Accounting
Rebuilding the corporate ladder at accounting firms
I was sitting down at Bryant Park in New York City, having a strawberry daiquiri and eating fried calamari at noon on a Friday in the middle of the summer with my fellow public accounting interns. Life was good.
You don’t even mind being dressed up in business casual attire when you’re getting paid $25 per hour to be there (internship programs usually let out early after Friday morning team-building sessions), especially while all your friends were working their menial summer jobs. Honestly, I was proud to be part of the corporate America grind, on the train with other professionals for the morning commute.
My identity very much so embraced the essence of a modern day yuppie (Young Urban Professional) for those not familiar with the term that boomed in the 1980s. I’d even started wearing argyle fashion, got custom dress shirts with my initials embroidered, and became a coffee enthusiast.
I recall thinking, “I’m going to be on the fast path and make partner in 10 years,” whilst having never done any real work beyond rolling forward workpapers, highlighting unreconciled cells on spreadsheets and gathering team lunch orders. The dream felt very real, and while 10 years is a pipedream at any national size firm and larger, I was convinced that I’d be quickly climbing the ladder in front of me.
But then came my actual first real engagement … where if I didn’t know something, I had to figure it out, not just highlight it and pass it on.
I did eventually get the hang of it, but not before my expectations of my career path shifted.
The traditional ladder sales pitch
Almost every one of us who came through the major public accounting firm “farm system” has heard it: Every five years or so, you can see your salary double. Associate 1 and 2. Senior 1, 2 and 3. Manager, experienced manager, senior manager, partner, MD or principal. The corporate ladder was very clear and transparent, which is probably the reason why so many of us went into accounting.
We’re naturally risk averse — this isn’t a secret. We like predictability, and nothing is more predictable than the past (we leave the financial forecasting to the more risky budgeting folks). It’s not just in knowing the black and white technical details of accounting, but it’s in our careers as well. We want to know what comes next.
That’s why public accounting was always so appealing — you know if you just dig in and grind it out, you’ll get a predictable raise and follow a steady promotion path.
With the injection of private equity into the profession, though, it’s not shocking that there may be a revisiting of how this ladder works.
The three employee types
Well before PE got on the scene, I’d begun preaching one of the core elements to my thought leadership paradigm: the three types of employees.
The three types of employees are the technician, manager and leader (sometimes referred to as the entrepreneur).
The technician is the person who is really good at doing the core work of the operation — think of your best senior associate on an audit or tax engagement. They minimize review notes, can be relied on to get the engagement done cleanly, and are always in the top percentile of utilization rates.
The manager is the person whom employees can turn to when they’re stressed. They are specially skilled in providing a calm and collected demeanor to the room, and create a sense of confidence that “we can do this.” Simply put, they are really good at understanding and managing people, keeping the engagement rolling, and reporting on how things are going.
The leader is the visionary of the group, who finds a way to get innovative with problem-solving. They think creatively about work, how to get it done and why it needs to get done. Oftentimes they are building the brand, doing business development, fostering partnerships and alliances, and designing strategic initiative campaigns.
This theory resonated with me, so I adopted, iterated and refined it — especially because I had firsthand experience with the alternative.
As I mentioned earlier, I originally was set on making partner, and I had many leaders tell me I would make a great one. Anyone who knows me gets my outgoing and charismatic personality type, which is considered a bit rare in the accounting world. This is exactly what makes for a successful partner, because you’re selling and doing business development.
My problem, however, was that I didn’t have what it took to handle the 10+ years of technical grind, essentially keeping my personality in a box so I could focus on the work tasks at hand, only to then finally be able to whip it out a decade later.
It got me thinking about the corporate ladder and promotion structure, which I later realized applies to all professions, not just accounting.
Here’s how the old structure works:
The best technicians (associates) get promoted to manager. The best managers get promoted to leadership (partners). The best leaders steer the business.
The problem? Being the best in one area doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to be the best in the next area … in fact, you could be worse.
Getting innovative with it
So now that you’ve got the context, the natural query is: so what do we change to?
Well, I was told I’d make for a great (leader) partner, but my problem was that in order to get there, I’d first have to prove I was the best technician (audit senior) and then the best manager. These two skill areas were not as much in my wheelhouse as my innovative and creative talents — so I’d either struggle and stress my way through to get to that position, or there’d need to be a different ladder to climb.
