Randy Crabtree on Managing Stress and Building Healthier Firm Cultures

In this insightful session hosted by Ace Cloud Hosting, Seth Fineberg, founder of Accountants Forward, speaks with Randy Crabtree, CPA, and president of The Brainstorm Group, about managing stress, preventing burnout, and building healthier cultures within accounting firms.

Randy hosts The Unique CPA, one of the most listened-to podcasts in the accounting profession, and founded the Bridging the Gap Conference. His work focuses on helping accounting professionals build more people-first, engaged, and sustainable workplaces.

During the conversation, Randy and Seth explore the root causes of stress in the accounting profession, how leadership shapes workplace culture, and why firms need to rethink the way they measure value beyond hours worked.

They also discuss how leaders can model healthier behaviors, how staff can become a voice for positive change, and why defining a firm’s purpose, clients, and value can create a more sustainable and healthy workplace culture.

Transcript

Seth: Hey, once again, Seth Fineberg, on behalf of Ace Cloud Hosting. I can’t say enough about my next guest today. I know that I talk up a lot of people that I have the honor to speak with on a regular basis, but I really adore this person, and I think he has a lot of great things to say about the profession.

And then our topic today is stress management and really building a healthy firm culture, a couple of things that have really become as important, if not more so than, you know, the technology and the stuff that we do on a daily basis. Randy Crabtree, say hello.

Randy: Hello, and thanks for having me, Seth. This should be fun.

Seth: Absolutely. So, look, we know at the top of your mind, and the top of a lot of firm leaders’ minds, is one of the key things that seems to be holding a lot of firms back, and possibly even attracting more people to the profession, is just the stress factor that goes into accounting. And being an accountant, why do you think that’s still so present today?

With all the things we can automate, and the things that we can do to kind of potentially balance out our workloads.

Randy: Yeah, it’s funny because as I evolve in this, whatever it is I do these days, but you know, talking about burnout and stress and that my passion for helping people live by their lives within this profession, it kind of evolves the way I’m looking at this, because at first it was they had just, we got to figure out how to get rid of burnout.

But that’s more; now it’s why. So, to go to your question: why are we dealing with this? Why is this happening to us? And the more I dig into it, the more it’s a mindset thing. It’s more of a, you know, the reason that this is happening and the reason that we’re, you know, scaring people away from this profession. And I think that is happening. I think it’s changing. I think we’re getting a little better.

But the reason is that we’re following this playbook that we’ve inherited for the last 80 years, and we too often don’t question the playbook we’ve been given. You know, everything has to be based on the hours we have to do everything. We have to help everybody. You know, we just take it as normal that, hey, tax season, 80 hours are busy season, whatever your busy season, it’s 80 hours. It’s the way it has to be.

And so we need to just start questioning these rules. And that’s where I’m kind of spending my time. The last few months, I’ve been looking into the cause. And if we could start beating the cause rather than beating burnout once it happens, let’s start beating the cause before it even happens. And so that’s kind of where I’m living recently, and it’s fun. In fact, I’m writing the presentation right before you, and I spoke about leadership’s impact on this.

Seth: Yeah, I mean that, you know, the tone gets set from the top, doesn’t it? And it’s not just leaders that, you know, are, you know, victims, but also, you know, staff as well because they want to impress. They want to, as you said, there’s just this sense of commitment to clients, to the work, to just, you know, doing the job that you got into this career to help, which is, you know, again, very noble.

But there’s also, you know, other baggage that comes with it. What would you say are, and I know you’ve addressed this before- I’ve heard you addressed this before- but for our audience here, what would you say are currently the most common causes of burnout?

The things that kind of creep in that even in leadership, they might not.

Randy: Yeah. The number one, this has always been my theory that the number one cause of burnout in our profession is the way we value ourselves. So, the way we value what we deliver and whether we believe it or not, even if we’re not billing by the hour, we really just still value the time we put in.

