The Power of Professional Networks with Mike Masymiw

This week's episode of the Big 4 Transparency podcast is sponsored by Forwardly. Huge thank you to Forwardly for sponsoring the podcast, but also a huge thank you for what they do in terms of helping firms improve your operating margins. So if you are in firm operations, I would encourage you to take a look at how much your payment processing fees might be costing you currently. It may just be a couple percent here and there, but once your firm scales, we may be talking many tens or even maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars that are not going to your firm's bottom line and are not available for reinvestment in your firm. Forwardly helps you not only smooth all of these processes out with seamless AP and AR, but they also do so using ACH payments in an automated fashion, helping you save on payment processing fees. So make sure you check out forwardly.com for your business payment solution. Hello and welcome to the Big 4 Transparency podcast. I'm joined today by Mike Maximillou, our first repeat guest on the podcast. And for good reason, I'm a huge fan of everything he does and says. He's also the executive director of the April Firm Alliance. Welcome back to the pod, Mike. Great to be back, Tom. Yeah, yeah. It's great to have you. So I'm going to apologize in advance for anyone listening to a very croaky voice, but Bridging the Gap was a pretty good party and then I just came back from my bachelor party as well. So apologies for that. But Mike and I chatted a whole bunch at Bridging the Gap and yeah, we have a whole kind of fresh new docket of things that I really would like to pick his brain on. Yeah. Fantastic. Let's go. All right. So let's start us off maybe kind of with some, some recent news, but you, Apri recently acquired the PS Plus Alliance, which as the director of the Alliance, I mean, impacts you quite a bit. Yeah. Let's talk about that deal and then what changes for member firms of the PS Plus Alliance is as a part of that. And so the really cool part about the acquisition from RSM is that we took the entire team as well. So there's 38 new team members. There's roughly 60 new firms, which puts us at over 40 team members in it, nearly a hundred firms throughout the country, including in Canada that pretty much go from like a million to 60 to 80 million in revenue. I haven't memorized all of the stats yet, but there's a very large swath of firms that our team now has like the expertise to go serve. The way that I was talking to these folks about it and was, so if I've got a $2 million primarily construction audit practice in New York, and you've got a $40 million firm with a $20 million audit practice with a $3 million niche in construction audits, those two folks can still talk. So it's not just about the size of the firm because a lot of the firms that were in the Apri Alliance, like they're ditching down into their very specific like expertise level. So then they can share information even with larger firms who have experts themselves, they just have more of them. So it's still really fun to be able to think of how a larger firm can interact with a smaller local firm and both still get value out of it. And then the flip side, not flip side, but a secondary really fun thing is my local firm Philomena was in the RSM Alliance. So these people were my alliance leaders. So I've known them for more than a decade, like they're my people and now they're my colleagues and it's wicked fun. That's cool. That's awesome. And so in terms of like what's changing for them, it kind of just seems like an unlock of more resources, right? For the most part, like, you know, you used to have 50 people you could go to now you have 100. Yeah, it really broadens how we can go find answers, how we can interact and be vulnerable and share what our questions are and hear different perspectives and responses on them, different success stories, different failure stories, because no one gets to success the first time every time, like we all trip, fall down, dust ourself off and get back up. And now there's 100 people you could ask those questions to and maybe 50 have done it. And maybe there's seven different ways that they've seen it work, then you get to go cool, I think that a piece of this one and a piece of this one is really going to work for me and thank you both for, for sharing, you know, all the knowledge that you have with me and as I move through this, I'm going to go share it with others and back to you. And then from the Aprio perspective, like, what's the strategic wedge of like a large firm like that running an alliance? Because it seems like a relatively kind of disconnected thing. And there's a lot of value kind of being provided to these other firms, but like, especially as a private equity backed company now, like, it feels like the move that they're normally after is to just acquire everyone. So like, where does the alliance come into play and all that? Yeah, it's, it's kind of an oxymoron, right? Aprio is this, this big firm that's acquired a lot of firms. It's growing like a weed for the last five, six years, and in a very intentional and strategic way, which I really enjoy. And then we've got this ecosystem of, of local accounting firms and regional accounting firms that we provide resources so they can exist on their own if that's part of their strategy, right? So the alliance isn't built to like be a feeding ground. It's actually built to help support the larger, you know, profession and all the different levels and areas you need firms to be at, because some local businesses need a local firm in their communities that understands their community to go serve them. And some need more services. So a