What if the alternative ladder offered paths that lent themselves to the person’s strong suite?
Right now, everyone wants to take the promotion to manager, because it means more money and status … but being a manager is an entirely different skill set! That’s why you have really bad managers, who are in that position because they were the best technician (now they’re just annoying micromanagers).
The best technician who is not good at managing people shouldn’t be a manager, but they wouldn’t turn down more money or a promotion, so what do you do?
If you took away the incentive but instead incentivized people to pick a path that leans into what they’re good at, how many technicians would choose to just keep becoming more efficient and effective technical workers? What if there are employees who are excellent at managing people, but not great at doing the actual work, who should just be overseeing the engagements? What if there are individuals who struggle to tend to report-to needs, but are brilliantly innovative and can design comprehensive business development plans?
All of these employee types need each other, and all are equally important, so why not pay them all equally?
If you just want to lock in and knock out audits or tax work and not think about dealing with people or finding new business, you could climb a technician ladder and eventually be the firm’s resident expert.
If you find yourself struggling to get the work done but are well liked and a person others can turn to for support, why not be on a manager path where you keep the culture, ensure project timeliness, and keep the ship steady?
If you’re always thinking about ways to grow the business, improve processes and get creative, how about an entrepreneurial path that puts you in an environment where you can be strategic and innovative for the good of the firm?
If we remove the stigma that one type of employee needs to be paid more than the other, we can start to design this new system. People won’t have to be torn between choosing what they’re good at and what is advantageous to their career.
A calculated move
Right now, it’s a tossup of business success, hoping that someone who excels at one employee type tier will be good at the next one. If you’re lucky, you end up with a great leader — but private equity and the world are starting to rely less on luck and more on accurate predicting.
You might miss out on some of the best managers and partners if your only or most heavily weighed promotion metric is technical skill.
If I’m an investor, I want my best technicians working, my best people and project managers managing, and my most creative and innovative minds leading the business growth — and I’d be willing to pay these all the same.
Everyone is happy, everyone is doing what they’re good at, and everyone is getting paid for their contribution. It’s a win all around.
I’d argue that this type of ladder provides a better, more calculated path to business success and career success for each individual and the company than the former method, so maybe it’s worth a serious conversation.
One thing is for certain: if I ever am running my own business or firm, I’ll be implementing this approach.
Significant changes are in store for President Donald Trump’s signature $3.9 trillion tax-cut bill as the Senate begins closed-door talks this week on legislation that squeaked through the House by a single vote.
Senate Republican leaders are aiming to make permanent many of the temporary tax cuts in the House bill, a move that would increase the bill’s more than $2.5 trillion deficit impact. But doing so risks alienating fiscal hawks already at war with party moderates over the bill’s safety-net cuts.
It amounts to a game of chess further complicated by the top Senate rules-keeper, who will decide whether some key provisions violate the chamber’s strict rules. Jettisoning those provisions — which include gun silencer regulations and artificial intelligence policy — could sink the bill in the House.
House Republicans’ top tax writer, Representative Jason Smith, on Friday said that senators need to leave most of the bill untouched in order to ensure it can pass the House in the end.
“I would encourage my counterparts, don’t be too drastic, be very balanced,” he said.
The wrangling imperils Republicans’ goal of sending the “Big, Beautiful Bill” to Trump’s desk by July 4. But the real deadline is sometime in August or September, when the Treasury Department estimates the US will run out of borrowing authority.
The House bill would raise the government’s legal debt ceiling by $4 trillion, which the Senate wants to increase to $5 trillion in order to push off the next fiscal cliff until after the 2026 congressional elections.
That’s just one of the major changes the Senate will weigh in the coming weeks. Here are others:
Permanent business breaks
Senate Finance Chairman Mike Crapo’s top priority is making permanent the temporary business tax cuts that the House bill sunsets after 2029. These are the research and development tax deduction, the ability to use depreciation and amortization as the basis for interest expensing, and 100% bonus depreciation of certain property, including most machinery and factories.
Senate Republicans plan to use a budget gimmick that counts the extension of the individual provisions in the 2017 Trump tax bill as having no cost. That gives them room to make the additional business tax cuts and possibly extend some of the new four-year individual cuts in the House bill like those on tips and overtime.