Our worth is the amount of time that we can put into a project. Because even if we’re not billing by the hour, we’re still tracking hours because we need to make sure this is profitable. There are so many different ways to do that. But that’s number one in my mind. The number one cause of burnout in this profession is how we value ourselves, you know.

And so that’s set by leadership. You know, if you have leaders that are out there, you know, treating hours like a badge of honor. Hey, I’m in early, I stay late, I come in on the weekends, I’m sending emails out at 9:00 at night, or I run on a Sunday afternoon.

What you’re telling your team is that this is how we operate. This is the culture that we expect at this organization that we value. You know, we’re only worth the amount of time we could put in. So, for me, I mean, I can go into others, but for me that’s a number one value in itself based on the hours we put in.

Seth: What can the profession do, you know, again, from leadership, you know, on down, particularly? I always wonder, well, it’s a two-parter, but from a leadership perspective, what can they do to say, you know, what, I don’t want to become a victim of burnout.

I might even be feeling I’m on that path, and I certainly don’t want my staff to be. What’s a step that they can take today?

Like right now we’re, you know, kind of looking at the date; we’re in late August now, starting to think about, okay, you know, we do have, you know, for the tax-centric and even bookkeepers, you do have a filing deadline that is coming in the next few weeks. What can we do differently that can help break that cycle?

Randy: Well, I don’t know if we’re going to be able to change it in the next few weeks, but going into the next busy season.

Seth: True.

Randy: But we can. There are things. So again, it starts with the value. So, let’s assume that we’ve done that. Let’s assume that we’ve changed to subscription pricing or value billing or some fixed fee. Just something different than tracking hours.

Now, the thing that leaders can do then is go first. Leaders can be the ones.

So a stoic leader and I don’t know if ‘stoic’ is the right word, but what I mean is a leader who is covered in armor that won’t say I’ve made a mistake, that won’t say I need help, that won’t say whatever that other people need to hear is not a leader that people feel comfortable following.

Because how can I be that leader’s perfect? How can I be perfect? How can I even live up to this? You know what expectation they’re setting, and they don’t even really know they’re setting it. They’re just trying to show that leadership is, you know, doing it all, being it all, knowing it all.

And so for me, one of the first steps is just changing that for the leader to go first, for the leader to say, hey, I struggled with this. Hey, I’ve dealt with burnout before. I don’t want you to. This is how I solved it. This is the change that I made. I made a mistake saying made them. I made a mistake. That alone. I mean, I’d rather be following a leader like that than a leader who says they’re perfect.

So, I made a mistake. But not just that. I made a mistake. I made a mistake. And here’s what I learned from it. That’s leadership. Now, we’re using that for something. Or I made a mistake, and I haven’t been able to solve it. And I need your help. That’s the type of leadership.

So, for me, the leader going first, the leader saying that I’m not perfect- not in those words, but showing they’re not perfect and they need the entire organization to really run as an efficient organization. They need others. That, to me, is the first step. And you can start that today. Will the change happen today? No. But when they see it, that change will start to permeate the entire organization.

Seth: So just changing your thinking, your attitude towards work, what it is, and your value. We touched on that, and we touched on how it has to start with leadership. But what if you’re not in a leadership role? You’re just there. You’re there to learn to do the work, to be a part of, really, you know, helping clients.

And so, you know, you’re on staff. Do you feel that they have a voice? If so, like, what should they be doing? Yeah. That’s, you know, it’s a tough one. But I’m sure you’ve spoken to these people too that are just like, you know, Randy, I’m starting to feel burnt out too, man.

Randy: And I just, yeah, this is a tough one because I’ve had that question a lot. And the question I have people come up with- people that I know at their firm- they’ll say, you know, my managing partner, my leader, you know, I tell them this, I tell them that they’re not listening. And that’s a very tough situation to be in.

Seth: Yeah.

Randy: The way I look at things, and every firm is different, but the way I look at things is that everybody is a leader. And I know if your culture isn’t based on that, it’s tough. But somebody has to set the path and create the trail.

