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Why Accountants Are Both Thrilled and Terrified by QuickBooks’ Latest AI Push

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How much should we trust AI with our critical financial processes?

In a recent episode of The Unofficial QuickBooks Accountants Podcast, hosts Alicia Katz Pollock and Matthew “Spot” Fulton break down the August 2025 “In the Know” webinar from Intuit, where AI agents take center stage alongside major Enterprise Suite enhancements and ProAdvisor Academy improvements.

From payment collection to payroll processing, QuickBooks is pushing automation further than ever before. But as Fulton and Katz Pollock discuss, the technology that saves you hours today needs careful oversight to avoid compliance nightmares tomorrow.

ProAdvisor Academy Gets Smarter

Before diving into the AI updates, the hosts highlighted some welcome improvements to ProAdvisor Academy. You can now filter courses by length and CPE credit amount—perfect for those moments when you think, “I have an hour, what can I learn right now?”

Even better, the system finally saves your CPE certificates in the “My History” section. As Katz Pollock notes, “They used to email them to you and you had to save them, and that was it. So the fact that you can actually now track your CPE is pretty darn awesome.”

Intuit is also launching a new quarterly series called Solution Spotlight, where support experts will tackle complex challenges and deep-dive into underutilized tools. The first topic? Bank transactions and reconciliation—the community’s most requested subject.

Enterprise Suite: The Multi-Entity Game Changer

Fulton and Katz Pollock spent considerable time discussing Enterprise Suite’s powerful consolidation features, and for good reason. These updates address long-standing issues that have plagued multi-entity businesses for years.

The Shared Chart of Accounts feature uses AI to standardize accounting across all your entities. As Fulton explains it, “You choose which chart of accounts you want to be your primary one, and then you can use the AI to say, okay, we think these accounts are going to match up with those accounts. You still have the ability to review and say, yep, you got this right.”

The time savings are massive. Fulton speaks from experience, “As an accountant, the time and energy it takes to try to normalize a chart of accounts is extensive. There’s a lot of thought and knowledge and wisdom that goes into it.”

Multi-entity transactions are even more impressive. When you invoice another entity in your organization, the system automatically creates the corresponding bill in that entity, complete with a PDF attachment. Fulton recalls the old way: “You would pull up two browsers, you’d have both companies up, and you look at the intercompany exchanges between one company and the other, and you go line by line to make sure both sides are there.”

But Katz Pollock raises an important point about accessibility. She has clients with multiple small entities—”literally QuickBooks Ledger or Simple Start”—who desperately need these consolidation features but can’t justify Enterprise Suite’s price tag. Her suggestion? “I think they should make an Enterprise Lite version focused solely on multi-company functions.

The Payments Agent: Getting You Paid Faster (and Smarter)

The Payments agent analyzes customer behavior to optimize your collection strategy. When you create an invoice, it shows you how long they’ve been a customer, their payment history, open invoices, and average payment time.

But here’s where it gets interesting. The agent suggests payment methods based on what will get you paid fastest. It even calculates total time to receive funds, including your customer’s typical delay. When Katz Pollock saw “ACH 14 days” in the demo, she clarified, “It wasn’t that ACH takes 14 days to clear. It’s that the customer takes on average nine days to pay, and then you have the three to five days it takes to clear.”

Fulton cuts to why this matters, “As business owners, all too often we rely on small margins to where we are super sensitive to cash flow. If it’s going to take somebody longer to pay, we need to know that.”

The system can also parse invoices from text, images, or PDFs, though Katz Pollock admits it “doesn’t do the line items yet. But you know, it’s just the infancy of the technology.”

One limitation bothers Katz Pollock: Reminder settings apply to all customers universally. “I have placeholder invoices or agreements with customers where it’s okay that they’re not going to pay for another 90 days,” she explains. Her workaround? Adjust due dates to match actual payment expectations.

The Payroll Agent: Convenience Meets Controversy

The Payroll agent’s text-message time collection generated the most heated discussion. Employees receive texts asking for hours, overtime, and tips. They respond with simple messages, and the system compiles everything for manager approval.

Sounds great, right? Not so fast.

“If they’re not keeping a time card, you know they’re going to overestimate how much they actually worked,” Katz Pollock warns. Fulton agrees, “How many employees are always completely honest with their hours and their overtime and their tips?”

The system is heavily restricted during beta. It’s only for US customers who don’t use auto payroll or QuickBooks Time, have one pay schedule, and use basic pay types. Fulton sees wisdom here, “Let’s make sure this is working before we give it to all the crazies out there.”

Still, there are safeguards. The system flags anomalies, requires manager approval, creates audit logs, and needs employee consent for each payroll period. Fulton even sees potential for construction companies where daily time certification is required. “They’re having to certify by responding back to this the amount of time they worked.”

Katz Pollock’s verdict? “The technology is going to be great. It’s the humans that you can’t trust in this particular issue.”

Customer Leads: Your Email Becomes Your CRM

Currently in Gmail-only beta (Outlook coming soon), the Customer Leads agent scans your email for customer interactions and organizes them into a sales pipeline: inquiry, negotiation, finalization, contracted, or lost.