Deficit hawks could demand new offsets, however, either in the form of spending cuts or ending tax breaks like one on carried interest used by private equity.
Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg
The SALT cap
The House expanded the state and local tax deduction limit from $10,000 to $40,000 to get blue-state Republicans behind the bill. But SALT isn’t an issue in the Senate, where high-tax states like California, New York and New Jersey are represented by Democrats.
“I can’t think of any Senate Republicans who think more than $10,000 is needed and I can think of several who think the number should be zero,” said Rohit Kumar, a former top Senate staffer now with Big Four firm PwC.
That includes deficit hawks like Louisiana’s John Kennedy, who has balked at the House’s SALT boost.
Senators could propose keeping the current $10,000 SALT cap as a low-ball counter, forcing the House to settle from something in the ballpark of a $30,000 cap, Kumar said.
The Senate could also change new limits on the abilities of passthrough service businesses to claim SALT deductions.
Green energy tax credits
Moderate Republicans in the Senate are pushing back on provisions in the House bill that gut tax credits for solar, wind, battery makers and several other clean energy sectors.
Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said she’s seeking to soften aggressive phaseouts of tax credits for clean electricity production and nuclear power. She has the backing of at least three other Republicans, giving her enough leverage to make demands in a chamber where opposition from four GOP senators would kill the bill.
Their demands will run headlong into ultraconservatives, who already think the House bill doesn’t get rid of tax benefits for clean energy fast enough.
Medicaid, Food Stamps
Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky, Rick Scott of Florida, Mike Lee of Utah and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin say they’re willing to sink the bill if it doesn’t cut more spending.
“I think we have enough to stop the process until the president gets serious about reductions,” Johnson said recently on CNN.
They haven’t made specific demands yet, but they could start off where the House Freedom Caucus fell short — cutting the federal matching payment for Medicaid for those enrolled under Obamacare and further limiting federal reimbursement for Medicaid provider taxes charged by states.
Conservatives’ demands are in stark contrast to Republican senators already uncomfortable with the new Medicaid co-pays and state cost-sharing for Medicaid and food stamps in the House bill. Senators Josh Hawley of Missouri, Susan Collins of Maine, and Jim Justice and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia join Murkowski in this camp.
Boosting their case is Trump, who told the Freedom Caucus to stop “grandstanding” on more Medicaid cuts.
Regulatory matters
There’s an extensive list of regulatory matters in the House bill that could be struck if they are found to break Senate rules for averting a filibuster and passing the legislation by a simple majority.
Provisions likely to be challenged for not being primarily budgetary in nature include a repeal of gun silencer regulations, preemption of state artificial intelligence regulations, staffing regulations for nursing homes and abolishing the Direct File program at the Internal Revenue Service.
The House bill’s provisions limiting the ability of federal judges to hold administration officials in contempt, ending funding for Planned Parenthood, requiring congressional review of new regulations and easing permitting of fossil fuel projects are also vulnerable.
The biggest Senate rules fight will be over using the “current policy” budget gimmick to lower the cost of the bill. Senate Republican leaders could explore bypassing rules keeper Elizabeth MacDonough if she finds the accounting move breaks the rules.
Battles over these provisions could take weeks.
“I think it would be very difficult to get it out of the Senate quickly,” said Bill Hoagland, a former top Republican Senate budget staffer now with the Bipartisan Policy Center.
Spectrum sales as pay-fors
A major auction of government radio spectrum that would generate an estimated $88 billion in revenue is another unresolved fight.
Ted Cruz of Texas, the Senate Commerce chair, backs the spectrum sale but Senator Mike Rounds of South Dakota has vowed to protect the Defense Department, which has warned auctioning off its spectrum would degrade its capabilities and cost hundreds of billions for retrofits.
The proposal would free up key spectrum for wireless broadband giants like Verizon and Elon Musk’s Starlink.
The estate tax
Majority Leader John Thune and 46 other Republican senators back a total repeal of the estate tax, which would likely cost several hundred billion dollars over a decade, benefiting the heirs of the richest 0.1%. That could make it too pricey for the Senate to include.
The House bill permanently increases the estate tax exemption to $15 million for individuals and $30 million for married couples, with future increases tied to inflation.
Private-equity backed accounting firm Ascend has added Florida Regional Leader firm Saltmarsh, Cleaveland & Gund and California-based Glenn Burdette to its platform, effective June 1.
