asked them, what disappointed, challenged, frustrated you about the last year? Question three, I asked them what they changed their mind on, not necessarily done on what AT, but what influenced their thinking the most.

Question four, I asked them what skills attributes they felt leaders needed to adopt or upgrade on to stay relevant in twenty twenty-six.

And question five was a prediction that they felt pretty sure was going to happen this year.

And in the next five episodes of Accounting Voices here on all podcast channels and on our YouTube channel, which is growing by the day, I am gonna give you the answers.

They've all gone into Google NotebookLM and through ChatGPT and everything else, 'cause you, you can imagine this is a huge body of work.

Asking forty-eight people the same question, you get a lot of different themes and answers.

So in this episode, I'm gonna go through question one with you on, on what we found.

Because when we ask people what defines the year, an uncomfortable truth came out that twenty twenty-five was not a year of progress so much as it was a year of separation.

Because while many accounting firms were still navigating change, a smaller group was starting to operationalize change and adapt very quickly.

But that gap was huge.

The velocity gap, as it's being called, and it's defining a kind of a fault line in accounting.