Struggling with your bookkeeping process? Discover how to transition to a professional accounting team without fear or hassle.

Ever had those moments where your numbers just aren’t making sense, or things don’t show up on time?

Julie Smith talks about that “uh-oh” feeling and what it’s like to realize you might need help. Glenn Harper reassures us that embarrassment is totally normal, but it shouldn’t stop you from making the change you need. They break down what the transition really looks like. From evaluating your current setup (no judgment!) to how their team does all the heavy lifting so you don’t have to stress.

You'll hear stories about what it means for entrepreneurs to actually hand off the books, how a professional team can be a real partner for your business, and why, according to Glenn Harper, no one regrets finally getting their finances organized. If you’ve ever wondered what switching accountants is really like, or just want to spend more time doing what you love in your business, this episode is for you!

This episode is brought to you by PureTax, LLC. Tax preparation services without the pressure. When all you need is to get your tax return done, take the stress out of tax season by working with a firm that has simplified the process and the pricing. Find out more about how we started.

Key takeaways for entrepreneurs:

• Don’t let embarrassment hold you back. As Glenn Harper shared, recognizing issues in your bookkeeping is common. When you know better, you can do better. For yourself, your team, and your clients.
• You don’t have to figure it out alone. The transition to a new system isn’t as daunting as it seems. Our team picks up the heavy lifting, giving you clear expectations and minimal to-dos for a seamless change.
• Focus on your strengths. Let professionals handle the numbers, so you can spend your valuable energy on what you do best and grow your business with confidence.

Moments

00:00 Organized onboarding and change management

03:47 Value of hiring a professional CPA

06:50 Benefits of professional bookkeeping services

Running a business doesn’t have to run your life.

Without a business partner who holds you accountable, it’s easy to be so busy ‘doing’ business that you don’t have the right strategy to grow your business.

Stop letting your business run you. At Harper & Co CPA Plus, we know that you want to be empowered to build the lifestyle you envision. In order to do that you need a clear path to follow for success

Our clients enjoy a proactive partnership with us. Schedule a consultation with us today.

Download our free guide - Entrepreneurial Success Formula: How to Avoid Managing Your Business From Your Bank Account.

Glenn Harper, CPA, is the Owner and Managing Partner of Harper & Company CPAs Plus, a top 10 Managing Partner in the country (Accounting Today's 2022 MP Elite). His firm won the 2021 Luca Award for Firm of the Year. 

An entrepreneur and speaker, Glenn transformed his firm into an advisory-focused practice, doubling revenue and profit in two years. He teaches entrepreneurs to build financial and operational excellence, speaks nationwide to CPA firm owners about running their businesses like entrepreneurs, and consults with firms across the country. Glenn enjoys golfing, fishing, hiking, cooking, and spending time with his family.

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Julie Smith, MBA, is a serial entrepreneur in the public accounting space. She is the Founder of EmpowerCPA™, Founder of PureTax, LLC, COO for Harper & Company CPAs Plus, and Co-host of the Empowering Entrepreneurs podcast. 

Named CPA.com's 2021 Innovative Practitioner of Year, Julie led Harper & Company's transition to an advisory-focused firm, doubling revenue and profit in two years. She now empowers other CPA firm owners nationwide through consulting and speaking, teaching them how to run their businesses like entrepreneurs. Julie lives in Columbus, OH with her family and enjoys travel, coaching basketball, sporting events, and the occasional shopping spree.

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Copyright 2026 Glenn Harper

Mentioned in this episode:

Brought to you by Harper & Company CPAs Plus

Running a business takes vision, grit… and the right financial partner. At Harper & Company CPAs Plus, we don’t just crunch numbers—we empower entrepreneurs. From proactive tax strategy and accounting to business advisory services, our team helps you keep more of what you earn and scale with confidence. Whether you’re launching, growing, or preparing for exit, Harper & Company is in your corner with expert guidance built for business owners like you. Visit www.harpercpaplus.com to book a complimentary discovery call today - or call us at 614-456-7222.

Brought to you by Harper & Company CPAs Plus

So good. And one more question. Oh wait, I was wool gathering. What were you

going to say? One more question that I have for you is, and it's

the pain point, right? It's the pain of change. And we all know

change is painful in the middle part, right? But

so say I was with a bookkeeper and I'm

having this aha moment right now that like, oof, my numbers

don't seem right, or maybe they're not in the right place, or I'm not getting

things timely. Whatever that pain point is that you're feeling right now, in

order to make a change may seem like an even bigger pain point.

But what does that transition look if I'm having that thought right now and I'm

like, hmm, I need to give Glenn Harper a call? Well,

great question. And thankfully I've had this question asked

a gajillion times. So it comes down to 2 things. All

right. The first thing is, as a business

owner, When you finally realize this, you're

probably embarrassed and you shouldn't be

because it happens. But when you have knowledge,

you have power. So now that you're aware, now you kind of have a responsibility

to yourself, your team, your clients, your organization

to kind of fix it and do it right. So don't be embarrassed. I've seen

a lot worse. So the question is, it doesn't matter where you're at.

We'll take you and we'll help you. So don't be embarrassed about it first, 'cause

it's just the way things are, okay? Way it is. The second

step is, what we do is we then evaluate

what you have. Like, is it any good? Is your

accounting set up right in QuickBooks? Is the

logic behind it and how it's set up, does it have account numbers and things

alphabetical? Is it easy to read? Are things in the right category?

