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Unbalanced

by Candy Bellau, Sam Hallburn, Anchor

Entrepreneurship

Season 20

Build a firm that funds your life, not burns it with Nick Boscia

Unbalanced welcomes The Balanced CPA. Nick Boscia joins Candy and Sam for a raw conversation about transforming a legacy family firm into a modern, sustainable practice—and why balance isn’t a finish line but a daily recalibration. Nick traces the shift from manual workflows and marathon hours to clear standards, upfront billing, and a tech stack that gives his team back their time. He talks through client pushback, raising prices without apology, and the moment “no payment, no work” became a promise to protect the firm, not a threat to the relationship. Powered by Anchor.

Season 4

The community she never planned to build, with Alicia Katz Pollock

At a recent conference, Alicia Katz Pollock asked a room of one hundred accounting professionals to raise their hands if they had explored QuickBooks' newest features. Three hands went up. One was hers. In this conversation, Alicia, founder of Royalwise and a longtime QuickBooks trainer, unpacks why that gap matters: the software now does far more than it did eighteen months ago, and the recent price increases landed before most practitioners even knew what was new. She also reflects on the parts of her work she did not plan for, like the member community that became the most valued part of her training library, and the collaboration philosophy she and her husband Jamie describe as baking a bigger pie rather than fighting over slices. Along the way she talks candidly about work life harmony over balance, and the winding path from substitute teacher to QuickBooks trainer. Anchor helps accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

Put down the bat: making peace with the mistakes, with Natalie Browne

Natalie Browne once went to make a $25,000 federal estimated tax payment and sent it to the state agency instead. She caught it, canceled it, and told the client. That kind of honesty runs through this conversation with the founder of Adding Technology, an accounting firm focused on construction and real estate. Natalie talks about the long road from solo bookkeeper to leader of a small team, and why letting people make their own mistakes is harder than quietly fixing everything herself. She gets into the pull of shiny new software, the vetting process her team now runs, and the perfectionism that had her losing sleep over a five-cent discrepancy. Her advice, repeated like a mantra, is simple: put down the bat. If you have ever been kinder to your clients than to yourself, this one will feel familiar. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

Why lowering your price always costs you more with Michael Coronado

Michael Coronado of Pronto Advisors still remembers walking into a restaurant decades ago and asking how they closed out the register each night. The answer: someone opened it, took out the cash, and put it in the safe. No one ever counted it. That story sets the tone for a conversation about what happens when businesses skip the basics, whether it's cash controls, tax planning, or pricing. Michael runs Pronto Advisors, a family accounting and tax practice focused on real estate investors and property owners, a business his father started 35 years ago. He talks about taking over from his mother, the difference between filing taxes and actually planning for them, and why he says he has regretted lowering his price 100 percent of the time. It's a candid look at what it takes to run a firm built on decades of trust. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. ⁠Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

If your client's name doesn't spark joy, fire them with Nicole Davis

Nicole Davis built her accounting firm without ever working in public accounting, and she will be the first to tell you how much she had to figure out the hard way. In this episode, Nicole shares what a scathing one-star review taught her about client experience, why she developed a "client match" tool to filter for fit before a relationship ever starts, and how a self-induced cash crunch after acquiring a payroll company turned into one of her firm's most important growth moves. Nicole talks openly about the emotional weight of firing employees, how an employment attorney helped her think about core values as legitimate grounds for dismissal, and why she now audits her client list the same way she would a closet: if a name does not spark joy, it goes. She also shares her unexpected path into stand-up comedy and what performing taught her about showing up on stage. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. ⁠Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

Flat rates, firm boundaries, and running a firm with your spouse with Ray and Nicole Nieves

Nicole Nieves didn't set out to run a firm on her own terms — she got there because her health demanded it. After years of pushing through long hours in New York, she found herself repeatedly hospitalized and forced onto medical leave. What came out of that hard stop was a set of policies most accounting firms still resist: documents due 30 days before the deadline, a standing Wednesday off, and a rule that if a client doesn't respond within 48 hours, they lose their place in the queue. In this episode, Ray and Nicole Nieves of NRN Financial Services talk through what it actually looks like to run a full-service accounting firm with a spouse, move your client base across state lines twice, and shift from hourly billing to flat rates. They get into nonprofit client challenges, managing client access to the books, and why Ray, a longtime tax professional, had to relearn almost everything when Nicole took over as managing partner. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

Season 3

Getting out of the weeds: fractional operators for accounting firms with Ashley Connell

Ashley Connell spent a year having 60 one-on-one conversations with accounting firm owners before deciding to go all in on the profession. What she heard most often surprised her: loneliness. Not just the need for peers, but the need for someone inside the business they could actually talk to. Ashley is the founder of Prowess Project, which matches accounting firm owners with fractional operators, experienced operations professionals who embed in a firm and help the owner step back from running the day-to-day so they can focus on growing the business. In this conversation, Ashley breaks down how the matching process works, why emotional intelligence is the trait she screens for above all else, what she got wrong early on, and why she built monthly roundtables specifically for firm owners who feel like they are carrying everything alone. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

When the rug gets pulled: rebuilding with intention with Rick Meekins

Rick Meekins had built something real. Multiple companies running simultaneously, an engineer on staff, hands in product development, construction, and more. Then COVID hit, and almost overnight, everything stopped. What followed were months of debt, difficult conversations, and a slow reckoning with what comes next. In this episode, Rick, founder of Polaris Story and host of the Relentless Pursuit of Winning podcast, talks through what 30-plus years of entrepreneurship has actually looked like, including a restaurant that pushed him past his limits, a consulting business undone by forces outside his control, and a deliberate decision early this year to start over with coaches, accountability, and a clearer sense of purpose. The conversation covers underpricing out of fear, why knowing what to do and actually doing it are two different things, and what it means to keep pursuing the win when the strategy has to change. Unbalanced is brought to you by Anchor. We help accounting and professional services firms send agreements, collect payments, and manage billing in one simple system. Join the thousands of accounting firms who have made the switch.

From bookkeeper to AI builder: what the profession needs to know with Jan Haugo

Jan Haugo spent 40 hours a week for over 18 months learning, building, and breaking AI tools outside the accounting industry because she felt what was available inside it wasn't enough. What she came back with wasn't a collection of tips for writing better emails. It was a system: general ledger error detection, 1099 audit checking, brand voice training, and over 80 operations built to match how accounting firms actually work. In this conversation, Jan walks through how she thinks about AI tool selection, why anonymizing client data matters more than avoiding AI altogether, and what it means to get 100 hours of production out of a 40-hour week. She also talks honestly about imposter syndrome, the validation that finally gave her confidence to teach, and why the accounting profession tends to sit quietly while the world changes around it. Powered by Anchor.

Problems are really opportunities if you think about it with Richard Soo Hoo

A nonprofit's CPA said they didn't qualify. Their payroll company said the same. So did a second advisor. Richard Soo Hoo, owner of Richard Soo Hoo CPA and Associates, looked at the paperwork anyway, told everyone they were wrong, and three weeks later the organization had $425,000 in Employee Retention Tax Credits in hand. That story sits at the center of this conversation, but it's hardly the only one. Richard reflects on what it actually means to get a tax refund (hint: it's an interest-free loan to the government), what happens when in-laws compare your work to the guy down the street who got them a $75 refund, and why decades of working inside Fortune 100 companies left him genuinely unprepared for the most interesting part of the job: dealing with people. Candid, understated, and quietly sharp, Richard brings a perspective that only comes from working at every level of the profession. Listen to the full episode, and follow the show so you never miss a conversation. Powered by Anchor.

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