"You can write off lingerie?" Learn how one accountant built a judgment-free firm for the adult industry. 

Big 4 Transparency
By Dominic Piscopo, CPA
For CPA Trendlines

When Katherine Studley posted a short TikTok in 2021 with the line “Boobs aren’t a write-off,” she wasn’t trying to build a firm - she was trying to prove a point. Now, the founder of The Only Consultant and Prisma Tax is one of the most in-demand accountants for adult industry professionals across North America, having helped thousands of creators, dancers, and sex workers file taxes, get compliant, and navigate financial systems that too often shut them out. 

In this episode of Big 4 Transparency, host Dominic Piscopo speaks with Studley about how she carved out one of the most unusual and underserved niches in accounting and scaled it to a fully remote, growing firm with a waitlist and a social following that fuels constant inbound interest. Studley’s journey started after leaving the CPA firm grind, working in coffee shops, and being recruited into a government intelligence role. But it was a viral conversation during the pandemic that unlocked a huge market: OnlyFans creators and exotic dancers who were suddenly earning six figures with no idea how to file taxes or whom to trust to help them.

Poe Group Advisors; Helping accountants buy, build, and sell exceptional firms.

Our clients love working with us, and we know you will too! Don’t just take our word for it. Learn more about our client success stories and how we’ve guided buyers and sellers through a smooth transition with their bookkeeping, accounting, and CPA firms. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors is the premier accounting practice intermediary firm in the industry with over 20 years of M&A experience. PGA was founded by Brannon Poe, a CPA with a Big 4 background. Buying or selling a CPA firm is one of life’s most significant ventures for business owners. Qualified buyers looking to buy an accounting firm want to find the right CPA practice for sale, and accounting practice sellers want to find the right buyer. This is where Poe Group Advisors excels time and time again in helping our clients find the right accounting practice sales opportunity. Learn More

Language, collaboration, and leadership training turned competition into cohesion.

The Disruptors

With Liz Farr

When Alan Whitman became Baker Tilly's CEO, he was caught between two warring camps. On one side were the legacy partners who had built the organization and “wanted to continue doing things the way that we’ve always done them because we’ve been so successful.” That side was afraid of “losing what they had built.” In the other camp were the new partners who wanted to change “to what they were promised, what they signed on to by becoming part of Baker Tilly.” The newcomers wanted “to move faster and do it differently.” 

As Whitman describes in his new book, “Break the Mold: How to Achieve Transformational Change Scale and Grow Simultaneously, the conflict was resolved over time, one conversation, one small meeting at a time. “It would be more evolution, not revolution,” Whitman says.  

Whitman’s book, part memoir and part practical guide, describes his time leading one of the largest accounting firms in the US through a fundamental transformation. “We’re a storied profession, the CPA profession, and we are an incremental type of people,” Whitman explains. The transformation Whitman had in mind needed a different approach, as he says in his previous appearance on The Disruptors. “Break the mold is designing new ways of doing things to achieve results that we don’t think can happen, or don’t even think that are possible.”  

Poe Group Advisors; Helping accountants buy, build, and sell exceptional firms.

Our clients love working with us, and we know you will too! Don’t just take our word for it. Learn more about our client success stories and how we’ve guided buyers and sellers through a smooth transition with their bookkeeping, accounting, and CPA firms. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors is the premier accounting practice intermediary firm in the industry with over 20 years of M&A experience. PGA was founded by Brannon Poe, a CPA with a Big 4 background. Buying or selling a CPA firm is one of life’s most significant ventures for business owners. Qualified buyers looking to buy an accounting firm want to find the right CPA practice for sale, and accounting practice sellers want to find the right buyer. This is where Poe Group Advisors excels time and time again in helping our clients find the right accounting practice sales opportunity. Learn More

The profession's newest partners may be the most vulnerable.

MOVE Like This
With Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk
For CPA Trendlines

MOVE Like This host Bonnie Buol Ruszczyk sits down with Sarah Elliott, CPA, co-founder of Intend2Lead, to unpack what conscious leadership looks like in accounting—and why the profession’s newest partners may be the most vulnerable leaders in the firm.