Fulton’s excited about consolidation. “I’ve been using 17 Hats, but the challenge I’ve always had is the integration piece. I can handle all this stuff up to the estimate and invoice somebody, but it’s always been external.”

Katz Pollock uses Method CRM currently and sees the appeal, “This will be really nice to be able to just keep it right inside QBO and not have to go to another app.”

The hosts admit they’re still learning this feature, and Katz Pollock has a future episode planned to dive deeper.

More Updates Worth Your Attention

A few other updates the hosts are looking forward to include:

Scheduled Compensation Changes

This might be the sleeper hit of the updates. You can now pre-program raises and bonuses with effective dates. As Fulton exclaims, “This is sunlight shining down onto us so we can take a vacation at the end of the year, too!”

Katz Pollock shares a perfect use case: “I had a client whose employee broke their field service iPad and was reimbursing them out of their payroll, $150 per month for six months.” With scheduling, that deduction would automatically end on the right date.

Sales Tax Automation Expands

QuickBooks now handles sales tax filing for Iowa, Minnesota, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, and West Virginia at $40 per filing. While the hosts debated the price, Fulton notes it’s actually market rate compared to services like Avalara.

Looking Ahead

The hosts emphasized community feedback throughout the episode. As Fulton puts it: “Are you using Enterprise yet? If you are, what features are you loving? If you aren’t, what features are most enticing?”

They’ve even started a LinkedIn group for the podcast where listeners can discuss episodes and share experiences.

Katz Pollock is launching her “Great QBO Refresh” training series in September, completely rebuilding her curriculum to address all the interface changes. 

Don’t miss Intuit Connect (October 27-29 in Las Vegas) or Reframe Conference (November in Florida), which Fulton calls “by far, hands down, the best conference I’ve been to in years.”

The Bottom Line

These AI agents aren’t replacing accounting professionals; they’re redefining the role. The firms that thrive will leverage AI for efficiency while maintaining the human judgment that ensures accuracy, compliance, and client trust.

As Katz Pollock wisely advises about the payroll agent’s rollout, “Intuit, go slow on this one. We want to actually see use cases before it becomes universal.”

The future of accounting isn’t human versus machine. It’s human with machine, each doing what they do best. Ready to dive deeper? Listen to the full episode above and join the conversation in the Unofficial QuickBooks Accountants Podcast LinkedIn group.

Alicia Katz Pollock’s Royalwise OWLS (On-Demand Web-based Learning Solutions) is the industry’s premier portal for top-notch QuickBooks Online training with CPE for accounting firms, bookkeepers, and small business owners. Visit Royalwise OWLS, where learning QBO is a HOOT!

Tax Law Rewards Professional Stagnation While Punishing Growth

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A Tennessee accountant diligently studies for and passes the CPA exam. His day-to-day work remains virtually identical: same clients, same responsibilities, same desk. Yet when tax season arrives, those CPA exam costs aren’t deductible. Why? Because becoming a CPA qualified him for a “new trade or business,” even though he had no intention of changing careers, and his actual work didn’t change at all.

This real case from Glenn v. Commissioner perfectly captures the absurd reality facing today’s professionals: the very credentials and education that make you more valuable in your current role often become non-deductible under tax law. Jeremy Wells dissects this paradox in his latest Tax in Action podcast episode, where he reveals how our tax system has created a knowledge economy trap that punishes professional advancement.

While tax law theoretically supports professional development through education deductions, it systematically penalizes advanced degrees, professional certifications, and career-expanding skills by classifying them as “personal investments” rather than business necessities. This leaves tax professionals and their clients caught in a regulatory maze where maintaining your current skill level is rewarded, while pursuing excellence faces potential penalties.

The Knowledge Economy Reality Check

“For quite a while now, most of the U.S. economy has been based on not the ability of people to produce things or do things with their hands, but rather the value of what they’re able to accomplish with their minds,” Wells explains.

The financial sector, insurance industry, and professional services all depend on knowledge work. Yet our tax system treats developing those valuable mental capabilities as personal indulgence rather than business necessity.

The existing education tax breaks demonstrate this disconnect clearly. The 529 plans that parents use to save for college offer no federal tax deduction for contributions, though some states do allow deductions. Student loan interest deductions under IRC Section 221 phase out based on income, effectively penalizing successful professionals. Education credits like the American Opportunity Credit and Lifetime Learning Credit focus on traditional college expenses, not the specialized training that drives value in today’s economy.

As Wells notes, these benefits can be rather limited. The problem isn’t that tax law ignores education entirely. It’s that the benefits don’t match the reality of professional development needs.

This brings us to the question Wells hears constantly from business owners: “Can I pay for my own education and use my business to do that?” The answer reveals just how complex this landscape has become.

Educational Assistance Programs: Promise and Pitfalls

The IRC Section 127 educational assistance programs initially appear to offer hope. These programs allow employers to provide up to $5,250 annually in tax-free educational benefits, and the definition of qualifying education is surprisingly broad.

