Rural communities offer meaningful work — and a chance to build a practice on purpose.

Accounting ARC
With Donny Shimamoto
Center for Accounting Transformation

In an era when private equity rollups and “bigger is better” narratives dominate accounting headlines, Donny Shimamoto, CPA.CITP, CGMA, returns to a quieter question: What does it look like to build a firm — and a career — around serving the places that rarely get the spotlight?

• MORE Accounting ARC: Why Happiness is Hard-Fought for High Achievers | The Fastest Way to Lose Talent Is “Dick Leadership” | Post-Holiday Fatigue Isn’t a Failure; It’s a Signal | OCR, Research Bots & Meeting Assistants: What Actually Helps Now | Return Season is the New Stress Test | Small Firms May Have the Biggest Advantage in 2026 | Downgraded: What the DOE Said About Accounting | Savage: Using Your License as a Megaphone | Baker: Interpreting Pricing Psychology | Don’t Get Fired by Your Own Automation | What Amazon Doesn't Tell You | Royalties, Residuals, and Reality Checks | ARC-SLC

In this episode of Accounting ARC, Shimamoto sits down with two practitioners who live that reality every day: Shayna Chapman, who runs a practice rooted in a small Ohio community, and Mohan Chirumamilla, who serves clients across Omaha, Nebraska, and Columbia, Missouri. Their conversation is part practical playbook, part gut-check — and it lands on a message that feels increasingly urgent for the profession: small towns still need sophisticated accounting, and accountants still need work that feels meaningful.

As AI automates compliance, value shifts to measurable outcomes and client aspirations.

Full show notes here

Gear Up for Growth
With Jean Caragher
For CPA Trendlines

Author and strategist B. Joseph Pine II urges accounting firm leaders to confront a fundamental question: What business are you really in?

According to Pine, the profession is approaching a critical inflection point as the global economy moves beyond goods, services, and even experiences, into what he calls the transformation economy.

“You use experiences as a raw material to guide people to change, to help them achieve their aspirations,” Pine tells Gear Up for Growth host Jean Caragher, president of Capstone Marketing. This shift, he explains, requires firms to move beyond simply delivering accounting work efficiently to helping clients achieve meaningful, measurable change.

Gear Up For Growth Ep 58 - Joe Pine

How to reset pricing, rebuild margins, and stop “helping” clients into bankruptcy.

Full show notes here

The Disruptors
With Liz Farr

Candy Bellau didn’t set out to build a firm that could operate without her. But her hand was forced when her mother became ill.

“I kept dropping the ball at my own company and my team, the long-term members kept picking it up, and slowly but surely, they just absorbed the client work I was doing,” Bellau recalls.

Bellau’s transition from operator to owner came at a pivotal moment. After working nonstop since age 14, Bellau found herself at 56 needing a change. “I don’t even know who I am. I don’t know what I like. I don’t have any interest outside of work and tasks that have to be done at home," she explains. So she took art classes, improv classes, wrote a book, and launched the Unbalanced Podcast with Sam Hallburn.

Disruptors Ep 132