regional firm is better. And all these other firms though, every now and again, one of their best clients goes, Hey, I've got a weird question. And the firm goes, I've never done that before. What am I going to do now? Cool. I've got a hundred alliance firms and a top 25 firm in my back pocket that I can go figure out how to get this done. So I can keep the client more importantly, the client gets to keep that relationship with their local accountant because that local accountant can do 90% of all the stuff that client needs. After we'll just do that weird project that you need, or the other Alliance member will go do that weird project. And we do that for roughly a hundred other firms around the country outside of the Alliance firms. So it's, it's really fun to be interacting with so many firms around the country, see all their different niches and expertise. And then when something falls out of that, they all have a place to go to get that other thing done. Hmm. Yeah. No, I think that makes a lot of sense. And I've spoken to some partners at big four who had at one point considered leaving and starting their own firm. And that was actually one of the big, biggest roadblocks for them where they didn't actually go forward with it because they're like, well, so what's going to happen down the line is like, you know, I'm going to get this crown jewel client and then they're going to want someone off weird service offering that I can't offer. And then I'm going to churn out my biggest crown jewel client every time it happens. So I'm a little bit scared to go out on my own, so I might just stay here. Right. And so I think that that's like really important for people to understand the dynamics of that, like that's out there and it does exist and you can get the resources to serve them. Yeah. For some people, they've already curated a network during their careers and they've got friends in areas that can help them out. And that's fantastic. But for someone who spent 15 years at one or maybe only two firms and they want to go hang out with their shingle and let's say it's a big four firm, right? Is that crown jewel client going to want to pay big four fees for that special project? Probably not. Or they would just be at that big four firm. So that's why in your example, the person they're like, oh man, what do I do? Well, a firm like April has a program where it's like, you can just, we'll just do that one weird thing. Like we're good with that. You do everything else. We'll just do the one weird thing and we'll just have a great relationship and you get to keep serving a client. We'll just have two firms serving that client. What do you do? Yeah. I mean, I like the top down tone of like, we're just a place that makes it happen. Where when Richard gets in trouble for the Aprio name, he literally just goes and changes his name. Like it just, it kind of sends a message of like, hey, we're just, we're going to find a way to make the thing happen. Right. So. Yeah. Yeah. So we brought a firm in from North Carolina and there's state board requires a founder or a partner's name to be in the firm name. So we called him his mom and he was like, yeah, so I'm going to add a middle name mom. It's 50 bucks instead of fighting a legal battle with the state of North Carolina. She was like, okay, honey, you come over for dinner. So that was Richard Perry, Aprio, Kobelman, because it's a simple solution. Yeah. No, I love that. That's like my favorite, just absolute favorite story of like, just, all right, fine. Yeah. We'll make it happen. Right. Um, speaking of Richard, uh, I'm, I'm going to ask you his, his favorite question. I asked it to him at firm growth forum and he came and thanked me later, but, um, um, so in the spring, um, right, I, I released this annual thing with big four transparency where I look at like the highest rated firms by employee satisfaction and with PE being such a topic of discussion, I did a breakout for PE and Aprio was actually number one in terms of employee job satisfaction at PE backed firms. Um, you know, we just talked about some of the tone and like, you know, attitude towards stuff that I think is very admirable, but are there things that you think are being done differently at Aprio as a PE backed firm or like, you know, are there things that have changed since becoming PE backed even for that you can see like from your vantage point? Yeah, there's, there's definitely changes for sure. I mean, the, the acquisitions have definitely ramped up and so has the, the lateral partner talent that we've been able to hire, right? Cause we can offer things like incentive programs and phantom stock or we name it or whatever it's called for, whichever investments that it's made in and, uh, our partner Charles bank, like we chose them with intention because they have all of their knowledge and expertise and they want to learn all about accounting from us. And I'm fortunate that the partner that I report to for the Alliance, he's on the board with the Charles bank folks. So I get to hear kind of secondhand stories of the questions that they're asking and that they want the accounting firm knowledge. They didn't come in and say, Hey, we can operate you better. They're like, you operate awesome. We want to invest in these areas, right? Like we just had an announcement. We have got a $300 million commitment to, you know, utilizing account, uh, artificial intelligence inside of the firm with intentionality. Um, and we just acquired a firm that was in the AI CPA accelerator program in 2024 that specializes in that, in the accounting industry. So that's super fun. It's one of the first things you've done in that realm. And as you said, like we just have this belief from the top down of we'll go get it done and if it hasn't been done before, we'll try and we'll fail and we'll learn and we'll try and we'll fail and we'll learn and we'll be successful. And it really is like top down and the leadership supports us doing that, which then lets me do that in the Alliance, which then helps us help the firms do that at their firm and they kind of can see this cascading effect. So even that leadership type of ethos extends beyond within Aprio because we have this Alliance that we're constantly talking to our firms about the things we're doing because they ask and then the mindset we have around it, like, Hey, you don't have to be scared to change. Like it could be super fun. