By 2018, I was already using AI and yelling into the void about it. I knew it would revolutionize the accounting profession because it had already revolutionized me.
I wasn’t asking what radical was, I was building it. Transformation doesn’t wait for permission.
While most of the profession was still debating the “future,” we were already fully cloud-based and using AI tools before the acronym was part of everyday conversations.
Don’t be mad about it because I tried to tell you! I was giving speeches, making videos, writing books and sending you emails just like this one.
I knew that technology was leveling the playing field, but even then, I knew that it couldn’t fix everything accountants struggle with. So yeah, this blog is a double “told you so.”
And now, here we are in 2025. The world finally speaks the language I was shouting years ago.
What was once Radical is now the blueprint.
But blueprints only work if you follow them. You might be thinking, “Leave me alone, I upload my stuff to the cloud, and I asked ChatGPT a question just yesterday.”
Ask yourself, did you take the tools without the mindset?
Just because tech is more commonplace now doesn’t mean that we’ve taught it how to fix broken processes. Tech still can’t rewrite a bad workflow or a toxic culture. It just speeds up the dysfunction. You can’t optimize what you haven’t rethought.
And honestly, we should be grateful for that because it means that our expertise is still relevant. In fact, it’s more relevant now than ever.
But it does mean that we need to step up.
The firms that are winning in 2025 didn’t dig their heels in back in 2018. They leaned in.
They didn’t just adopt new tools; they asked better questions. They rewired how they work. They use technology to create more time and space for strategy and relationships. Time and space to actually lead.
They’re meeting clients at the intersection of technology and human empathy and helping them move forward.
The good news? It’s not too late.
But it is time to decide what kind of leader you want to be, so that we’re not having this same conversation in 2032.
Because the future isn’t coming. It’s been here. And your clients are waiting for you to catch up.
If you’re ready to lead, everything you need is already in motion.