Wells explains that under these programs, “education includes any form of instruction or training that improves or develops the capabilities of an individual.” Even better, “education is not limited to courses that are job-related or part of a degree program.” This could potentially cover everything from technical training to wellness courses that make employees “better people, more productive, happier.”

The program can cover tuition and fees, books, supplies, and equipment, and even student loan repayments. The definition of “employee” is also broad, including “self-employed individuals or what we might refer to as independent contractors.”

But here’s where the system reveals its bias against small business owners.

The fatal flaw lies in the anti-discrimination rules. Any business owner with more than a 5% stake in their company cannot claim more than 5% of the total benefits paid out by the program. As Wells explains, “If you are self-employed, and you want to use this program for yourself, and you have other employees, you, as a more than 5% owner of that business, cannot claim more than 5% of the benefits paid out by that program.”

The math is brutal. If you want to claim the full $5,250 benefit for your own education, your business would need to pay out at least $105,000 in total educational benefits to all participants. For most small businesses, this makes the program impractical.

The discrimination rules add another layer of complexity. Programs cannot favor highly compensated employees: those earning over $160,000 in 2025, those with 5% or greater ownership stakes, or those in the top 20% of employees ranked by compensation.

Wells notes that for many small business owners, this means they either “don’t do this program at all” or “just exclude themselves from the program.” And there’s another catch. Unlike cafeteria plans under IRC Section 125, you can’t offer employees a choice between the education benefit and additional cash compensation.

The program also has strict substantiation requirements. Employees must provide documented proof that expenses qualify, and they can’t double-dip by receiving reimbursement and then claiming education credits on their personal returns. Wells warns this is particularly important because “it’s entirely possible that that employee would then turn around and report those educational costs on their tax return and claim an education credit.”

When Business Owners Go Direct: The Section 162 Minefield

When educational assistance programs fail small business owners, they turn to direct business deductions under IRC Section 162. This is where things get really tricky.

Treasury Regulation 1.162-5 allows education deductions if the education “maintains or improves required skills” or “meets legal or employment requirements to maintain his or her present salary, status or job.” This generally includes professional continuing education and refresher courses.

The regulation also covers education to meet an employer’s minimum requirements “if the requirements are imposed for a bona fide business purpose.” Wells gives the example of requiring employees to take spreadsheet training because “we use a lot of spreadsheets in my business, and my employees need to be able to effectively use those spreadsheets.”

Even travel for education can be deductible if “the travel is directly related to the duties of the individual in employment” and “the major portion of that business needs to include activities directly maintaining or improving required skills.” However, taxpayers must allocate personal activities during the trip separately.

But here’s where the Tax Court draws its line in the sand.

The Tax Court’s War on Professional Growth

Treasury Regulation 1.162-5(b) establishes two types of education that are explicitly non-deductible, and the Tax Court has interpreted these restrictions aggressively.

First, taxpayers cannot deduct education that meets “necessary minimum educational requirements.”  Second, and far more damaging, education that “will lead to qualifying an individual for a new trade or business” is automatically disqualified.

The logic, Wells explains, is that these expenses are “essentially personal or perhaps capital expenditures” where “you’re investing in yourself.” The Tax Court views this as an “inseparable aggregate of personal and capital expenditures” rather than ordinary business expenses.

The cases reveal a pattern of hostility toward professional advancement that spans decades. In the Glenn case, the accountant couldn’t deduct CPA exam costs even though his work remained identical. The Tax Court ruled that becoming a CPA granted “certain rights, responsibilities, privileges that weren’t there before.”

The pattern repeats across professions. In Robinson v. Commissioner (1982), a licensed practical nurse completed an RN program while maintaining virtually identical duties. The Tax Court ruled against her because registered nurses have different capabilities than LPNs.

Even IRS employees get caught in this trap. In Weiler v. Commissioner (1970) and Taubman v. Commissioner (1973), IRS revenue agents couldn’t deduct law school costs despite arguing that legal training enhanced their current tax research abilities.

Law degrees face particularly harsh treatment. Wells notes that “law degrees generally qualify for a new trade or business” regardless of the taxpayer’s current profession or intentions.

The MBA Split Decision

The MBA cases show just how arbitrary these determinations can become. In 2016’s Gora v. Commissioner, the Tax Court allowed a financial controller’s executive MBA costs because his continued work in “management and finance” didn’t represent new qualifications.

Just one year later, in Kray v. Commissioner (2017), a computer design consultant’s identical executive MBA was ruled non-deductible because it qualified her for “new tasks” like “financial analysis, managing a business, managing and overseeing a staff.”

Wells warns that “an MBA may or may not qualify” as deductible, making this area particularly risky for taxpayers.

The Practical Reality for Tax Professionals

This creates impossible situations for tax professionals advising clients. The Tax Court’s standard isn’t whether you actually change careers or even want different opportunities. As Wells emphasizes, the keyword is “potentially”—education that could potentially qualify you for different work is probably non-deductible.

The system forces taxpayers to choose between pursuing valuable education that enhances their business capabilities but facing potential audit challenges, or limiting themselves to narrow, maintenance-level training that clearly fits within existing job requirements.

