Discover how forward-thinking accounting firms are transforming tax season from a burnout-inducing marathon into a competitive advantage that retains top talent and delivers exceptional client results.
Highlights
- 99% of accountants experience burnout, with systemic workplace issues driving the crisis beyond time management.
- Professional-grade AI reduces cognitive load, improves accuracy, and transforms tax season from survival to advantage.
- Sustainable practices combine boundaries, workflow fixes, and intelligent technology to prevent annual burnout cycles.
Being an accountant means that work often comes in ebbs and flows. The tide moves in every quarter, and there is always tax season. It’s stressful; that’s just part of the business, right?
But tax season doesn’t have to be synonymous with burnout and staff exodus. Forward-thinking firms are discovering practical strategies that go beyond traditional time management, including how professional-grade AI is transforming tax season from survival mode to competitive advantage.
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The hidden cost of tax season burnout on your practice
The AI advantage: How professional-grade technology transforms tax season
From survival mode to competitive advantage
3 steps to avoid burnout during tax season
Ways to recover and avoid burnout next tax season
The hidden cost of tax season burnout on your practice
Understanding burnout’s true impact requires examining both the immediate research inefficiencies and the systemic workplace issues that perpetuate the problem beyond individual time management.
Research fatigue
Almost all (99%) of accountants experience some level of burnout, according to a 2022 survey conducted by FloQast. But the problem runs deeper than individual exhaustion.
Matthew M. Hauger, Senior Tax Managing Director at Jansen & Company CPAs, explains the old reality: “I used to spend an hour and a half on an article and realize it wasn’t what I needed.” This wasted time and frustration compounds across entire teams, creating a cascade of problems:
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- Staff retention crisis (97% of firms face staffing challenges during peak season)
- Client service quality deterioration under pressure
- Lost productivity from cognitive overload and inefficient research processes
- Long-term reputation and growth implications
For some professions, the impact is minimal. Being an accountant is different. Numbers are less flexible, and even a seemingly small error can have serious consequences.
Why traditional burnout solutions fall short
Abundant guidance exists on how to avoid burnout. Most will tell you to set boundaries, and that is good advice. The problem is that boundaries are only a tiny piece of the problem. Many people experience burnout because of systemic issues, meaning that the structure of their workplaces is inherently flawed.
Complex cases requiring “deep, structured research and nuanced interpretation” overwhelm teams without proper tools. In cases like that, it doesn’t matter how many boundaries they set; they won’t escape burnout until someone addresses the bigger issue.
The foundation: Creating a culture of support and innovation
Take the time to set up a company culture that helps your people do their best work and do fewer tasks that they could easily hand off. This means redefining success beyond simply tracking hours worked:
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- Quality over quantity: accuracy under pressure
- Team development during peak periods
- Client satisfaction as a team achievement
Building a culture that supports learning and growth, even during peak season, is essential. As Hauger notes about his approach to professional development: “I need AI as a tutor… I learn so much more that way.”
The AI advantage: How professional-grade technology transforms tax season
Professional-grade AI solutions address three critical areas: reducing cognitive overload through automation, maintaining accuracy under pressure, and enabling seamless collaboration across team levels.
Reducing cognitive load through intelligent automation
You can avoid burnout and take control of your life by focusing on the activities that mean the most to you and outsourcing the rest. But what if that “outsourcing” could be to intelligent technology that actually makes your team smarter and more capable?
Professional-grade AI handles complex tax code lookups and precedent research. As Hauger discovered: “CoCounsel shines for deep research. Nobody can touch it.” He added, “It’s the best thing since sliced bread. It’s probably the most exciting thing I’ve had to use since I got into this line of work a decade ago.”
Automated document analysis eliminates the frustration of spending hours on research that leads nowhere, while intelligent data extraction means avoiding wasted research time and benefiting from faster pathways to answers for unusual client cases.
Improving accuracy when stakes are highest
The difference between generic AI and professional-grade solutions becomes critical when accuracy matters most. The quality of AI matters immensely. As Hauger puts it: “It saves us time, but not just time. There’s an accuracy and a confidence element there… I don’t want you to pull an article from some guy in a basement.”
