By Vincent Howard, CPA | Managing Partner, Howard, Howard and Hodges | SkillAbility for Accounting Firms
Last updated: July 23, 2026 | 28-minute read
- What a manager one-on-one should accomplish
- Why status-update meetings fail
- What current research says about manager conversations
- Five outcomes every accounting one-on-one needs
- How often managers should meet with staff
- What should happen before the meeting
- The 30- and 45-minute agenda
- Questions that build accounting judgment
- How to give feedback that changes performance
- Turn review notes into development
- Connect one-on-ones to career progression
- Create accountability without micromanagement
- Busy-season one-on-ones
- Remote and hybrid conversations
- Difficult one-on-one conversations
- How AI should change the meeting
- Copy-and-use one-on-one template
- 100-point manager coaching scorecard
- Completed one-on-one example
- What the firm should measure
- Common one-on-one mistakes
Many accounting managers hold regular one-on-one meetings.
The meeting begins with the manager asking:
“What are you working on?”
The employee lists:
- Returns in progress
- Bank reconciliations waiting on documents
- Review notes still open
- Clients who have not responded
- Deadlines coming next week
The manager moves items around, answers several procedural questions, and reminds the employee about due dates.
Thirty minutes later, the meeting ends.
The manager knows more about the employee’s task list.
The employee does not necessarily know more about how to perform the work.
That is not coaching.
It is a verbal workflow report.
Status should be visible before the one-on-one. The meeting should be reserved for the work a dashboard cannot do: clarify priorities, examine reasoning, give feedback, address barriers, build capability, and create accountability.
A status update tells the manager where the work is.
A coaching conversation improves what happens next.
Who I Am and Why This Matters
I have practiced public accounting since 1990. I founded my accounting firm in 1993, merged it in 2001 to form Howard, Howard and Hodges, and helped grow the organization from three people to approximately 50 staff across four locations and multiple states. Our firm was named PASBA Firm of the Year in 2015.
For years, I believed an open-door policy made me a supportive leader.
Employees could bring me any question at any time.
They did.
I answered quickly because it seemed efficient.
It was efficient for the employee’s next five minutes.
It was not efficient for the firm.
My day became a continuous stream of interruptions. Staff learned that the fastest path through uncertainty was to ask me. I learned very little about which capabilities were developing because I usually supplied the missing judgment before the employee had to show it.
Managers in accounting firms fall into the same trap.
They use one-on-ones to catch up on status and then spend the remaining time answering questions. The employee leaves with more answers but not necessarily a stronger method for finding the next answer.
Since 2020, I have built and run the SkillAbility accounting workforce development platform used by more than 1,000 accounting professionals across dozens of PASBA firms. That experience has reinforced a distinction:
Training teaches repeatable work. Workflow shows status. Review evaluates the file. The manager one-on-one should integrate those signals and develop the person.
What Is a CPA Firm Manager One-on-One?
A CPA firm manager one-on-one is a recurring, two-way coaching and accountability conversation that helps an employee prioritize work, improve current performance, develop professional judgment, address barriers, build next-role capability, and understand how individual work contributes to clients, the team, and the firm.
The meeting should produce:
- Clear priorities
- Visible decisions and risks
- Specific feedback and recognition
- A stronger approach to the work
- Defined development activity
- Commitments with owners and dates
- Issues that require escalation beyond the manager
It should not become:
- A reading of the workflow dashboard
- An unstructured complaint session
- A private technical help desk
- A delayed performance review
- A manager lecture
- A substitute for clear firm processes
Why Status-Update One-on-Ones Fail
The information already exists somewhere else
If the firm cannot see assignments, deadlines, open items, workload, and status without asking each employee verbally, the firm has a workflow problem.
The one-on-one should not compensate for missing operating visibility.
Status consumes the time needed for judgment
Managers leave little time to ask:
- What is most likely to go wrong?
- What decision are you avoiding?
- Which review note keeps repeating?
- What did the client’s response change?
- What part of this could you own next time?
The manager becomes the answer source
Employees learn to bring unresolved questions rather than facts, investigation, options, and recommendations.
Development remains abstract
The employee may hear “keep growing” but receives no assignment connected to review, client communication, judgment, coaching, or the next role.