There's a— there's— if it's on this side of the equation, hey, that looks pretty

good. We just got to tweak some things. Then we'll probably keep the system you

have and just tweak it to make it pretty. If you're over on

this side, we're like, whew, I'm not sure what was going on

here, but this looks like this has had 30 different people playing with it. And

there's all kinds of things. We might just say, look, we got to kill this

and just start another one. All right. We'll evaluate that and tell

you what that looks like, what you're expecting. But the cool thing about

this is you don't have to do anything as a client. We do it all.

I was going to say, I was in charge of onboarding at one point and

it's a very structured thing inside of Harper. So you're going to get a checklist,

you're going to know exactly what you're responsible for, but what you're responsible for

is really just access and making sure we have the access to be

able to do exactly what we need to do. We do every single heavy lifting.

If Glenn says we're going to restart, redo, our whole

internal team getting together to figure out what does that look like based on your

data, based on what you do. And so it's really, I think from a

Harper perspective, very organized so that change, we

understand change, right? We understand it doesn't feel good. No, it doesn't feel good anywhere.

We want to alleviate that. So no surprises, here's exactly your expectations,

here's the expectations from Harper. And then it's kind of up to our whole internal

team to kind of make sure we get you onboarding and get you onboarded in

a very timely fashion so you start receiving those numbers for the health of your

company timely. And we're also able to get you

in with Glen to be able to do some of that advising. So I think

really it's from Glen's standpoint, that embarrassment, that

knowledge, that awareness to get you in, to get you evaluated. That's the

biggest step that a prospective client has to take in our

situation because it's really, it's kind of, what do you say? Like Jesus, take the

wheel. Once you've been able to kind of do that, We're kind of able to

take it from there and just, we've built, you know, a phenomenal internal

team that everybody has all their strengths to be able to really take that and

run with it. I can, what usually ends up happening is

there's a reason at those CPA

letters at the end of my name is there's this standard that

says, when I work with a client, I am responsible.

I take full responsibility of ensuring that your

things are in order, your books are in order, your taxes in order. When

you are doing it on yourself or you have maybe just a part-time bookkeeper,

there's really no responsibility. There's no accountability because people are like, ah, well, I

didn't know. You're not paying for that, right? So they're not going to take

ownership of it. So the second you then work with a

professional like ourselves, we take ownership of that. Now,

You got to give us the data. You got to say, yes, go do what

we do, and you got to be available for us to get what we need

from you, but we'll do it the right way and we'll take ownership. So that

means when there is a problem, we got you. We got you. The

ownership of the work product is the hard part.

It's really hard. We've worked with some fantastic bookkeepers that

they're awesome and they take ownership. They do a great job. We've worked with some

that are not so good. There's some CPAs that are awesome, some are not so

awesome, whatever. The spectrum's all over. But our job is to take

responsibility. So once you realize as the owner that when you

can get through the, whatever, the pain, the embarrassment of calling us

and we come in and evaluate you, we take that emotion off the table. Then

you know we're going to be accountable for, and we're going to do what we

say we're going to do. And you don't have to do anything other than just

be available for questions. Our team, like Julie says, takes care of those things.

And now we have the new process, the new system, the new

training that's gonna happen. So if we keep your internal person, great, we'll work with

them. We'll tell 'em what to do. If it happens to be only our team,

great, we'll do what we need to do. Your job as the owner is just

to get us access and do what we ask you to do and answer questions,

and we'll do all the rest. You continue to do your job. I just had

a, you know, aha moment as you're saying that. Another one? You've had a lot

of 'em today. I mean, I know I'm actually listening to what you're saying today,

so maybe I'll do my books better or get my information to you better. I

don't know, one of those things. I think the whole thing is

whatever entrepreneur is walking through the door, whatever they are good at is what

they are good at. And you kind of alluded to this at one point too

about a dentist doing whatever. But I think the goal

for Harper, for you, for our team is to say, hey, listen, you're

good at what you do. Go do what you do. Let us take this off

because we, at the end of the day, we want you to go use your

time and energy to do what you're good at. and allow us to do what

we're good at and then know that we're working together for you. We're a

partner with you for the best possible outcome. And I think sometimes as an

entrepreneur, you know, we get bogged down in like, well, we could do it ourself.

Why don't we just do it ourself, right? And so sometimes we forget like our

best use of time is maybe not doing debits and

credits or thinking how, where can this be plugged in in a tax return?

It's actually doing what you're passionate about and good at and allowing

our team to do that. other part for you? I have

never, never had a

situation where when we take over

somebody's bookkeeping, their accounting, their tax work, their

advising, I've yet to have somebody that go, man,

that was the worst money I ever invested. It always works out.

And it just always does because you are now an

empowered owner 'Cause you know exactly

how much money you make, what your expenses are, what your tax liabilities are, the

strategies involved. You now, instead of just doing your job, you've

become empowered. Isn't that the name of this thing right there? You now have

become empowered where you understand how your business runs and works, where

before you had no clue. And it's okay if you didn't know

before. Today you know, so make the decision.

I think you just closed the loop, so we should just drop and stop here.

There it is.