In this episode, we speak to Jana Lamprecht, a CA(SA) and Programme Director of Chartered Accountancy at the University of the Free State, in South Africa. Jana has been lecturing at the University of the Free State since 2002, initially focused on auditing and assurance. Prior to that, she completed her articles at PwC. In November 2024, she was promoted to her current position as Programme Director.

We speak about the ways in which accounting students and accountants can embrace automation tools, such as Power Automate, to level up their work. From the importance of learning digital skills to the impact of automation on the wider industry, this podcast covers it all.

Rapid-Fire Recommendations

• Book: Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck
• Biggest lesson Jana has learned when teaching accounting: The only constant is change.
• Key takeaway: For accountants and future accounts - embrace automation. You need to be able to future-ready yourself. It is not just about saving time on tasks like invoicing and data entry; it's about unlocking your potential to solve problems, analyze data, and to be able to connect with your clients like you have never done before.

Today, we’re diving into one of the biggest opportunities for accounting firms looking to scale: ditching bulky, expensive ERP systems and building a lean, integrated tech stack in the cloud.

Our guest, David Tuck, is the Co-Founder and CEO of Mayday. He is joining us today to unpack how accounting firms can save money, boost efficiency, and stay agile by choosing the right combination of apps - and how to avoid the common traps along the way.

If you’ve ever wondered whether your tech stack is helping or holding you back, this episode is for you.

Rapid-fire recommendations:

• Tech that's great: Xero
• Tech that's overhyped: AI as the next generation of accounting. AI will sustain the industry, not disrupt it.
• Key takeaway: As a small and medium business, it’s not just possible to scale with Xero and its ecosystem but it enables you to build a superior quality system as well.

In this special episode of the podcast, we speak to two professionals who work together, hand in glove, to executive changes through businesses. We consider the growing partnership between HR and Change Management, what this means for organizations and what business leaders can apply to changes in their own organizations.

Our guests are Eve McKenzie, GM Change Management at Xero, and Tina Karia, People Experience Business Partner at Xero.

Some of the topics covered include:

• The real meaning of change management and the practicalities involved.
• The long impact of change.
• The interaction between HR and change management.
• The pitfalls of change management and how to avoid them.
• How to deal with resistance to change.
• Measuring the success of a change management initiative.
• The Three S Model applied at Xero: Simple, Safe, Structure.

Rapid-Fire Recommendations

• Software: ChatGPT & Gemini; Slack; Miro

• Book: Neuroscience for Organizational Change: An Evidence-based Practical Guide to Managing Change by Hilary Scarlett

• Podcast: The Diary of a CEO

• Valuable lesson about building a business: Your culture is your business. You can have the best strategy in the world, but if your people don’t feel connected or feel empowered, it won’t work.

  The secret currency of an organization is your relationships.

• • Key takeaways: Change is inevitable but it’s how you plan and execute the change that is important. The people experience is vital to that experience and can make or break the outcome. It’s about involving your people early on, ensuring open and honest communication, and giving room for emotional outlets. Change is hard.
  • Don't forget the number one rule of any change is connecting people to outcomes. How do you do that? How do you get their minds, emotions, and behaviors involved? If you’ve got a strategy that designs for those three components, then you’ve got the greatest likelihood of success.