Saltmarsh, Cleaveland & Gund, based in Pensacola and Tampa, Florida, and Glenn Burdette, in San Luis Obispo, California, are the latest firms to join Arlington, Virginia-based Ascend, which is backed by private equity firm Alpine Investors and ranked No. 29 on Accounting Today‘s
Glenn Burdette formerly operated under an employee stock ownership plan and adds a central California presence to Ascend along with a team of 75 and seven partners, while Saltmarsh marks Ascend’s first Florida footprint and adds a team of 16 partners and 178 total team members to the firm.
Ascend reported $314.74 million in revenue and 1,464 employees in 2024.
Terms of both deals were not disclosed.
“These are two monumental partnerships for Ascend,” said Ascend president Nishaad in a statement. “Glenn Burdette was founded 60 years ago, and in 2000 became the first CPA firm in California to form an ESOP. That decision marked the firm’s commitment to a set of core values that they still wear on their sleeve today – a desire to provide opportunity for their people, a focus on shared ownership as an enabler of success, and a fierce commitment to hold the pen on their own story.”
Glenn Burdette provides tax, audit, bookkeeping, business consulting and financial management services, primarily to middle-market and small owner-managed businesses.
“Partnering with Ascend is the right move at the right time for Glenn Burdette,” said the firm’s CEO David Merlo. “Their forward-thinking approach and shared values make them a natural fit for our next chapter. We chose Ascend because of their strong commitment to reimagining what’s possible — for both our clients and our people.”
Saltmarsh, Cleaveland and Gund is a full-service accounting and advisory firm offering expertise and specialized consulting for many industries and high-net-worth individuals.
“Saltmarsh has an equally proud history, with an 80-year legacy in Florida’s panhandle and central cities,” said Ruparel in a statement. “The firm is synonymous with quality, is a longstanding best-place-to-work, and has a dynamic group of partners that are seen as trusted advisors across disciplines. Less than a year ago, Lee Bell and the Saltmarsh leadership team took the time they needed to articulate a strategic vision that would carry the firm into the next decade and enumerate a plan for achieving that vision. We feel privileged that they decided Ascend is best positioned to help them fulfill those ideals.”
“The success of our business is entirely about putting our people first so they can do what they love, which is helping our clients achieve success,” said Saltmarsh Advisors CEO Lee Bell in a statement. “Ascend’s intense focus on people and their unique concentration on supporting our more than 80-year legacy as Saltmarsh is why we made the decision to partner with them.”
Both Glenn Burdette and Saltmarsh are independent members of the BDO Alliance.
Since Ascend was launched in early 2023, it has made a significant number of investments, including including
Intuit has reported strong third quarter growth, with the company reporting total revenue of $7.8 billion, an increase of 15 percent. Within this revenue growth, Intuit’s Credit Karma grew the most, raking in $579 million during the third quarter, a 31 percent increase, driven by credit cards, personal loans and car insurance.
With this growth in mind, Intuit is optimistic about its future prospects and has raised its full year guidance for FY2025 as a result. The company now expects to end the year with $18.760 billion, which would represent a roughly 15% annual growth, higher than the previously expected 12-13% growth. GAAP operating income is expected now to grow 35% versus the previously-anticipated 28-30%; non-GAAP income, similarly, is anticipated to grow 18% versus 13-14%.
Business solutions revenue is expected now to grow about 16%, the consumer group is expected to grow about 10% (versus 7-8% previously), the ProTax group is expected to grow 3-4% and Credit Karma is expected to grow 28% (versus 5-8% previously).
Within the consumer group specifically, TurboTax Live is expected to grow 47%, to $2 billion; TurboTax Online is expected to grow about 6% on share gains and average revenue per return is expected to grow 13% as more customers choose assisted offerings. Meanwhile, the number of customers who use TurboTax for free is expected to go down from 10 million last year to 8 million this year.
Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi attributed this rapid growth to its AI investments.
“We have exceptional momentum with outstanding performance across our platform. We’re redefining what’s possible with AI by becoming a one-stop shop of AI-agents and AI-enabled human experts to fuel the success of consumers and small and mid-market businesses,” said Sasan Goodarzi, Intuit’s chief executive officer. “We had an outstanding year in tax, including a significant acceleration in TurboTax Live revenue growth as we disrupt the assisted tax category.”
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