Positioning yourself for long-term success in the tax and accounting industry
Building a successful advisory practice is all about amplifying your strengths, drawing from your experiences, and deepening your relationship with clients — and women are in a unique position to embrace this lucrative opportunity.
However, while more female CPAs are extending their practices beyond traditional tax compliance, recent survey results suggest that some are not confident in their ability to pivot from compliance-based work despite having the same knowledge and experience as their male counterparts.
You already deliver excellent compliance services — and you know an advisory focus will allow you to provide even better service to your clients. Get started by exploring practical tips and best practices from other female firm leaders who have made the profitable shift. It’s a powerful decision that not only boosts your bottom line but also increases responsiveness to your clients’ needs.
Women in today’s accounting profession
While women make up roughly 50% of entry-level roles in accounting, they represent a much smaller fraction of firm leadership, with accounting partner groups remaining overwhelmingly white and male. Founder of BBRC Cos., and President of the Accounting MOVE Project, Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk, produces an annual survey on workplace demographics in the profession to drive greater inclusion, noted the concerning stagnation:
"I'm not seeing huge shifts," Ruszczyk said. "While women still make up a majority of firm employees overall — I've seen percentages between 53 and 60% — they make up far less of partner groups or firm leadership."
The numbers underscore this disparity. The average ratio of women partners remains below 30% across the profession, falling short of what Ruszczyk identifies as a critical threshold for meaningful change. She explained that "31% is a tipping point because there's studies out there that show that that's kind of the point where people are seen as individuals versus a group of others."
The advisory opportunity
As firms navigate their top challenge — hiring, attracting, and retaining quality talent — advisory services present a compelling growth area.
The data reveals a significant market opportunity. According to the Thomson Reuters Institute State of Tax Professionals report, three-quarters of survey respondents said their clients "strongly" desire more tax and business advice in addition to tax preparation. Yet paradoxically, 75% of respondents said their firms continue to cite business and individual tax-return preparation as their most profitable service, suggesting untapped potential in advisory work.
The firms that have embraced advisory services are seeing impressive results. According to the Tax Firms Advisory Services Report from Thomson Reuters Institute, 85% of firms saw advisory revenue increase, with 88% of those firms experiencing advisory revenue growth that outpaced compliance work.
Additionally, the report found that currently, advisory services represent 31% of average firm revenue, with 35% of clients purchasing these services. Perhaps most telling, 87% of firms plan to expand their advisory services within the next year.
According to the Accounting Move Project, advisory services are organically aligned for women's advancement as they enable flexible scheduling, work-life blend, and inspiring business development opportunities.
Wilson-Taylor Associates is the content strategy firm that manages the Accounting MOVE Project. Its President, Joanne Cleaver, said in a press statement:
"Women are perfectly positioned to chart new ways to win new types of business, because they take encouragement and direction from incremental wins. In an unpredictable business environment, firms can rely on the deep loyalty that many women earn with ongoing clients, and that create footholds for new practices."
While large accounting firms have been expanding the range of services they provide, more midsize and even small firms are finding ways to provide individualized tax strategies, better client relations, and more personalized service overall. Given that women comprise such a significant percentage of the profession, it's time to fully understand the shift to advisory and the vital role women can play in these higher-value, higher-margin services — services that could also provide a pathway to greater representation in firm leadership.
Unlocking the power of advisory
In the face of increased client demands, a complex regulatory and legislative landscape, and the commoditization of tax preparation, the days of rearview mirror accounting are swiftly falling by the wayside. Clients today want an accounting professional who will provide them with proactive advice.
“Compliance, while really important, is becoming increasingly commoditized in today’s world because of technology. It is constantly evolving, and it’s making it easier for people to take that on themselves, but advisory services help a firm stay relevant in this changing landscape. I think it gives the firm the ability to add a lot of value to their clients,” said Mucki Sobania, Senior Solutions Consultant, Tax and Accounting for Thomson Reuters.
