Quadrant Advisory

We’re super excited to welcome John Meara to Quadrant Advisory as our Director of Accounting Services! 🎊

John brings the kind of depth that makes an immediate difference: 15 years across public accounting and senior financial leadership, experience spanning multiple industries, and a strong technical command of the work. From GAAP and ASC guidance to ERP systems and complex accounting issues.

Just as importantly, he brings the leadership mindset to help teams operate better and clients feel well-supported.

He joins us from Colorado, which feels fitting somehow - steady, grounded, and built for the long haul. We’re thrilled to have him on board and excited for what we’ll build with him. 🏔️

Welcome to Quadrant, John!

March is Women's History Month, which mostly means corporate social posts that get forgotten by tomorrow.

But here's something that actually shows up in our work:
Financial advice given to women is often framed differently than advice given to men. Even when the situation is identical.

Women get told to "be conservative" and "reduce risk." Men get told to "be strategic" and "optimize tax position."

Same recommendation, different framing. One sounds like protection. The other sounds like power.

The business owners and executives we work with - women and men - need the same thing: clear financial information, honest risk assessment, and planning that matches their actual goals and constraints.

A good start is trying to notice when we're defaulting to patterns instead of responding to the person in front of us.

If you work in finance or advise business owners: listen to how you frame recommendations. The words matter.

Be honest - why are you still doing your own accounting?

Is it because:

• You think you’re “not big enough” yet?
• You don’t want to lose control?
• You assume it’ll be too expensive?
• You want to build it in-house?
• You find it difficult to trust anyone with numbers?
• Or you’ve just gotten used to carrying it?

At some point, leadership is about deciding what no longer deserves your time. And growth doesn’t always come from adding more.

Sometimes it comes from finally putting something down.

This year, Black History Month carries a milestone worth marking - 100 years of commemorating Black history on a national scale, since Negro History Week was inaugurated in 1926.

A century of recognition. A century of stories told, voices amplified, and legacies honored.

And yet the most powerful thing about Black history isn’t just what was endured - it’s what was built. The art, the science, the movements, the businesses, the ideas that changed the world.

At Quadrant, we believe in recognizing excellence in all its forms. This month, we’re taking time to reflect on the giants whose work continues to shape industries, culture, and possibility, and encouraging our team and community to do the same.

Learn more about this year’s theme, “A Century of Black History Commemorations,” through the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) at https://hubs.ly/Q044v8x80.

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Illustration via Freepik.

The IRS recently released new guidance on overtime tax treatment, right as tax season is coming into view.

It's an update that doesn't demand something dramatic from businesses. But it lands in very real places: payroll runs, year-end forms, and the questions people naturally ask when something changes that affects their pay.

What counts as qualifying overtime?
What will show up on W-2s?
Will this change take-home pay?
Do payroll systems already reflect this, or is there something we need to adjust?

For founders and operators, moments like this aren’t about compliance checklists or being “on top of everything.” They’re about care. About making sure the systems behind the scenes are steady enough that people don’t have to worry, guess, or carry unnecessary uncertainty.

Most teams aren’t looking for perfection or instant answers. They’re looking for clarity. Knowing where information lives. Knowing someone has thought it through. Knowing that if something shifts, it won’t turn into chaos.

That’s why updates like this matter, even if they’re technical on the surface. Not because they demand urgency, but because they touch trust. Payroll is personal. Taxes are personal. And the way a company handles these moments says a lot about how it operates day to day.

For leaders, the real work here is staying grounded. Having the right partners. Knowing where guidance lives. And creating space for calm, straightforward conversations when questions come up.

These small, quiet updates are often where good operating habits show themselves most clearly.

#2026

There’s a quiet tension in modern accounting that doesn’t get talked about enough.

On the one hand, technology has never been better, with faster closes, cleaner workflows, and real-time dashboards. Tools that make finance more efficient than it’s ever been.

On the other hand, accounting isn’t just data. It’s context. Judgment. And trust.

These numbers represent years of work, tough decisions, payroll for real people, and bets founders have taken with their own livelihoods. When you hand that over, you’re not just trusting a system, you’re trusting the people behind it.

At Quadrant, we believe the future isn’t tech-only or people-only. It’s intentional technology paired with experienced humans who know when to rely on systems and when to step in.

We use best-in-class tools because they reduce noise and create clarity. But we don’t outsource thinking, judgment, or accountability to software. Sensitive information deserves experienced eyes, real conversations, and people who understand what’s at stake.