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, from the Charles Bank perspective, like it feels like they can probably learn at such an accelerated pace versus just like a one-off firm. That's not as plugged in like that. I had the opportunity to talk to, I pray that I'm pronouncing this properly, but Mewshin and he's, yeah, he's, he's a really, really interesting guy. And you can tell that like, he, he just has this like rapid fire stream of questions for you of just like, I just want to know everything, you know, right? Like he's, yeah, he's a really cool guy to talk to. Yeah. I mean, you mentioned questions and throughout my career, I've, a lot of times I got asked questions from leadership. They were passive aggressive statements framed as questions versus at Aprio. When people ask questions, they really want to know like, Hey, why'd you do that? Not you were wrong. What'd you do? It's like, no, no. Like why? What went through your brain? Cause I want to learn. And Charles bank is really similar, uh, within us being the first accounting firm investment. So it's, that really mattered to me when I heard some of those stories in the beginning of how much they wanted to learn from us as well and how much they wanted to contribute to us, not just with dollars, but with knowledge. Yeah. Yeah. There's something to that I think in a lot of the private equity conversations and, and I have some convos with the private equity groups and some conversations with owners of firms. But where they talk about, like a lot of them are looking to acquire a platform firm, right? They're looking to acquire like the, the main firm that they're then going to kind of like run all the acquisitions through or use that as a model to build out the other firms and stuff. And I do feel like being a part of the acquired platform firm is probably kind of the most interesting part of the journey versus being kind of like one of the later tack on additions. I think that's probably where it's like, you're being told things need to change. But I think being acquired as the platform firm is probably actually like, you're now setting this tone for all these other firms and like, we're going to kind of figure that out together. Right. Yeah. It really, it feels that way. Cause even before the investment from Charles bank, Aprio was acquiring a lot of firms and we were Aprio ties in them. As we say, like part of our MNA strategy is we have Aprio week with each of our firms where our integration team, who their only job is integrating firms, goes to their office for a week and sits there and like, we have a tax leader who will be like, this is a tax software and here's how I used it because I was a manager at Aprio. You know, I would staff senior manager. I've used it. I've reviewed it. I know our process. This is why. And that's super helpful if you're sitting there going, man, I had to switch tax software. This stinks. Oh no. I've got an internal expert that's here to hold my hand with questions and she's sitting here the whole week. This is amazing. Yeah. And it matters to me. That's really cool. Yeah. Um, and speaking of something else that matters for, for you, but, um, what, like, what's the approach towards PR and like, why, why does it seem like it's maybe so different At least for you. I don't know if that's firm wide, but at least for you where you seem to really get like room to spread your wings, right? Like you're one of the very few people from a top hundred firm that I'll talk to, let's say who isn't like, okay, I need to run this by a PR firm. You just kind of like get to go, you get the runway to go. Or when the PWC layoffs happen, right? You really kind of just stepped in and sent this firm, this Alliance wide email saying like, Hey, talk to Dom. He's got a bunch of PWC people who've been let go and want to have conversations, right? Which thank you for, and on behalf of a lot of other people who got interviews. Thank you. Um, how does that come to be again? Because right, like with scale, I find like comes a certain level of red tape and like that doesn't seem to be the case, at least in any of my interactions with you. I think what it is, is that just the general concept of April hires really smart people and doesn't tell them what to do. They ask us like, what do you need to get it done? And we, we have real autonomy to go do those things, not the perceived autonomy you get if you're hitting your internal metrics at a larger firm. And as long as you are, they leave you alone, but as soon as you're not, now you start getting a little bit micromanaged. And that'd be fair, but good news is we're hitting the metrics. But as you said, the autonomy shows up in other ways where if like my natural inclination is to go out and, and poke bears and stir pots and challenge the historical norms, the industry has been around for 125 years and we've all inherited it from someone before us. And a lot of times we don't ask questions because, well, it's worked. But then it's like, well, what's the definition of it worked? Like we make