And man, that’s really tough when you’re a staff accountant in your first year or whatever; you’re in the beginning ranks of your career. It’s tough to do it. But I don’t want anybody to suffer through their careers. And so, what they just need to do is start modeling a different behavior and not hide it, you know, be upfront about it.

And if and I hate to say this, but if that ends up being something that is not such a change that the organization is going to implement, well, unfortunately that means it’s probably time to change organizations. But be that person, be the leader. I have a hard time with leadership in general because I look at it as this pyramid, and it probably is.

But that pyramid means these people on the bottom can’t make a difference. I can’t do anything without the people. If you look at the pyramid, the people on the bottom of the pyramid, to me, leadership is a straight line, and everybody has the ability to impact the organization, and we all have that ability.

But I know the culture of organizations is different. But be that beacon; be the one to make the change. And I know that’s easy for me to say at 64 years old, having been through this profession forever, but I honestly believe I did that at the beginning of my career too, and that I had ups and downs, sure, but it got me to this spot that I’m at, and I love the spot I’m at.

So, you know, being that beacon, being the voice of maybe the contrary opinion to what’s currently happening in the organization. It’s not a terrible thing to be.

Seth: And finally, Randy, part of our topic today is really on building a healthier firm culture. What would you say are the key components of what you would deem to be like this? This firm is on its way, or, you know, these are the aspects of a healthy firm. And you and I have been engaged in employee satisfaction research for the last few years.

And some of these things come up: these cultural components. So, what sort of things stand out as the things that indicate this? These are really the signs of a healthy firm culture.

Randy: Yeah. So, it’s a lot of stuff we talked about already. But at the bottom line, a healthier culture starts with defining who you are. And as an organization, in my mind, you know, if you’re a culture that’s there, we’re helping everybody, and we do everything, man, that’s something hard to live up to.

So, you need to go to that. You need to look at yourself as an organization as, okay, this is what we do, and this is who we serve. And you may think you already have defined that, but the minute you take in new clients that don’t fit that niche or that expertise you have, you’ve gone to change the culture.

And if you’re starting out in this organization, I understand taking on everybody. But for me, start with defining who you are. When that happens, everything starts to fall into place. Leadership. If leadership is making that decision already, my assumption is we’ve already looked at these other things.

We’ve already looked at it. You know, I can’t do everything myself as a leader. We’ve already looked at the hours are not the things that we need to value ourselves on.

We’ve already looked at, you know, this is, you know, not being an expert in everything, building strategic partnerships, outsourcing, automation to the max, and elimination- getting rid of things when leadership’s already making this decision of defining who we are. I think all that other stuff already probably started.

For me, that’s the next step. When I see that, when I see a strong definition that says, you know, we are a firm that, you know, helps our clients and making this up on the fly, so helps our clients in the, you know, to be thriving through ups and downs in business cycles and tech situations. That’s much deeper than, say; we do tax and accounting.

So, coming up with a definition that will outlive, you know, what currently is happening in the profession, which is automation of tax and accounting, that with AI, that’s going to happen. So go deeper than that. So, when I see a company or firm going deeper than that, I see a firm that’s already deciding that they’re going to be the leaders of the future in this profession.

And when you’re defining it that way, you’re already putting the ambiguity out of people’s heads of who we are and what we do and who we serve. And that helps with burnout, to me.

Seth: I love that, Randy, and we already are starting to see the old skin get shed of being defined by the work we do, and not the outcomes and the other things that are hard to physically touch. But you feel them, and you know them when you see them, and your clients remain happy because you’re doing the things that you set out to do.

And that’s not just, you know, filing a tax return correctly and, you know, closing books in a timely manner and everything matching up. Right. It’s so much more than that. Randy Crabtree, thank you so much for being with me today. And we’ll see you out and about soon enough. I know that you are very active on the speaking circuit. So, if you are heading to any conferences this fall, definitely look for Randy to be out there as well.

Randy: Thanks, Seth.

Seth: Thanks, Randy.

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Randy Crabtree on Managing Stress and Building Healthier Firm Cultures

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