Wells notes that taxpayers must be “established in a trade or business” before education expenses become deductible, and the Tax Court has ruled that “a relatively short or temporary tenure in a job before starting the education doesn’t establish the taxpayer in the trade or business.”

Even holding a position doesn’t guarantee you’ve met minimum educational requirements. University teaching assistants, for example, haven’t met the minimum requirements for permanent faculty positions until they actually have their PhD.

Navigating the Knowledge Economy Trap

Our tax system rewards professional stagnation while punishing the learning that drives economic value. Tax professionals’ continuing education to maintain existing credentials? Fully deductible. Are the same professionals pursuing advanced degrees to better serve clients? Potentially non-deductible because it might qualify them for “new” responsibilities.

For tax professionals, this creates compliance challenges and ethical questions. Do we advise clients toward valuable education that faces potential tax challenges, or recommend they limit learning to “safe” options that maintain the status quo?

Wells warns that employers and self-employed individuals “really need to be careful when they’re trying to deduct those work-related education costs.” The Tax Court “can be pretty strict about education either meeting those minimum requirements for a profession or even more often than that, qualifying the recipient of that education for a new trade or business.”

Understanding these limitations is about recognizing how tax policy shapes professional development decisions across the entire economy. The knowledge economy demands continuous adaptation and skill development, but our tax code remains anchored to an industrial mindset that views capability expansion as personal indulgence rather than business necessity.

Listen to the full episode of the Tax in Action podcast for Wells’ complete analysis and detailed guidance to help clients make informed decisions about their professional development investments. Don’t let the knowledge economy trap catch you or your clients unprepared.

The Business Case for Leading with Heart in a Numbers-Driven World

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Dawn Brolin’s accounting firm partners told her she was fat. They criticized her for wearing the same clothes repeatedly. And when she tore her meniscus at the gym, they made her drive herself to the hospital with explicit instructions to be at work the next morning.

This wasn’t a scene from a workplace horror story. This was real life for a CPA who would later become one of accounting’s most passionate advocates for empathetic leadership. In a recent episode of the She Counts podcast, Brolin opened up to hosts Nancy McClelland and Questian Telka about the raw experiences she shares in her new book, “The Elevation of Empathy,” revealing how toxic leadership nearly broke her, and ultimately shaped her understanding of what authentic leadership looks like.

What makes Brolin’s story particularly powerful is that she doesn’t just talk about being a victim of empathy-free leadership. She also admits to her own failures and how she learned to recover from them. Her journey shows embracing empathy as a strategic advantage, rather than hiding emotional intelligence to appear “tough enough,” creates stronger teams and better business outcomes.

Before we dive deeper, if this topic triggers any emotions or struggles you’re facing, there is help available. The Crisis Text Line offers confidential professional mental health assistance: just text HOME to 741741.

When Leadership Lacks Heart: The Partnership from Hell

Brolin’s partnership nightmare wasn’t just about bad bosses. It was a masterclass in how the absence of empathy destroys people and businesses from the inside out.

At the time, Brolin was one of three partners in the firm. She brought in most of the clients, and was working to support her young family as the primary breadwinner. She was genuinely excited about building something meaningful. Then reality hit.

“There was zero empathy in that firm,” Brolin recalls. “None whatsoever.”

Because Brolin wasn’t yet a CPA, her partners—both women—relegated her to answering phones and fetching lunch, despite her being the primary rainmaker. The real cruelty went deeper than professional dismissal. They systematically attacked her personally, criticizing her weight and mocking her clothing choices.

The gym incident is an image of empathy-free leadership: when Brolin tore her meniscus during a step aerobics class they’d all attended together, she found herself writhing in pain on the gym floor. Her partners’ response? Figure it out yourself.

“I somehow dragged myself down to the office, and now I need to get to the hospital,” Brolin remembers. “And they were like, ‘All right, well, you’re gonna have to drive yourself to the hospital and make sure you’re at work tomorrow morning.'”

With a torn meniscus.

This wasn’t leadership, it was systematic dehumanization. The partners were creating a culture where employees watched this treatment and learned that success meant crushing others. “I watched how they treated the employees,” Brolin explains. “It wasn’t just me.”

But Brolin made a crucial decision in that toxic environment. Instead of absorbing these behaviors as normal, she used the experience as a reverse blueprint. “I was never going to do that as an employer,” she realized.

When the Empathy Champion Falls Short: Brolin’s Coaching Confession

Here’s what makes Brolin’s story so honest and powerful: she advocates for empathy and admits when she’s failed at it herself.

As a softball coach known as “The Designated Motivator,” Brolin poured her soul into her players. She made it her mission to be inclusive, to make every kid feel appreciated and loved. Then three players transferred to another school.

“My empathy went out the window,” Brolin admits. “I was devastated that they left. I poured my soul into them, and I was like, ‘You’re leaving me.’”

Instead of considering why these kids might have needed to transfer, Brolin took it personally. She withdrew her care and support from them completely. “That was so wrong,” she reflects.

But here’s the beautiful part: Brolin recognized her mistake and fixed it. About a year later, she went to each of the three kids and apologized.