“Additionally, client demographics are changing. There’s an increased desire for strategic advice. Clients are looking for proactive service from a trusted advisor versus that more transactional, look-in-the-rearview-mirror tax return,” she continues.
According to the Tax Firm Advisory Services report, among growing firms, 88% report that advisory revenue is expanding faster than compliance revenue. Advisory services now represent 31% of total firm revenue on average, marking a clear shift from a nice-to-have service to an essential growth engine for modern practices.
Providing advisory services enables firms to strengthen client relationships while increasing revenues. By investing in technology to automate tax compliance work — and assisting in identifying advisory opportunities — firms are shifting how their resources are utilized and prioritizing the advisory services their clients need most.
“I have seen firms increase revenues by hundreds of thousands within a year through advisory services while reducing their book of business,” said Pamela Butler, Senior Business Advisory Consultant with Tax and Accounting Professional Services for Thomson Reuters. “They are working with the clients that want to learn, understand the value of working with a professional, and are willing to invest in their business.
“Utilizing tools to streamline the gathering, sorting, filtering, and reporting on data to uncover advisory opportunities has been a challenge. Technology is providing a path for easing this pain point. We have a long way to go, but strides for improvement are happening.”
Providing clients with favorable advisory services undoubtedly presents significant growth opportunities for women within the profession, and those who have made the shift are reaping the benefits.
One example is Sandy Heit, owner of ModernCPAs, featured in the Thomson Reuters “Spotlighting Women in Advisory Practice” blog series. After purchasing a content and consulting solution, Heit discovered many of the services she offered could be more strategic and monetized. That shift in business model “completely transformed her practice.”
“The program had a formula for how to deliver advisory services, provided customizable content to deliver to clients, and provided the ability to articulate the value we are providing,” said Heit, adding that before long, she required all new clients to start with an advisory services package.
However, it is important to note that change isn’t easy — and some people may feel more trepidation toward change.
If you’re among those who feel unsure about pivoting from compliance-based work to more strategic business advisory services, take comfort in knowing that you’re not alone, and there are some best practices to help you prove successful.
Change is not easy. That’s why transforming the business model to advisory can be scary for some professionals. The reality is that a growing number of women in the profession are breaking through and seeing the rewards.
Another example is Alicia Shaul of Shaul & Associates PLC, also featured in the women in advisory practice blog previously mentioned. Shaul said she grew tired of the overwhelming workload during the tax season and decided to move her practice away from a compliance-focused shop. But Shaul admitted that moving to an advisory practice was “a big leap of faith.”
If you need a confidence boost to kickstart your advisory journey, here are seven best practices from women who’ve been there.
1. Identify your clients’ needs
Think about the common pain points your clients have. What do you hear yourself saying repeatedly? What questions do you answer multiple times for your customers? What are the typical “misses” your clients experience?
According to Butler, don’t look for the hardest, most unique situations to resolve — focus on helping the masses in a duplicatable way. This method allows you to create standardization in terms of resolving client issues.
“When you can use these standardized tools numerous times and get compensated for doing it, this creates the win-win scenarios we get to feel good about because we are making a difference for our clients,” said Butler. “There are so many opportunities to help business owners outside of compliance work. You just need to take the time to have the relationship that fosters the advisory model.”
Taking this approach helped Erin Heath, CPA and owner of Erin R. Heath, find success. Heath, featured in the blog series as well, said that before she shifted to an advisory practice, she “hadn’t really sat down and (looked) at my client base because I was so busy.” Once she did, her initial thought was that her clients were all farm and ranch businesses — but upon closer inspection, she saw that government entities and nonprofit agencies were also part of her business.
In her move to advisory, Heath strived to make sure she understood clients’ needs and what services she should offer.
Another example is Brittany Lanphier of Lanphier LLP , who said that having a model that has standardized and streamlined their processes has given the firm the resources to efficiently deliver the needed advisory services. Today, her ideal client is a relatively small owner-manager business without a CFO and fewer than 100 employees.