good money, but we work a hundred hours a week. Like to me that doesn't work. So why are we working a hundred hours a week? Can we make the same amount of money working 40 hours a week? Can we make it working less than 40 hours a week? Yeah. You know, what if that's what the profession looked like? And we're obviously not going to go from a hundred to 40 and yes, a hundred is purposely a really high number that I hope nobody is working, but it, it just sets the tone of asking the questions about everything we inherited. Apert is a naturally disruptive firm. That's one of the reasons why we've been able to grow so fast is challenging those things in a bunch of different ways. So from that perspective, I just, I fit into that culture that our 31 fundamentals kind of describe and define of, Hey, it's okay to challenge things. It's also okay when you challenge it to get the answer of the way we're doing it probably is the best way. All right, great. That's awesome. I'm glad we asked the question. Now we know we can move on to the next thing. How's that culture like get retained while you're growing that fast? Cause that's, that's a big thing, right? Is like dilution of culture is more people, more capital, more resources come in. Like what, what's being done to keep that strong? So I think a big part of it is there's, there's typically a leader that is, I'll call it a science to each of the M&A transactions. You know, it might be another partner that checks in with the managing partner at those firms sits in on the first couple of scheduling calls or all team meetings. And we start each of our meetings with the fundamental of the week. This one happens to be embraced change. Very appropriate for our conversation. So as an example, with when we acquired the PS plus team over the first meeting I was on, I was like, Hey, we got to start the meeting with the fundamental of the week and like, Oh yeah, that's the thing that we do. I was like, yes, it's a thing that we do, but we do it every meeting and we're not going to skip over it. And here's the fundamental and who's brave enough to share a story about this fundamental having never done it before. Like you're among friends, you all know each other already. I'm the new one on the call. So how does this, you know, what's the story you have about this fundamental? And then three people started sharing stories. I was like, this is fantastic. Y'all get it. We're going to do this every time we have a meeting and after you do it two or three times it, it then becomes the natural thing that the new team starts doing. And then once they get through all 31 fundamentals, we do them again. So we get through them like almost twice a year and that's how we really reinforce that the fundamentals are the driver of the culture and people are sharing their own stories on every meeting every week. That's cool. Yeah. So it's just like a constant reminder of it while not being too heavy, right? Like it's just kind of like a one-off like, Hey, let's, let's take a couple minutes to do this. Um, interesting. And is that happening from wide? Like are like, you know, it's like a senior and a senior manager meeting at the firm talking about that or, or is it kind of more leadership doing that? It's whoever might be on that particular call. If there's, if there's three more people on the call, we do it. So if on our integration team, if, if our, if Saul is the tax manager who's on the integration team and she's helping out the tax team with something, you know, she'll start the meeting off with, all right, this week's fundamentals embrace change. And that's kind of what we're doing here, right? You had to switch from your old software to the one that we're doing. We're embracing that change. There's a lot of things that might be similar from one to the other, and it's just where they put the buttons. So like, let me help you go do that. So what's the way that you've embraced change this week? So like even on, you know, smaller group meetings, if we had one more person on this call, we'd be doing it. Okay. Interesting. Huh? I like that. It's cool. I think it's, it's really easy to like at a certain point, like, Oh, you know, that old thing, we're not going to do it, but it's, I think it's good to have people who are like all in on it and enthusiastic like you to kind of like maintain that culture. Right. So, um, and something's working, right? Like the job satisfaction numbers are good. And so, I mean, from a completely external third party, something's working. So that's great. One of the kind of big meaty topics I want to get into is your, um, your session at bridging the gap. So, um, you know, you shouldn't pick favorites, but it was my favorite session. I told you after I loved it, um, I have felt some similar elements to that in the past in my career. And so let's get into the session a little bit, and then I have a couple of questions on it. Um, I guess like framing wise, it was, it was named, uh, why I left each job that I have left and, and what could have been done to retain me. Right. Yeah. My journey to partner is why I quit and what you could have done to keep me. Yeah, there we go. That was enough. Um, yeah. So can you kind of walk us through some of the content that was covered there? Sure. So I, I worked at three different local accounting firms, uh, and then we merged the third one into a national firm, not Aprio. Um, so I've, I've left three different jobs intentionally and at each of the jobs, something was happening there that I didn't agree with, or my career is being stifled in a way that I didn't see it in a way that I wanted to grow the same way that they saw it. And I was vocal at each firm of what I wanted. So my big thing is no surprises. So