“I want you to know something. This is an epic fail on my part, not yours,” she told them. She gave them permission not to forgive her, making it clear the apology was about them, not about making herself feel better.

They forgave her. Now they text regularly.

“My point in saying that is, for those people who have been unempathetic to an individual, you can fix that,” Brolin explains. “You can go to a person, and admit you messed up.”

In short, empathy isn’t about being perfect. It’s about recognizing your failures, owning them, and doing better.

Empathy as Your Secret Business Weapon

The accounting profession has operated under a fundamental misunderstanding: that empathy equals weakness. Brolin’s experiences prove exactly the opposite.

“Empathy doesn’t mean you’re soft,” Brolin emphasizes. “As a matter of fact, I think it’s a superpower.”

The American Psychological Association defines empathy as understanding a person from their frame of reference rather than your own. This breaks down into two skills: cognitive empathy (logically understanding someone’s perspective) and emotional empathy (actually feeling what they feel).

In business terms, this translates to measurable advantages that accounting firms can’t ignore. The research is overwhelming: empathetic leaders drive stronger team performance, higher retention rates, sharper decision-making, increased innovation, and improved mental health across their organizations.

“When leaders have empathy, people gravitate to that leader more than they do to a leader who doesn’t have empathy,” Brolin explains.

Consider Brad Smith, former CEO of Intuit, who Brolin cites as one of her favorite leaders. At industry conferences, Smith would stop mid-stride when he saw familiar faces, remembering personal details about employees’ families and asking about their daughters’ college plans.

“That is a leader who has empathy, who cares about other people by his actions more than his words,” Brolin notes. “They don’t superficially care about you because it’s going to give them an advantage. They care about you because of you.”

Being appointed to a leadership position doesn’t automatically make someone a leader. True leadership requires the ability to connect with and understand the people you’re leading. When your employees trust that you see them as whole humans rather than just billable resources, they bring their full creative potential to work.

The Burden Women Carry (And Why Men Need to Step Up Too)

Women in accounting firms often carry the invisible emotional labor of our workplaces. According to a 2023 Deloitte report, 51% of women say they’re expected to manage team wellbeing, compared to only 27% of men.

Telka knows this intimately. “I think about things like birthday gifts for colleagues or cards that have to be signed or someone’s ill and they need to be sent flowers,” she explains. “It often fell on me, probably because I was the most empathetic. The men were never the ones who were driving those situations.”

McClelland captures this perfectly with her favorite greeting card: “The front of the card says, ‘Happy birthday, from us.’ Inside: ‘But I think you know who went out and bought the card and wrote it and addressed it—and who just put the stamp on it.’”

But Brolin believes many men in the industry are more empathetic than we realize. “They’re just not being intentional about it,” she says. Take Randy Crabtree, who wrote the foreword to Brolin’s book, or Mike Paine, who told Telka, “I really want to help women in the field. Help me understand what the problem is and tell me what I can do, then I’m here for it.”

“And that’s empathy,” McClelland points out. “That is empathy right there.”

Learning to Accept What You Give: The Hardest Lesson

For Brolin, one of the biggest challenges has been learning to accept empathy, not just give it.

“People think because I keep going, I don’t hurt,” Brolin shares. “Let me be very clear. I hurt, and I keep going.”

Women leaders often become so focused on caring for others that they struggle to let others care for them. When Kellie Parks called after reading Brolin’s vulnerable Mother’s Day post, Brolin’s instinct was to deflect and hang up quickly.

Instead, she made a conscious choice to receive Parks’ empathy. “I let myself listen to what Kellie had to say and gave some space in my soul.”

McClelland offered Brolin a reframe that many women leaders need to hear: “Would you want me to hide my pain to protect you?” When Brolin said of course not, McClelland continued, “It’s an honor to have you turn to me when you need help. So if you ask for help, you’re showing us the same respect.”

As McClelland puts it, the goal is “unconditional love, but conditional involvement”—staying open to authentic connection while maintaining boundaries about what treatment you’ll accept.

Practical Tools for Building Your Empathy Muscle

Brolin offers specific practices for developing empathy as a leadership skill:

  • Practice mindfulness to build awareness. When you talk to someone, be truly present in that conversation. This is especially challenging at conferences with distractions everywhere, but it’s worth the effort.
  • Ask questions without making assumptions. Go into conversations with a blank slate rather than preconceived notions about what someone will say. As Telka notes, “Most of the time if I don’t make assumptions, things turn out much more positively.”
  • Pay attention to nonverbal cues. What are people not saying out-loud that you should consider asking about?
  • Ask for feedback. Be vulnerable enough to say, “This scenario happened with this client. What could we have done differently? Was it something I should have done that I didn’t do?”

Remember, as Brolin’s softball story shows, empathy can be learned and relearned. You can unlearn behaviors that hurt others. Most people aren’t out to hurt others. They’ve just learned harmful patterns that they can change.

Your Empathy Is Revolutionary

Brolin’s journey from victim of empathy-free leadership to champion of emotional intelligence demonstrates that our profession’s future depends on leaders who understand that strength and compassion are partners in creating sustainable success.

