After a decade in Big Four audit and private equity finance, Brendan Morahan saw two partner-track opportunities collapse in the space of six months. He didn’t set out to start BPM CPA, but he found himself in December 2023 with few good options and a lot of hard-won opinions about how small firms were getting it wrong. Within three years he had built a million-dollar practice by doing almost the opposite of what most firm owners do. In part 1 of this special two part conversation with John Randolph on Episode 93 of CPA Life, Brendan makes a pointed case that the traditional partnership model is losing its pull on the most capable people in public accounting, that the tax manager role is the single most critical and irreplaceable position in any small firm, and that advisory isn’t

Host John Randolph launches a new quarterly segment called Pipeline Pulse, pulling back the curtain on what’s actually happening in CPA talent conversations right now, on Episode 88 of CPA Life. Drawing from scores of interviews with accountants quietly exploring their options, he identifies three critical disconnects plaguing firm hiring: Most firms still treat capacity planning like a last-minute scramble instead of a year-round discipline, leaving them perpetually understaffed when resignations hit in January. They’re also selling compensation hard while candidates are buying something entirely different; one senior with 14 years of experience would take a lateral move just to escape the 2,000-billable-hour requirement standing between her and manager. And firms keep