if I think that I'm worth more money than I'm being paid, I'm going to try to show you how I could do that. I didn't have the resources of big four transparency way back then. So I actually built a spreadsheet of how the partners could make the same amount of money and I could make more money too. Um, cause I was very efficient at my jobs and that wasn't really rewarded. I was rewarded with more work, but not more money. So I, I told them what I thought I was worth and what I wanted to do. And they said no. And I was like, okay. And they're like, all right. And I was like, no, you don't understand. Okay. It's not acquiescence. Okay. As I'm now looking and here's the letter of resignation. And then I got shocked, Pikachu face. I was like, I don't understand why you're surprised. Like I told you what I wanted and you didn't do your job of provide it to me when I thought I was worth it. Um, or a different place when I got, uh, scolded during, uh, an annual review for something that happened two weeks before. And that was the entire review. Uh, cause a partner got lit up by a client and then decided that I need to go get lit up too. I was like, this should have been a conversation in your office, not my annual review. I was like, and this is how you're going to act. Like, do I want to be a partner with you? Do I want to get business married to you? And I was like, no, I don't. And I told them what I wanted to do in the, in the name of leadership and whatnot. And they said no. And I was like, okay. And again, shocked Pikachu face. And I was like, I don't understand why you're surprised. And then the last one was when I worked seven years at Filamino, the local firm, and I really enjoyed there. So I actually like at this point in the presentation, I said, this is why I stayed. But when I said things like I wanted to be a leader at the firm, they helped me with coaching on how to be a better leader. The things that were currently holding me back, a few of the changes I had to make, some work I had to put in, and they supported me in that work, you know, they helped me get from manager to partner cause I told them that's what I wanted to do. Uh, so I told them what I wanted. They said, we agree, let's go. And that was fantastic. And then we merged into Markham and I tried to do the same thing, right? I was one of our CARES Act leaders. I was like, cool. I just demonstrated a leadership skillset in this new environment. I showed them that I have this skillset and this is what I really want to do here. And they said, no, go be a tax line partner again. And I said, no. And then they were surprised when I left. And I was, I don't still don't understand why they're surprised when I said I want X and you said no. So that's like the three minute rundown of a hour long presentation. Yeah. No, I mean, good job summarizing it. I'm actually, I'm very impressed by that. Um, and you use the term for this, you taught, you mentioned it as a Cottywample. That was like the framing of the whole thing. So what was the definition of Cottywample again? It's a purposeful journey to an unknown destination. Right. Yeah. And so I really enjoyed that framing as like, you know, even, even on the backdrop of my own experience in, in accounting, um, some other jobs too, but accounting, um, where it was like, oh man, like you could be more successful here if you kind of just, you know, ate some of the shit or, you know, kept your head down a little bit or, you know, did whatever. Um, and that is maybe true with regards to, I could be more successful in the traditional sense of receiving praise in the job, but then at the same time, what I really enjoyed about that presentation was the acknowledgement of like, that might not be my success, right? My success is if I speak about what I am interested in and want to do and who I am as a person and I can find something that fits that rather than necessarily, and, and, and, you know, you need to still grow as a person. And there are things that I'm like, oh, this is me, but like, I should probably learn to grow past. But like, there are some things too that are like, this is my essence and this could be like my superpower or what sets me apart or whatever that can. and kind of just get stomped out, right? And what I really liked was kind of the refusal of to just do that and acknowledge because I want to go make more money. It was that you actually really truly held out for something that was for you, right? Yeah, interesting. When I had quit being a partner at Markham, I didn't have a job lined up, and that was intentional. You know, I'd been working for 19 straight years, you know, doing the grind of the traditional accounting career, and I was tired. Like, burnt out might be a word you could use, although I was excited about what I was going to do next. I was more frustrated that people kept telling me no. I had a conversation with someone in my network, and he was like, man, I thought you were smart. Like, you want to go quit a job where you can make a half a million dollars a year being a tax partner, so you can make a hundred grand being an admin somewhere? He's like, I don't get it. I was like, it's okay that you don't get it. I don't need there to be 10,000 of these jobs. I only need there to be one. I just need one company to believe what I believe in. I just need there to be one job where I can go do this, because I can't have 10,000 jobs. So, that's what I'm looking for, the one company that's a little bit risky, a little bit disruptive, will take a chance on someone who believes in something, and I didn't even know what job I would get. Like, I interviewed for five or six different types of jobs that I had never considered, because I was just going to be a tax