Elliott, a former audit partner who left public accounting in 2014 to become an executive coach, argues that real change happens in a precise order: mindset, then skill set, then habits. Her “conscious leader” model centers on leaders who share power, elevate others, and stay curious, even when uncertainty invites fear.

“Our best leaders are human-centric first,” Elliott says. “In a world of accelerating tech and change, we have to start with people—always.”

Intend2Lead recently surveyed 110 newly promoted partners (2023–2024). The results spotlight avoidable gaps that push rising leaders toward burnout—or out of public accounting altogether.

Gen Z won't fix your firm culture problem - they'll leave it.

Accounting Influencers
With Rob Brown

When the youngest professionals in accounting start saying “no,” leaders should start listening.

In this episode of Accounting Influencers, the conversation turns to the one thing that could make or break your firm’s future: how you treat your people, specifically, how you treat Gen Z.

They’re qualified. They’re confident. And they’ve watched what the generations before them endured—burnout, long hours, micromanagement, and “be grateful you’ve got a job” culture. Their conclusion? “No thanks.”

This isn’t softness. It’s a strategy.

Gen Z values mental health over martyrdom, meaning over money, and culture over compensation. They’ve seen the toll that toxic leadership takes, and they’re unwilling to sacrifice well-being for tradition.

Here, Rob Brown outlines five toxic traits that send young accountants running for the exits.

Poe Group Advisors; Helping accountants buy, build, and sell exceptional firms.

Our clients love working with us, and we know you will too! Don’t just take our word for it. Learn more about our client success stories and how we’ve guided buyers and sellers through a smooth transition with their bookkeeping, accounting, and CPA firms. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors is the premier accounting practice intermediary firm in the industry with over 20 years of M&A experience. PGA was founded by Brannon Poe, a CPA with a Big 4 background. Buying or selling a CPA firm is one of life’s most significant ventures for business owners. Qualified buyers looking to buy an accounting firm want to find the right CPA practice for sale and accounting practice sellers want to find the right buyer. This is where Poe Group Advisors excels time and time again in helping our clients find the right accounting practice sales opportunity. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors; Helping accountants buy, build, and sell exceptional firms.

Our clients love working with us, and we know you will too! Don’t just take our word for it. Learn more about our client success stories and how we’ve guided buyers and sellers through a smooth transition with their bookkeeping, accounting, and CPA firms. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors is the premier accounting practice intermediary firm in the industry with over 20 years of M&A experience. PGA was founded by Brannon Poe, a CPA with a Big 4 background. Buying or selling a CPA firm is one of life’s most significant ventures for business owners. Qualified buyers looking to buy an accounting firm want to find the right CPA practice for sale and accounting practice sellers want to find the right buyer. This is where Poe Group Advisors excels time and time again in helping our clients find the right accounting practice sales opportunity. Learn More

Reserves, credit lines, and leadership pipelines fuel expansion

Gear Up for Growth

With Jean Caragher

For CPA Trendlines

“Fiercely independent isn’t a strategy, it’s a stance,” says John Geraci, managing partner of LGA CPAs & Advisors. “To truly remain independent, firms must be strategic about how they differentiate themselves, understand the threats posed by private equity, and have the conviction to invest in their people and future leaders.” 

Geraci and Jeff Call, managing partner of Bennett Thrasher, were guests on Gear Up for Growth, hosted by Jean Caragher of Capstone Marketing.  

As private equity continues to reshape the accounting profession, both leaders agree on two critical factors for firms choosing to remain self-owned: independence must be intentional, and culture is the ultimate differentiator. 

Poe Group Advisors; Helping accountants buy, build, and sell exceptional firms.

Our clients love working with us, and we know you will too! Don’t just take our word for it. Learn more about our client success stories and how we’ve guided buyers and sellers through a smooth transition with their bookkeeping, accounting, and CPA firms. Learn More

Poe Group Advisors is the premier accounting practice intermediary firm in the industry with over 20 years of M&A experience. PGA was founded by Brannon Poe, a CPA with a Big 4 background. Buying or selling a CPA firm is one of life’s most significant ventures for business owners. Qualified buyers looking to buy an accounting firm want to find the right CPA practice for sale, and accounting practice sellers want to find the right buyer. This is where Poe Group Advisors excels time and time again in helping our clients find the right accounting practice sales opportunity. Learn More