Accountability becomes deadline chasing
The manager monitors whether tasks moved.
The employee is not held accountable for how the work was approached, what was learned, or whether feedback changed later performance.
For the broader operating constraint, read The Manager Bottleneck.
What Current Research Says About Manager Conversations
Research does not support filling calendars with long meetings.
It supports frequent, meaningful manager contact.
Weekly feedback is associated with substantially stronger engagement
Gallup and Workhuman reported in 2024 that employee engagement varied sharply with manager-feedback frequency: 48% among employees receiving feedback weekly or more, 38% among those receiving it a few times per month, 23% among those receiving it a few times per year, and 5% among those receiving feedback annually or less.
More Frequent Manager Feedback Was Associated With Higher Engagement
Source: Gallup and Workhuman feedback research. These are associations and should not be interpreted as proof that frequency alone causes engagement.
Quality matters as much as cadence
The same Gallup–Workhuman research found that employees who strongly agreed they received valuable feedback were five times as likely to be engaged, 57% less likely to be burned out, and 48% less likely to be looking for another job.
Only one in four strongly agreed that the feedback they received was valuable.
Meaningful conversations do not need to be long
Gallup’s 2025 research on manager span of control reported that 15–30 minutes of meaningful feedback, delivered consistently, can be enough. Across seven studies representing 44,025 responses, engagement was about seven in ten among employees who strongly agreed they had received meaningful feedback in the prior week, regardless of team size; it was about one in four when they did not strongly agree.
Meaningful Feedback Was Associated With High Engagement Even as Team Size Changed
Source: Gallup span-of-control research, based on seven studies and 44,025 responses.
Managers may believe they give more feedback than employees experience
Gallup reported a major perception gap: 50% of managers said they provided weekly feedback, while only 20% of individual contributors said they received it weekly.
That is why a recurring meeting needs visible preparation, useful content, and documented commitments. A calendar invitation alone does not create a meaningful conversation.
CPA firms need manager capacity and leadership development
The AICPA’s 2026 PCPS Top Issues Survey included 629 respondents. Firms with 101–500 professionals listed managing staff workload and firm leadership development among their five leading issues, while staff retention appeared as a major five-year issue for every size group except sole practitioners.
A manager one-on-one sits directly at the intersection of those concerns.
Done poorly, it consumes manager time without changing capability.
Done well, it helps staff solve more work independently, improves review readiness, strengthens relationships, and develops the next generation of managers.
Five Outcomes Every Accounting One-on-One Needs
Clarify → Examine → Coach → Develop → Commit
Confirm priorities, expected outcomes, authority, deadlines, and what can wait.
Make the employee’s reasoning, risks, assumptions, workload, and barriers visible.
Give recognition, corrective feedback, questions, standards, and context that improve current performance.
Connect current work to a capability, stretch assignment, or next-role responsibility.
End with decisions, owners, evidence, deadlines, support, and the next checkpoint.
1. Clarify priorities
Accounting employees often face several urgent-looking items at once.
The manager helps distinguish:
- Client deadline from internal checkpoint
- Material risk from routine completion
- Immediate action from work that can wait
- Employee authority from manager or partner authority
- Important development work from avoidable busyness
2. Examine the work and reasoning
The employee should arrive prepared to explain:
- What changed since the last meeting
- Which item creates the most risk
- What investigation has been completed
- Which decision is required
- Where support or access is missing
- What lesson should transfer to later work
3. Coach current performance
Coaching may include:
- Recognizing strong judgment or execution
- Clarifying a standard
- Examining a repeated review note
- Rehearsing a client conversation
- Helping the employee compare options
- Correcting a behavior before it becomes a pattern
4. Develop future capability
Every meeting does not need a new development goal.
Every meeting should remain connected to an existing one.
Examples include:
- Submit review-ready work consistently
- Own routine client-information communication
- First-review a defined workpaper
- Lead part of a client meeting
- Coach a junior employee
- Manage a recurring workflow
- Recognize an advisory or planning trigger
5. Create commitments
A one-on-one should end with fewer ambiguities than it began with.