In a world of automation and data breaches, the balance matters more than ever.

The right tools. The right people. Used with intention.

That’s how finance moves forward safely.

What’s something you love doing, even though you’re terrible at it?

One of our favorite moments this week came from a simple question that popped up in our team Slack.

The answers came in quickly. Golf. Surfing. Karaoke. Video games. Water skiing. Things people do on purpose, knowing full well they’re not great at them, and choosing to enjoy them anyway.

What stood out wasn’t the activities themselves. It was the absence of pressure. No one was trying to optimize the experience. No one was measuring improvement or talking about outcomes. It was just people talking about things they enjoy because they enjoy them.

As work gets louder and schedules get fuller, it’s easy to forget how important that kind of space is. Not everything needs to be productive, and not everything has to be efficient. Some things are worth doing simply because they help you disconnect, reset, or maybe even laugh at yourself a little.

With the weekend around the corner, consider this a small reminder to make time for something you’re bad at and do it anyway. Sometimes the point isn’t to get better. Sometimes the point is just to enjoy it.

Curious to hear, what’s one thing your team does just for fun?

How often do your CFO and Head of People actually talk?

In many companies, people are the single biggest investment.
Not because they’re a line on the P&L, but because everything meaningful flows through them.

And when something starts to feel ‘not right’ financially, it’s usually not because people are failing. It’s rather because the system around them is starting to strain.

We often see this play out in subtle ways long before a budget breaks or margins tighten. For instance, high performers begin to burn out; roles stretch as complexity grows; teams move faster, but with less clarity; headcount increases, yet things feel harder instead of easier.

None of that means the people are the problem.

In many cases, it’s the opposite.
Talented, capable people are doing their best inside structures that haven’t evolved with the business. Sometimes it’s a mismatch of pace, support, or expectations. Sometimes it’s simply asking a fish to climb a tree, when it would thrive somewhere else entirely.

This is where the conversation between finance and people leadership really matters.

Today’s CFOs aren’t just tracking payroll totals. They’re contributing into deeper questions:
Are we giving this team the conditions to succeed?
Where is complexity outpacing capacity?
What is the real cost of disengagement, not just financially, but humanly?

The strongest leadership teams don’t treat people insight and financial visibility as separate lanes. They connect them early, with respect for both the numbers and the humans behind them.

Not to squeeze more out of anyone, but to build organizations where performance, sustainability, and dignity can exist at the same time.

12-25-25.
It’s one of those dates we won’t see again for another hundred years. The numbers line up in a way that makes you pause. Not because it changes anything, but because it reminds you how fleeting everything really is.

Last Christmas, things were so different.
Next Christmas, they’ll look different again.
So much of life lives in motion. If not all of it.

What we have is today. And even today isn’t permanent.

Maybe that’s the real spirit of Christmas. Not just the lights or the traditions, but the permission to slow down and sit with the moment you’re in. To believe in a little magic, even if you’re no longer a kid. Especially if you’re no longer a kid.

At Quadrant, we spend our days working with the past and thinking about the future. Cleaning up records, untangling history, and making sense of what’s already happened. But at the same time, planning, forecasting, preparing for what’s next.

That’s why days like this are a reminder that presence matters just as much as progress.

So wherever you are, whoever you’re with, we hope you let yourself enjoy the season. Not because everything is perfect, but because it’s happening now.

Merry Christmas from all of us at Quadrant.
Here’s to holding on to the magic, even as everything keeps changing.

The penny just reminded us - even the most essential tools eventually outlive their usefulness.

For more than two centuries, the U.S. penny played a real role in everyday commerce. It wasn’t symbolic. It wasn’t outdated. It was the foundation of how people exchanged value.

But over time, the world shifted, prices changed, technology accelerated, and the cost of producing a penny eventually exceeded the value it represented.

In 2024, it cost the Mint 3.69 cents to make a 1-cent coin. That’s buying a dollar for $3.69, and hoping it still means something.

This reflects a larger truth for businesses:

Even systems that once worked exceptionally well can become inefficient if the environment around them evolves.

While familiarity feels like safety, it can also hide:
• Inefficiencies that quietly accumulate
• Processes no longer suited to scale
• Tools that once solved problems but now slow decisions
• Habits carried forward long after their purpose expired

As companies plan for 2026, this is a good moment to evaluate the “pennies” still sitting in your operations and finance.