“It’s really been about taking the more basic principles that impact everyone who’s in business, basically, and creating a process and a system by which we just deliver that consistently to them,” Lanphier said.
2. Be committed and transparent
If you’re a sole practitioner, be committed to change. If you have staff, ensure they buy into and support the shift to advisory. Then, it is essential to keep the lines of communication open and be transparent with both staff and clients.
“I have had firms tell me they can ‘feel’ the difference between working with a client that has been onboarded into the firm with advisory services and maintenance packages versus a client that has been with the firm prior to implementing an advisory model,” Butler said, adding that this contributes to transparency in relationships. Such transparency can include upfront pricing, clear and concise scope of services, expectation settings in advance, exchange of knowledge and information, and a working relationship toward common goals.
Echoing the sentiment, Shaul said, “Effective advisory services really come down to communication and confidence. Clients will not buy into those services unless I have.”
3. Focus on your strengths
Focus on what you know and what you’re good at. Ask yourself what you do well. Do you have knowledge within a specific area you haven’t leveraged yet?
“I would encourage women who are thinking of adding advisory services to start by thinking about how they provide the most value to their client base. Not to get hung up on, ‘I don’t know absolutely everything about everything. Or I need to have these specific new services,’” said Sobania. “Don’t focus on what you don’t know. Focus on what you’re good at because you’re likely offering a lot of advisory services already, but just for free. So, (it’s) thinking about utilizing that knowledge and expertise and turning it into an engagement for your client.”
4. Automate compliance work
Tax compliance processes are uniquely positioned to be automated as they comprise a network of patterns like standardized forms and prior-year data. Professionals can reduce or even eliminate data entry through scan-and-populate tax software and the ability to automatically verify optical character recognition (OCR) source document data.
By incorporating tax software that utilizes AI and machine learning, your firm can automatically detect discrepancies, provide an audit trail, and even identify tax-saving opportunities and business insights for your clients. You can redirect all the time you save toward building a strategic business plan and deepening those all-important client relationships.
5. Leverage scalable resources
Don’t overlook the importance of having the proper tools and resources to provide successful advisory services. Implementing a content and consulting solution enables your firm to build a scalable advisory services model and standardize processes.
When looking for the right tools, resources, and coaching, consider a comprehensive solution that delivers the following:
- Industry-relevant content and tools, including videos, proposal and email templates, pricing calculators, PowerPoint presentations, checklists, and more
- One-on-one coaching sessions with a dedicated business consultant
- Access for all your staff to a comprehensive online learning plan to enhance the implementation
- Ongoing coaching and collaboration with your peers
- Access to CPE-qualified, advisory-focused webinars
- An online collaboration tool for member communications and a means for connecting with other members easily
- A calendar of in-person and virtual events throughout the year to keep you actively focused on your advisory journey
- The ability to ascertain additional one-to-one coaching if needed to further your success
6. Shift to value-based pricing
When shifting your practice to an advisory-based model, it is vital to fully understand the value of your services and price them accordingly. If your firm still bills by the hour, it is time to consider moving to a value-based pricing structure.
“I’m a huge proponent and I think it makes the most sense to do value billing, especially when you are thinking about creating that advisory relationship and making sure that, number one, you are being compensated for your expertise and, number two, your client knows exactly what they are getting from you,” Sobania said.
The Tax Firm Advisory Services report discusses how firms are actively diversifying their pricing strategies, with additions across almost every category regardless of firm size. Large firms are leading the charge; 90% now offer hourly pricing — up from 75% in 2024 — and 81% offer flat-fee pricing — up from 75% in 2024. The most notable shift, however, is among midsize firms, where more than half (56%) now use value-based pricing in 2025, up from 48% in 2024. This uptick in value-based models signals a growing recognition that pricing should reflect the worth of expertise and outcomes, not just time spent.