Document:
- Employee action
- Manager action
- Decision or authority granted
- Evidence expected
- Deadline
- Next checkpoint
How Often Should CPA Firm Managers Hold One-on-Ones?
Use the shortest cadence that prevents surprises and supports meaningful coaching.
| Employee / Situation | Suggested Cadence | Typical Length |
|---|---|---|
| New hire or new role | Weekly, with shorter touchpoints between meetings | 30–45 minutes |
| Developing staff accountant | Weekly | 30 minutes |
| Established senior | Weekly or biweekly based on workload and development needs | 30–45 minutes |
| Performance or workload concern | Weekly or more frequent documented checkpoints | 30 minutes |
| Busy-season high-risk period | Short weekly coaching meeting plus operational touchpoints | 15–30 minutes |
Do not schedule a 60-minute meeting merely because the calendar defaults to an hour.
Do not move everyone to monthly meetings because managers are busy.
A shorter weekly conversation often prevents the longer rescue conversation caused by delayed feedback, hidden workload, or an issue that was allowed to age.
Separate the recurring one-on-one from immediate feedback
Do not save a correction for next Friday if the employee needs it today.
Use the scheduled meeting to identify patterns, reflect, and plan development. Give time-sensitive feedback close to the work.
What Should Happen Before the Meeting?
The workflow should already be current
The employee should update:
- Assignment status
- Deadlines
- Open client items
- Blocked work
- Review status
- Estimated completion
The manager should review exceptions rather than reconstruct every engagement verbally.
The employee should prepare the agenda
The employee owns the first draft because this develops planning, self-awareness, and accountability.
Require five items:
- Most important result since the last meeting
- Top priority before the next meeting
- Decision, risk, or obstacle requiring discussion
- Feedback or development topic
- Commitments still open
The manager should prepare evidence
The manager should review:
- Recent work or review-note patterns
- Workflow exceptions
- Client or team feedback
- Development goals
- Prior commitments
- Recognition that should be specific and timely
Use an exception dashboard
The dashboard should highlight:
- Late or at-risk items
- Open items older than the standard
- Repeated review notes
- Work awaiting manager decision
- Capacity imbalance
- Unusual client or technical risk
This allows the meeting to begin with the exception—not a tour of every normal assignment.
The CPA Firm One-on-One Agenda
The 30-Minute One-on-One
- 3 minutes: Personal connection and important context
- 5 minutes: Wins, recognition, and progress on commitments
- 7 minutes: Priorities, workload, decisions, and risk
- 8 minutes: Coaching on one meaningful work situation
- 5 minutes: Development and next-role evidence
- 2 minutes: Confirm commitments, owners, and dates
The 45-Minute Development One-on-One
- 5 minutes: Relationship check and context
- 5 minutes: Recognition, outcomes, and prior commitments
- 10 minutes: Priorities, workload, risk, and decisions
- 15 minutes: Deep coaching on a work, judgment, client, or people situation
- 7 minutes: Development plan and stretch responsibility
- 3 minutes: Commitments and meeting quality check
Do not force every topic into every meeting
The agenda creates balance.
The most important issue may require most of the conversation.
When that happens, record what was deferred and schedule the appropriate follow-up.
Questions That Build Accounting Judgment
Strong managers do not answer every question immediately.
They use questions to reveal the employee’s reasoning and determine what kind of support is actually required.
Priority and workload questions
- Which commitment matters most before our next meeting?
- What is most likely to miss an internal checkpoint?
- What should stop or move if this new request becomes urgent?
- Which task are you carrying that someone else should own?
- Where are you waiting instead of escalating?
Technical and review questions
- What is the purpose of this workpaper or procedure?
- What evidence supports the conclusion?
- What remains unresolved?
- What would the reviewer need to understand without asking you?
- Which review note is part of a repeated pattern?
- What check should have caught this before submission?
Judgment questions
- What looks unusual?
- Which fact would change your conclusion?
- What have you investigated?
- What options did you consider?
- What do you recommend and why?
- Is this decision within your authority?
- When should a manager, partner, or specialist become involved?
Client questions
- What does the client need to understand?
- What question will uncover the real issue?
- What promise are we authorized to make?
- How would you explain this without accounting jargon?
- What action should the client take next?