Empathetic leadership drives measurable results through higher retention, stronger teams, sharper decision-making, and improved mental health. In an industry grappling with talent shortages and burnout, leaders who can authentically connect with their teams while driving results are essential for survival.

Women in accounting must reject false choices. You don’t have to choose between empathy and strength, between caring and competence. Your emotional intelligence is your competitive advantage.

As Audre Lorde reminds us, “Caring for others doesn’t make you weak. It makes you dangerous to systems built on indifference.”

Ready to hear Brolin’s complete journey and discover more tools for empathetic leadership? Listen to the full She Counts episode to learn how to turn your emotional intelligence into your greatest professional asset. The future of accounting depends on leaders brave enough to lead with both their heads and their hearts, and you’re uniquely positioned to show the way.

This Forbes Top 200 CPA Says Sponsors Matter More Than Mentors

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Picture this: You’re sitting across from a potential client—an older gentleman who seems kind and polite. Your expertise fills the room, your credentials speak for themselves, but throughout the entire meeting, he keeps calling you “darling.” Not your name. Just “darling.”

This experience happened to Nicole Davis, founder of Conscious Accounting (formerly Butler Davis) and a Forbes Top 200 CPA. For Davis, who’s originally from Georgia, where terms like “honey” and “sweetheart” are common, it wasn’t about being offended. It was about something deeper.

“Since we’re in a professional setting, I’m like, ‘you need to call me by my name,’” Davis explains. “When some men see a pretty face or just women in general, they kind of tend to sidestep our expertise.”

Sound familiar? If you’ve worked in accounting, tax, or bookkeeping for any length of time, you’ve probably been there. That moment when your face is seen, but your capabilities somehow become invisible. It’s why a recent episode of the She Counts podcast bears the title “Don’t Call Me Darling,” and why Nicole’s response to these moments is a masterclass in redefining professional power.

When Power Looks Different Than Expected

Davis’s journey to commanding respect didn’t happen overnight. Despite her current reputation for dominating whatever room she enters, she admits something that might surprise you: “I am highly introverted. People think I’m not because I can turn on. But as quickly as I turn it on, I can turn it off.”

Early in her corporate career, Davis bought into traditional definitions of power. “Early in my career when I worked in corporate America, I thought power meant title, power meant that corner office, power meant I’m calling the shots and I’m telling people what to do.”

But when she started her own firm, that facade crumbled. What emerged was something far more powerful. “Real power isn’t in a title. Real power isn’t in how much money you have. Real power is when you own who you are, and you make everyone else also accept that person.”

The catalyst for this shift? Representation. Davis’s boss at the Federal Home Loan Bank, Michelle, was the first Black woman she’d ever worked for. “When I started working for her, my eyes started to open. I started to see myself like a boss, but I didn’t see the path to get there as a Black woman, because all I saw was white men.”

This speaks to something we don’t talk about enough in our profession. When you don’t see people who look like you in positions of power, it’s hard to imagine yourself there. As co-host Nancy McClelland admits, “When I hear the word ‘doctor,’ I presume it’s a white male. Now, that is just absolutely ridiculous. It’s these deep-seated institutional societal biases we all have.”

For Davis, seeing Michelle changed everything. It showed her there was a path and more importantly, she could define what that path looked like.

Redefining What Domination Really Means

When Davis talks about “dominating” spaces, she’s not talking about aggression or making others small. “Dominating means agency. It means I am calling the shots. I’m writing my own tickets, I’m making the rules. I am doing things my way.”

But here’s the part that gave podcast co-host McClelland chills: “Dominating is not about making men small, right? Dominating is about making the space honest enough for all of us to fit into it.”

This isn’t about rejecting collaboration or building walls. It’s about what Davis calls “owning your story so completely that the room moves to your rhythm. I’m not moving to theirs.”

Learning to do this required Davis to develop boundaries that she calls “non-negotiables.” “I set boundaries and I set them fast with people,” she says. The key is being “warm but firm.”

As Davis explains, “People think you have to walk into a room and be the loudest person there to show you’re significant. No, you don’t. You walk into a room and you’re just there. Your presence says way more than words you could ever speak or say.”

This kind of presence requires something many women in accounting struggle with: refusing to shrink ourselves to make others comfortable. But when you do it right, something magical happens. Davis describes authenticity as working “a lot like Wi-Fi” because “people in range of you being who you are get that signal and they log into theirs.”

In other words, when you show up authentically, you give others permission to do the same.

Technology: The Great Equalizer

One area where Davis sees a massive opportunity for women is technology, specifically AI. Her philosophy? “Buddy up with the bots.”

“AI is making a grand stand in our profession, and so many people still have not latched on to it yet,” Davis observes. But here’s where women have an advantage. “Women have mastered efficiency out of necessity. Women are perfectly positioned to make a big major splash in the tech industry.”

Davis describes AI as acting like “a tireless junior associate” that “never needs to take a vacation. They never get tired. They can do all the things you really don’t want to do from an administrative standpoint, possibly from an analytical standpoint.”

This is about layering technology with relationship-building, and it’s something women excel at.