7. Be selective
When providing advisory services, it is crucial to recognize that some clients — whether existing or prospective — may not be a good fit for your firm. In other words, be selective.
“Being selective truly is the first step in implementing an advisory model,” said Butler. “Working with the right clients increases productivity, staff morale, quality of service, feeling appreciated, and gratification in doing something good.”
Butler added that reducing your book of business provides the vehicle to open the door for deepening client relationships because you won’t be overwhelmed with juggling multiple clients — “You are afforded the opportunity to work with clients you enjoy while doing more of the work that feeds your why.”
Tips for attracting — and retaining — top talent
Today’s job seekers are looking for independence, opportunities for growth, and a sense of purpose in their work.
Attracting and retaining top talent is critical as you build your advisory practice. Here’s how to do it — even amidst a challenging labor market.
1. Understand employee motivations
With an emphasis on meaningful contributions and flexible work arrangements, an advisory services model becomes a magnet for talent. By leveraging technology and endorsing remote work, firms can attract and retain top-tier professionals even in a competitive market.
Providing your staff with autonomy fosters loyalty, trust, and increased productivity. Further, by automating tax processes, you can bridge talent gaps and enable staff to shift their time to lucrative advisory roles. This sought-after guidance helps clients while empowering your staff to leverage their expertise effectively.
2. Expand your talent pool
A pivotal shift for firms is broadening their hiring criteria beyond the three-to-five-year experience bracket. Embrace interns, recent graduates, individuals from diverse academic backgrounds, and part-time professionals. Consider recent graduates proficient in data analytics or science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines that align well with tech-savvy firms.
By providing essential training and covering educational expenses for certifications, smaller firms can amplify their candidate reach. This approach also underscores a commitment to nurturing talent at every career stage.
3. Showcase your unique value proposition
A shift from being a compliance-focused firm to one encompassing varied advisory skills — spanning business development, data analytics, technology, and strategic planning — reflects a wider evolution in accounting, and you should promote it to both prospective clients and potential new hires.
Embracing technology and fostering collaborative management practices can give your firm the upper hand in talent acquisition. Prioritizing hands-on training, educational support, community engagement, and cultural initiatives can tip the scales in your favor. Offer younger professionals avenues to specialize, engage directly with clients, and contribute meaningfully to business growth. This prioritization can truly set your firm apart in the battle for top talent.
With a more engaged staff, you can shift your engagement strategy for new clients based on the value your firm brings to their business. You can gear new client services toward identifying end goals, setting the path toward those goals, and guiding your clients down each step of that path.
Technology can also help you analyze trends and support your clients with the insight that assists their businesses in growing and thriving. Because you and your staff will gain a deep understanding of the expertise your customers genuinely need, you will empower your firm to identify additional opportunities that further strengthen these relationships and boost revenue.
When you make the move to advisory services, you can be more selective of the clients you serve, and your referrals will more accurately set expectations for your future clients. Ultimately, clients will see you as a strategic partner versus a compliance processor — a powerful combination that engages staff, strengthens client relationships, and improves your bottom line.
Are you ready to make the shift to advisory?
Advisory services are one of the most significant growth opportunities for today’s firms — and women practitioners who are embracing these higher-value services are realizing substantial benefits both in terms of job satisfaction and quality of life.
For more insight and personal stories from women who’ve built successful advisory practices, check out our Spotlighting Women in Advisory Practice blog series.
Ready to make the shift to advisory services? Thomson Reuters Practice Forward and Ready to Advise work together to make this transformation achievable.
Provide a business model framework with Practice Forward, including how to package services, what to charge, and how to engage clients consistently.
Deliver and execute with Ready to Advise and its AI-powered opportunity identification, automated client plans, and guided workflows that enable your entire team to deliver sophisticated advisory services.
Together, they address the core challenges facing firms today while creating the recurring revenue relationships that future-proof your practice. Ready to transform your practice? Request a demo for Practice Forward or Ready to Advise today.