Development questions
- Which capability are you deliberately building?
- What evidence shows progress?
- What responsibility are you ready to practice next?
- What feedback are you not getting but need?
- What would make you more independent in this area?
Questions for the manager
The conversation is two-way.
- What can I clarify?
- Where am I creating a bottleneck?
- Which decision or resource are you waiting on from me?
- What could I do differently to help you perform?
- Was this meeting useful? What should change next time?
How to Give Feedback That Changes Performance
Feedback should help the employee understand:
- What happened
- Why it mattered
- What standard applies
- What behavior should change or continue
- What evidence will show improvement
Use the Evidence–Impact–Next Action model
Evidence
Describe what was observed without exaggeration.
“The client-information request was sent two days after the midpoint checkpoint, and the return reached review without the basis document.”
Impact
Explain why it matters.
“That compressed the review window and required the reviewer to stop the file after beginning work.”
Employee perspective
Ask:
“What happened from your perspective?”
Standard
Clarify the expected behavior.
“Material missing items should be identified at assignment start and escalated by the midpoint checkpoint if unresolved.”
Next action
Define what should happen next.
“For your next five returns, update the open-item list at assignment start and midpoint, and bring any material unresolved item to the weekly workload review.”
Recognition should also be specific
“Good job” is pleasant.
It does not teach the employee what to repeat.
Use:
“You identified the payroll-liability difference before submission, traced it to the prior-quarter filing, and escalated with the facts and a recommendation. That prevented the reviewer from discovering the issue late and is exactly the judgment we expect at your level.”
Balance is not forced symmetry
Do not manufacture a compliment to soften every correction.
Do recognize meaningful progress and strong work consistently so corrective feedback is not the only time the manager becomes specific.
Gallup and Workhuman found that employees receiving both feedback and recognition weekly had higher engagement than employees receiving weekly feedback but less frequent recognition.
Turn Review Notes Into Development
Review notes are one of the richest sources of accounting-development evidence.
They are often wasted.
The employee clears the note.
The manager closes the file.
No one determines whether the same issue will recur.
Classify the note
- Technical correction
- Missing support
- Documentation issue
- Workflow failure
- Judgment or escalation issue
- Client communication issue
- Coaching comment
- Reviewer preference
Discuss patterns, not every note
The one-on-one should not become a second file review.
Select the pattern that matters most.
Use five questions
- What was the reviewer trying to protect?
- What should have happened before submission?
- What check or evidence was missing?
- Where else could the same issue appear?
- What will prove the lesson transferred?
Assign transfer evidence
The employee may:
- Correct the current work
- Apply the standard to a second assignment
- Create a self-review checkpoint
- Explain the lesson to a peer or junior
- Complete a realistic practice scenario
Use the Workpaper Review Checklist to move basic readiness checks before manager review.
Connect One-on-Ones to Career Progression
Employees should not have to wait for an annual review to learn whether they are becoming ready for the next role.
Keep one active development outcome visible
Examples:
- Improve review-ready documentation
- Own routine client communication
- Develop first-review capability
- Build tax-research discipline
- Lead a monthly close
- Coach a junior employee
- Manage a recurring workflow
- Develop advisory questions
Define the evidence before assigning the work
| Development Outcome | Practice Assignment | Readiness Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Review-ready work | Submit six representative files using the self-review standard | No repeated basic support or documentation pattern |
| Client communication | Draft information requests and lead three routine meeting sections | Clear purpose, professional tone, appropriate authority, useful next action |
| First review | Review defined junior work under manager calibration | Finds material issues, writes usable comments, and improves later junior work |
| Workflow ownership | Coordinate a recurring client or return group | Protects checkpoints, escalates early, and keeps work moving |
| Coaching | Coach a junior through a repeated correction without taking the work over | Employee understands the standard and improves on later work |
Use the Accountant Development Plan to connect the recurring conversation with the employee’s full path from execution through leadership.
For senior-level progression, use the Senior Accountant Promotion Criteria.
Create Accountability Without Micromanagement
Accountability is not checking every step.
It is creating clarity about the outcome, authority, evidence, deadline, and consequences—and then requiring the employee to own the work.