partner. And then my eyes got opened up, and I was like, man, I could do a lot of different things. So, I didn't even know what I'm going to apply for. If the people sound great and the job sounds interesting, I'll take a look. And I got told no more times with 20 years of experience since I had no experience coming out of college. Every other job was like, I applied and I got it. Yeah. Yeah, so, I mean, the backdrop of you just kind of leaving this great job as a partner, right? A lot of which is having faith in your network and understanding that people were there along the way, right? Because I do have a lot of conversations with people. Actually, very recently, someone who was like, I'm about to make partner. I actually really don't think that's the journey for me. Like, show me the world, which was a really cool journey to take with this person. It was really cool being able to introduce them around and all that. And part of you being able to kind of just make the bold move of just being like, man, you know what, this isn't for me, I think is the underpinning of you having a fantastic network, right? So like, what did you do to maintain that? And like, what would be like a modern day recommendation for people to be able to do that? It's really a journey to build a network that's full of successful, good humans that all have connections in different places. So I started by joining an organization, the Greater Hartford JCs, because I wanted to get some management skills, learn how to do project management, because I wasn't getting that as a staff and senior accountant. I was like, that's a skill I'm going to need. And I'm looking around the firm going, well, there's no one for me to manage, so let me go try. Really safe place to go fail miserably at a nonprofit organization. Like, every time I ran a project, I learned something about what to do better. I learned what not to do. So it was being able to take a risk in a safe place. So I started building that network. I got involved with the Connecticut Society of CPAs through a kickball tournament with the Young Professionals Group. I joined that NYP Council for three or four years, met a bunch of other people in the state, ended up going through AICPA's Leadership Academy during that time and met 30 people from around the country that were awesome humans and really successful. And then with that kind of recurring Leadership Academy, I kept in touch with all the classes after mine, right? Every year on LinkedIn, I'd say, here are the graduates. And I would go through that post and I'd click on all of them. I would message them. I'd say, congrats, welcome to the club. Like, if you need anything, let me know. You know, I've been around a couple of years. And I've made some really good friends now that I go see at the conferences from future classes. I travel around the country for my job and there's one of the alumni in every city I go to. And I'll ping them, like, hey, I'm going to be in town. You want to grab dinner or a drink or coffee in the morning before I go visit the firm? It's work to keep the network going, but it's not hard work because you want to go see these people. It's just like, oh, hey, I'm going to go be somewhere. Do I know anybody there? And reach out to them. And if you're not going to actually travel, like, I don't know, pick a random Thursday on LinkedIn and just message five of your friends in your network and be like, hey, I was thinking of you because this thing happened in my week and it reminded me of you. Just so that you're on their mind. And a lot of it started with like, how can I help you? Yeah, yeah. No, I really like that. And like to dig even deeper to this kind of process, like beyond just the network, like, cause that's the enabler of all this. That's like what makes this possible and not a terrible idea, right? Like, cause if you had just left and you knew nobody, it'd be like, oh, Mike, what have you done? I agree. Right. But at the same time, there's something internal there too, right? Like, because a lot of people would just probably sit with that. They're like, ah, you know what? Like, I'm not really getting what I wanted out of this job, but like, still a partner. Like, I'll just, I'll sit it out. What's, you know, what's the next 20 years of my life anyways? Which, you know, sarcasm not always carried through a microphone super well, but like some people actually genuinely are kind of like that though. They're like, well, it's a job. It's kind of meant to suck, right? So like, what was like the thing that like got you to just not settle for that? Like, where does that come from? I would say two places. I was relatively successful in my academic career, which gave me the internal knowledge that I can learn things and I can pass tests well, which that was important back then. Yeah. So like, I just had this innate thought that I can go do things. But when it came down to being able to leave being a partner, which theoretically is one of the pinnacles of a career, I actually called up Amber Setter. I used her as a business coach for nearly a year. And she had this fantastic phrase called unexamined fear. And what she made me do was go examine the fear. Yeah. You know, so it's like, oh, well, jobs are inherently meant to suck. She'd be like, do they? Like, that sounds like it's a fear of yours that a job has to suck. So let's go examine it. Why does it have to? Like, is it your past experience? Have you not had good ones? Like, did every part of the job suck? And just asking questions to get like deep, deep into the root of what that fear is. And where mine came down to is, man, I really want to be able to put food on the table for my family. And if I'm unemployed for too long, I can't do that. She