Professional-grade AI builds on trusted content, unlike web-scraped alternatives, and provides:
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- Reduced professional liability concerns through verified answers
- Consistent quality output regardless of workload pressure
- AI grounded in tax code and editorial commentary
From survival mode to competitive advantage
The transformation from surviving to thriving becomes evident when firms can handle complex issues like converting an improperly structured passive rental C-corp, IRS challenges around solar energy credits, and tax planning for partners abroad without the traditional stress and time investment.
Professional-grade AI helps retain top talent, expands capacity without added stress, and improves service quality during busy times.
Pilot programs with willing early adopters, training integration during slower periods, and teams measuring success through feedback create sustainable change. Clear communication about AI as enhancement, not replacement, helps teams embrace tools that actually make their work more rewarding.
3 steps to avoid burnout during tax season
Whether you are a remote worker or managing a full accounting firm, stop the burnout before it starts. Begin combatting burnout by establishing boundaries, but also address the systemic issues that make boundaries insufficient.
1) Lock in non‑negotiable boundaries (and communicate them early)
Start by defining what “available” actually means during tax season — hours, response times, and escalation rules — then make it visible to your team and clients. Set a daily hard stop, schedule buffer time between complex returns, and use clear status signals (calendar blocks, out‑of‑office messages, intake forms) to reduce constant interruptions. Boundaries only work when they’re shared and consistently enforced, so put them in writing and repeat them often.
2) Fix the workflow that’s driving the overload
If the system is chaotic, “work-life balance” becomes a nice idea instead of a real safeguard. Identify the bottlenecks that create late nights — missing client documents, unclear review standards, last‑minute scope creep — and solve them with process, not heroics. Standardize checklists, tighten your document request cadence, automate repetitive steps with AI as much as you can, and define what qualifies as a “rush” so everything doesn’t become urgent by default.
3) Build a sustainable pace with capacity planning and recovery
Burnout thrives when you sprint for weeks with no recovery built in. Plan your weekly capacity like a schedule you’re protecting: cap the number of high-complexity returns, batch meetings, and reserve time for reviews so they don’t spill into evenings. Then add recovery on purpose — short breaks between deep-focus blocks, a “no-meetings” window, and at least one real off-duty period each week. Consistent rest is what keeps accuracy high when the deadlines pile up.
Ways to recover and avoid burnout next tax season
Recovery and prevention strategies focus on recognizing professional value, taking restorative breaks, and conducting strategic reflection to improve future tax seasons.
Remember a tax preparer’s work is valuable
As stressful as the tax season is, remember that your clients, colleagues, and boss highly appreciate the important work you do. It’s easy to lose sight of why you’re doing the job you do when things get busy, but accounting is a fundamental part of a business that helps everything run smoothly on the finance side.
Take some time to remember and reflect on why you love your job and how your role helps others – and consider how the right tools can help you deliver even more value.
Use the offseason to take time away
Taking time off remains one of the most effective ways to recover from burnout. While that may have been impossible in April, the summer is an ideal time to take a break away from the office. When you take time off, be sure to switch off any work email or text notifications.
Reflect on this year’s tax season
Consider what you learned this tax season that you can apply to next year. You might want to rethink the way you manage emails, respond to client calls, and evaluate whether better tools could have made a difference. If one of the issues this year was slow research or inefficient processes, come up with a plan to implement solutions that address systemic problems, not just time management.
Reduce tax season burnout and stress at your firm
Tax season burnout isn’t inevitable. As Matthew Hauger discovered, the right combination of cultural support, strategic workforce management, and professional-grade AI creates a sustainable competitive advantage. By reducing cognitive load, improving accuracy under pressure, and enabling confident client communication, Jansen & Company CPAs used tax season as an opportunity to strengthen their teams and enhance their market position.
Tax season is always a stressful time, but you can keep the impact to a minimum by taking a proactive approach. Once you see which tasks are most meaningful, keep the focus there and hand off the rest – to intelligent technology that makes your team more capable.
The choice is clear: continue the cycle of annual burnout, or build a practice that thrives under pressure while supporting long-term professional growth.
Ready to transform your tax season experience? Download our white paper, “Expertise matters in AI-powered tax and accounting solutions” to discover how professional-grade AI transforms tax season outcomes and reduces burnout.
Explore CoCounsel Tax to see how AI built for tax professionals reduces burnout while improving outcomes.