This approach has allowed Davis to build her firm primarily through relationships rather than traditional sales tactics. “I built my firm strictly on relationships,” she says. “I just kept taking care of my current clients and adding more services to what they needed.”

The result? A practice designed around her values rather than traditional expectations, what she calls achieving true freedom through strategic use of technology.

The Power of Sponsorship vs. Mentorship

While many people focus on finding mentors, Davis believes sponsorship is more critical. “Mentors guide, but sponsors vouch.” This concept was a key inspiration to co-host Questian Telka in her initial creation of the She Counts podcast.

Davis’ own story illustrates this perfectly. In 2020, Jeff Drew from the AICPA reached out about the practitioners planning committee. “I had no idea this committee existed,” Davis admits. But Drew’s sponsorship opened doors she didn’t know were there, eventually leading to her current role as committee chair.

“Sponsors rewrite the guest list for you so your name is on it,” Davis explains. “And when you’re on the list, your mentors help you stay on the list and guide you as you go through your journey.”

This distinction matters because it shows sometimes the biggest barrier isn’t our capability; it’s visibility. Sponsors help solve that problem by putting your name in rooms where decisions are made.

From Spaces Not Built for Us

When asked about spaces traditionally dominated by men, Davis counters, “What space was ever built for me?”

It’s a powerful question that reframes the entire conversation. Rather than trying to fit into existing structures, Davis has consistently created her own path, from starting her accounting firm to launching a construction company.

“Who said women can’t wear heels and then put on some steel-toed boots in the same week?” she asks with characteristic wit.

This mindset shift, from asking for permission to creating opportunities, separates true leaders from those still waiting for someone else to open doors.

Getting Out of Your Own Head

Davis’s advice for women wanting to take up more space is, “Take it. I know we haven’t touched on this a lot, but stamp out imposter syndrome. You’re not an imposter.”

Her approach involves speaking life into your goals. “Say it out-loud. Say it to yourself in the mirror. Say, ‘I am a badass speaker. I am an exceptional accountant. I know how to do this, this, and this.’ Even if you don’t know how to do it, say it anyway. Because eventually your mind is going to start believing it, and eventually your actions start following what your mind believes.”

It’s about recognizing that you’ve already proven yourself. “You wouldn’t have gotten this far without knowing anything. You know something. Use that to level you up.”

The Ripple Effect

Davis’s journey from being called “darling” to being recognized as a Forbes Top 200 CPA represents something bigger than individual success: cultural transformation.

When women refuse to shrink themselves, when they set boundaries while maintaining warmth, when they leverage technology to create more inclusive practices, they create ripple effects that extend far beyond their immediate sphere.

As Davis puts it, authenticity becomes “a permission slip” for everyone around you. Refusing to apologize for taking up space permits others to do the same.

In the accounting profession, technology is challenging traditional power structures and changing client expectations. There’s a new generation of professionals who refuse to accept “that’s how it’s always been done” as an answer.

Women like Davis are leading this transformation, not by playing by the old rules, but by writing new ones. They prove you don’t need to adopt masculine models of authority to command respect, and you don’t need to diminish others to demonstrate your strength.

Every boundary you set, every authentic moment you choose over conformity, every time you refuse to make yourself small, you give the next generation permission to thrive.

Because the world needs more women who understand that true domination isn’t about making others small. It’s about being so genuinely powerful that everyone around you gets permission to thrive.

Ready to transform how you show up in your professional spaces? Listen to the full She Counts episode to hear more of Davis’s insights and discover specific strategies you can implement immediately. 

The Lookback Period Mistake That Turns Valid Refunds Into Permanent Losses

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Lenora Hamilton thought she had everything figured out. She filed her 2017 tax return in November 2021—late, but still claiming a $2,070 refund she believed was rightfully hers. The IRS immediately rejected her claim. She appealed, lost, and spent nearly a year fighting in federal court.

The final verdict in early 2025 delivered a crushing blow: the court ruled her claim was “timely filed,” but she couldn’t recover a single dollar. Not because the refund was wrong, but because she missed something called the “lookback period.” A technical timing rule had permanently erased her entire refund.

In a recent episode of the Tax in Action podcast, host Jeremy Wells used Hamilton’s story to explain the refund statute of limitations—a subject most tax professionals think they understand but actually don’t. The stakes are enormous: once these deadlines pass, Wells warns, “there’s virtually no going back.”

The Two-Step Framework That Trips Up Even Experienced Practitioners

Most tax professionals think the refund statute of limitations is straightforward. File within three years, get your refund. But Wells explains it’s a complex two-step process where each step has different rules and different consequences.

Step One: Can You File at All?

The first step determines whether you can file a refund claim. This “limitation period” is the later of either three years after the return was filed or two years after the tax was paid if no return was filed. Wells calls this the “refund statute end date,” and it’s your final deadline to file any claim.

Here’s the key detail that trips up practitioners: “The filing of an original return, not an amended return, begins the period of limitation,” Wells explains. This means if you amend a return filed years ago, you’re still working within the timeline set by that original filing date.

Step Two: How Much Can You Actually Get?