goes, okay, well, how much do you need to run your house? You're an accountant. Go look at your spreadsheet. And I think for me, that number was like $10,000 a month. She goes, come on, with 20 years of tax experience, you can make 10 grand a month being a contract employee while you're looking for what you really want to do. And with your network, you have enough friends that they would pay you to do that. So what are you afraid of? I was like, I guess I shouldn't really be afraid, right? And that's one of the first like steps you take out of that, I'll call it that puddle of fear onto like solid ground of, all right, I don't really need to be afraid of this thing. And I've used that unexamined fear a lot talking with our firms, with thinking about what I want to go do next. Like with this PS Plus acquisition, I have no idea what my job title or role is exactly going to be going forward. I'm okay with that ambiguity because I'm not afraid of it. It's going to be amazing. Like we're going to make it amazing. And it's okay that I don't know exactly what it is, but it's going to be amazing. And that's the important part. Yeah, yeah. Well, and I think that's like a thought process that's important for accountants to understand, right? Like, so good on Amber. We actually started talking a little bit at the conference. I'm hoping to have her on and kind of dig deeper into some of that. But like, I had a business coach too when I was looking to leave my job, right? And at the end of the day, it was like, well, what are you afraid of? And I was like, well, you know, I'm on this path, like probably, you know, whatever, five, six, seven years from like being a finance director or whatever. And he's like, okay. And do you think that experience running your own company is going to be a negative to that, right? But it is really, really easy to kind of like scare ourselves into these things. And I do think some of the stereotypes around like risk aversion and accountants are true, right? Like I ended up in accounting because I didn't want to close doors in finance. And so I didn't want to just do a finance degree because I was like, well, you know, this is gonna open more options and I can kind of do most of what I could do with that other thing anyways. And so I think that risk aversion's there. And so having either someone or hearing a conversation hopefully like this that challenges some of those, you know, easy pathways to thinking of just like, oh, you know, I am on this path. I don't want to fall behind it. So like, I'll just kind of keep doing the thing. I think it is important for people to have like a challenge to that, right? So, I mean, shout out to Amber for you to like talking you through that, absolutely. Yeah, I've received a handful of really good pieces of advice over the years. I was at a Leadership Academy 2.0 type of session before Engage one year. And one of the phrases that came out was kick the should out of it. Yeah. Like, what should I do? What am I supposed to do? It's like, who cares? Like, what do you want to do? Like, this is your life. This is your career. What are you worried about what the outside world thinks of it? Because there could be the people like the one I mentioned who couldn't understand why I would want to go do something different. But there were a number of people who were like cheering me on or rooting for me. Like, oh my gosh, this would be amazing if you could do this. Listen to the cheerleaders. Like, don't listen to the haters. Like, there's 8 billion people on the planet. I don't need all of them to like me or support me. But I've got the couple of hundred that are in my corner and I rely on them. Yeah. And then how did you kind of land in that job? I feel like the presentation maybe kind of like ran out of time and it was like, oh yeah, and then I found this thing and then now I'm doing this. How does that story kind of end for you? Because like you said, you were searching for something but you didn't exactly know what it was or like that job didn't even really exist. So like, how does that kind of story end there? So one of my friends who was in my leadership academy class in 2010 was at a map group meeting for the AICPA in North Carolina and he had just moved there. My boss lives in North Carolina. He was at the same map group. They were acquiring the firm foundation from RSM which has turned into the Alliance. So John is my boss. He goes, hey, Jason, my friend, I'm starting this Alliance, need someone to run it. Who do you know? Like, you know, a lot of people, you worked at AICPA, you were in leadership academy and Jason goes, man, well, my good friend, Mike just quit his job being a partner at Markham after working at local firms his whole career. He needs to be the one to run it. Like he'd be amazing at it. And I didn't even know John. I didn't even know what April was. Like I live in Connecticut. April was based in Atlanta at the time and hadn't expanded nationally like it has the last five years. So that's how I got the first interview. Someone in my network knew someone at Aprio, a place I'd never heard of, starting this new thing that they had never done before. They were looking for someone to run it. So like talk about the power of a network. Like my friend was looking out for me. He was advocating for me in a room that I wasn't in. And I try to do that a lot for the people in my network. I'm constantly listening for opportunities, especially if I know somebody who's looking for something. Yeah. And my friend was doing that for me and interviewed with everybody at Aprio that was in leadership, like Lord and Richard and John. And now I'm doing exactly what I should be doing, exactly where I should be doing it. Yeah. I love that. And