Even if you file a timely claim, step two determines how much you can recover through the “lookback period.” The rules change dramatically based on when you file:

  • File within three years: You can look back at the full three years
  • File after three years: Your lookback period shrinks to just two years

This is where Hamilton got trapped. The court found she filed a timely claim, satisfying step one. But because she filed her 2017 return so late—November 2021—her lookback period couldn’t reach back to her 2017 tax payments, which were deemed made on April 15, 2018.

As Wells puts it, “The court said she filed a timely claim for refund. However, for that timely claim, there was no refund available. What does that mean? How can that be?” To understand the answer, you have to know when the IRS considers payments “made” under tax law.

The Payment Timing Trap That Caught COVID-Era Taxpayers

The lookback period depends on when payments are “deemed made,” not when they actually happened. This creates counterintuitive situations that can permanently cost taxpayers money.

The Withholding Rule

Under IRC section 6513, all tax withheld from your paychecks during the year is deemed paid on April 15th of the following year. It doesn’t matter if the money was withheld in January or December—it’s all considered paid on April 15th.

For Hamilton, “Her 2018 withholding is deemed paid on April 15th, 2019, which is the 15th day of the fourth month following the close of that tax year.”

The COVID-19 Disaster

These timing rules created a perfect storm during the pandemic. The IRS postponed filing deadlines—2019 returns were due on July 15, 2020, and 2020 returns were due on May 17, 2021. But payments were still deemed made on April 15th of each year.

This trapped taxpayers who filed during the postponement periods. Someone who filed their 2019 return on July 15, 2020 (perfectly timely) might wait until July 15, 2023, to file a refund claim. Their three-year lookback would run from July 15, 202,3 back to July 15, 2020. But their 2019 payments were deemed made on April 15, 2020, which falls outside their lookback window.

Wells explains: “This left taxpayers who didn’t file extensions for those tax years stuck with potentially valid refund claims, yet they didn’t have any periods within the lookback period because those payments were still deemed filed as of April 15th.”

The IRS eventually provided relief through Notice 2021-21, but only after recognizing that its own timing rules created harsh consequences for taxpayers who did nothing wrong.

The Dangerous “Due Date” Myth Costing Taxpayers Money

A destructive misconception in refund statute law sounds perfectly reasonable: “You have three years from the due date to claim a refund.” 

But Wells makes it crystal clear that this perception isn’t accurate. “The end date is actually three years from the filing date or possibly two years from the payment date.” The due date might coincide with these periods for taxpayers who file on time, but it’s not what controls the deadline.

Why the Due Date Myth Fails

The due date myth crumbles in the exact situations where practitioners need precision most:

  • Late-filed returns: A taxpayer who files their 2020 return in September 2023 doesn’t have until April 15, 2024 to claim refunds. Their three-year period starts from September 2023.
  • Amended returns with post-deadline payments: Wells explains these create situations where “a valid refund claim made more than three years after the due date, could look back into those payments made after the deadline.”

The Hamilton case perfectly illustrates this. If you applied the due date myth, you’d think she was too late filing in November 2021 for a 2017 return. But the court found her claim was timely because the real rules don’t work that way.

The Professional Liability Risk

For tax professionals, relying on the due date myth creates serious liability exposure. When practitioners give advice based on this oversimplified rule, they risk costing clients money they can never recover.

Wells emphasizes the finality built into these rules: “Once that statute of limitations is up, once you have passed that refund statute end date, there is no going back with some very, very limited exceptions.”

Why These Rules Are So Unforgiving

The refund statute of limitations operates with mechanical precision, regardless of hardship or apparent unfairness. Courts consistently rule that these deadlines are clear and unambiguous, so there’s no room for equitable exceptions or reasonable cause relief.

The Finality Principle

Congress built finality into the tax code intentionally. As Wells explains: “There’s an implicit concept in the tax code that Congress has written into it. I tend to call it finality.” At some point, taxpayers should feel confident that old tax years are truly closed.

But this finality only works if practitioners understand the real rules. The Hamilton case, with its modest $2,070 refund that became a years-long legal battle, shows how even small amounts trigger the same unforgiving rules that govern million-dollar refunds.

The Stakes for Tax Professionals

These rules affect every practitioner who works with amended returns, late filers, or clients with potential refund claims. Understanding when the IRS deems payments made, how postponements interact with lookback periods, and when the due date myth doesn’t apply isn’t just technical knowledge—it’s client protection. And it can be the difference between recovering thousands of dollars and losing them forever.

When Time Runs Out, Money Disappears Forever

The refund statute of limitations represents tax law at its most technically demanding and unforgiving. The two-step framework of limitation periods and lookback periods creates a system where understanding timing rules can mean the difference between financial recovery and permanent loss.

For tax professionals, these rules represent the intersection of expertise and fiduciary responsibility. Relying on oversimplified rules or misunderstand the distinction between filing dates and due dates means risking giving advice that permanently costs clients money.

This finality places enormous responsibility on practitioners to understand and navigate these rules correctly.

Don’t let technical complexity cost your clients money they can never recover. Listen to Wells’ complete Tax in Action episode to master these critical timing rules and protect your clients’ interests and your professional reputation.