how'd you make it known to your network, like at large, right? Because I think that's part of the battle too, is like some people have great networks, but they're like, ah, like it's embarrassing to be like, I'm looking for something new or whatever. Like, what did that look like? That was a month's long interaction on our Leadership Academy Slack group. There'd be random Tuesdays where I would just, I say, get mad. You know, that's part of the process is you got to feel the emotions. So I would just sit there and I'd write like a three page manifesto. And I'd be like, all right, I just wrote this. I need to get it off my chest. Like, let me know what you think. And yeah, it was about like, this is what annoys me about the profession. This is what I want to do to go fix it. Like, why haven't we fixed it? We could do so much better. We can do this and that. I was like, this is the kind of stuff that I want to do. Like, so if this is part of a job that you know of that exists, like that's what I'm looking for. Like, it was hard to put into words because impact is what I was looking for. How to make the profession better tomorrow than it was yesterday. And I had no idea how to do that. So a lot of it was being vulnerable. But with that group of people, you're allowed and encouraged to be vulnerable because they have a lot of the same mindset. They're leaders themselves and they have imposter syndrome. They have times where they're not feeling like this might be the best decision or they're second guessing themselves. And it's a really comfortable, like psychologically safe space that we can just be our authentic selves and say, all right, I'm looking for this thing and I don't know how to define it. And then some of my friends would help me define it. They're like, it sounds like you're looking for this. It sounds like you're looking for that. And that really helped me mold what I was looking for into something concise so that when I was talking with someone that was outside of that group, I could have a 30 second elevator speech of, here's what I'm really looking to go do next. Yeah. Yeah, no, that's cool. What's the name of that group again, specifically? I wanna make sure I link it in the notes. It's the AICPA Leadership Academy. Okay, okay, cool. Yeah. I'm not sure when the applications are due or when the episode will air. It'll be a pretty soon airing of the episode, but yeah, I'm gonna make sure I link that in the show notes. And I mean, listen, if they miss it, there's always next year. And this sounds like it's part of a lifelong or career long journey. So it's one of those things where it's like, ah, if you have to wait six months, it's not the end of the world either, right? So cool, Mike. I really appreciate having you on. I tell you this all the time, but I'm like all the way behind kind of every opinion that you push up about the industry and like everything, you know, every kind of thing you look to try to promote change in, I always find myself on the same side as you for. So, you know, it's always a pleasure to have you on. Again, thank you so much for the session. Also, I think that was an absolute highlight of bridging the gap for me and just hearing yourself be like, oh, I'm not the only one and I've been through this or have been the square peg in the round hole at a big four or whatever. And then seeing someone in a very, you know, desirable position, very happy with what they do, I think means a lot for people who feel a little lost in that front. And so, yeah. So yeah, thank you for all you do for the profession and the people in it, Mike. Oh, you're welcome. I got the idea for the session from my teenage daughters actually, because they started to see me as a human kind of after I was a little successful and they didn't really get to see some of the struggles. And I was having one of those conversations where I was like, you didn't know me when I was an 18 year old idiot. Like I've thought things that you're going through and I've gone through what you're going through. So I was like, what if I did that for my career, for the people that, you know, find me on LinkedIn now and they're like, oh man, that's a great role. It's like, well, what about the first 20 years? Maybe I should share some of that and let them know that it's not like, oh, you just grow up innately successful or it's inherent in who you are as a human. No, it takes work, it takes struggle, it takes falling on your face. It takes a great group of friends. It takes a lot of things, including like the support of the family. You know, the number of times that my wife told me like, just go do it. Like, if it's for your career, I support you. We'll figure out the money later. Like, you'll make enough. I'm not worried about it today. So it's a lot of great support systems. Yeah, yeah, that's an underrated thing is like having a great kind of like life partner, spouse. Like, I think, you know, goes a long way as well because yeah, when I left my good stable job too, people were like, oh my God, what does the missus think about it? And I was like, yeah, she doesn't really think about it. She's like, yeah, that's cool, man. That's awesome, go for it, right? So I think that goes a long way as well. So yeah, shout out to them as well. But yeah, thank you so much, Mike. I really appreciate it here. And you know, I'm honored to have you as the first repeat guest on the pod. Honored to be the first repeat guest and really honored to be on here any and every time that you want me to be. It's a fantastic pod, lots of great topics, tremendous speakers that you have on here. So every time that you ask, the answer is gonna be yes. Perfect, I now have that recorded. So thank you, all right. Thank you, all right.