Use the accountability contract
- Outcome: What must be true when the work is complete?
- Owner: Who is responsible?
- Authority: Which decisions may the employee make?
- Checkpoints: When must progress or risk be reviewed?
- Evidence: What will show that the standard was met?
- Escalation: What conditions require help?
- Deadline: When is the result due?
Do not take ownership back too quickly
When an employee raises a problem, ask:
- What have you already done?
- What options do you see?
- What do you recommend?
- What decision do you need from me?
Follow up on prior commitments
Begin each meeting by reviewing the commitments from the last meeting.
Do not let uncompleted actions disappear into a new agenda.
Differentiate inability, uncertainty, and avoidance
The manager response should change depending on the cause.
- Inability: Teach or provide practice.
- Uncertainty: Clarify authority or ask questions that support judgment.
- Missing access: Remove the barrier.
- Workload conflict: Reprioritize.
- Avoidance: Address the behavior and accountability directly.
Busy-Season One-on-Ones
Busy season is when firms are most tempted to cancel development conversations.
It is also when workload, deadline, judgment, and communication problems become most expensive.
Shorten the meeting, not the management
Use a 15–20 minute weekly agenda:
- 3 minutes: Capacity and wellbeing signal
- 5 minutes: Top priorities and deadline risk
- 5 minutes: One decision, obstacle, or review pattern
- 3 minutes: Commitments and manager support
Ask busy-season questions
- Which deadline is most at risk?
- What client information is aging?
- Where will review capacity become the constraint?
- What work should be reassigned?
- What is taking longer than expected and why?
- What quality risk are you tempted to move past?
- What do you need from me before the next checkpoint?
Protect development through micro-coaching
Use the live work to reinforce one transferable lesson.
Do not attempt a broad career discussion during a filing emergency, but do not let the season become three months of task assignment without feedback.
Watch for workload and burnout signals
Listen for:
- Persistent inability to disconnect
- Hidden overtime
- Repeated missed internal checkpoints
- Withdrawal or unusual conflict
- Errors increasing with hours
- Employees afraid to surface capacity limits
Escalate wellbeing, accommodation, safety, harassment, or employment concerns through the firm’s appropriate HR and legal process.
Remote and Hybrid One-on-Ones
Remote managers should not replace trust with activity surveillance.
Use outcomes, workflow, evidence, and recurring conversations.
Use video when nuance matters
Video or in-person conversation is useful for:
- Development planning
- Difficult feedback
- Role changes
- Relationship building
- Client-conversation practice
- Complex judgment debriefs
Make hidden work visible
Remote employees should not have to perform busyness to prove productivity.
Use:
- Updated workflow
- Clear outcomes
- Open-item visibility
- Documented decisions
- Predictable checkpoints
Create space for connection
Do not make every remote conversation transactional.
A brief relationship check helps managers understand context that affects performance, collaboration, or wellbeing.
Avoid meeting overload
Microsoft has reported dramatic growth in meeting volume and time since 2020. The answer is not another long recurring meeting. The answer is a focused conversation with preparation, an agenda, and decisions.
Difficult One-on-One Conversations
Repeated missed commitments
Say:
“We agreed that the open-item list would be updated by Tuesday on the last three assignments. It was not completed on any of them. Help me understand what is preventing the commitment from being met.”
Then determine whether the issue is clarity, skill, workload, access, or accountability.
The employee disagrees with review feedback
Ask:
- Which fact or standard do you believe is incorrect?
- What evidence supports your interpretation?
- Is this a required firm standard or reviewer preference?
- What decision needs calibration?
The employee wants a promotion
Do not answer with “not yet” or “keep doing what you are doing.”
Identify:
- Next-role outcomes
- Evidence already demonstrated
- Evidence still missing
- Assignments that will create the evidence
- Who makes the formal decision
- When readiness will be reviewed
The employee brings only problems
Require a stronger handoff:
- Facts
- Work completed
- Options
- Recommendation
- Decision requested
The manager has failed the employee
The manager should be willing to say:
“I did not give you the standard or decision early enough. That contributed to the outcome. Here is what I will change, and here is what remains your responsibility.”
Accountability is stronger when it applies in both directions.
How AI Should Change the One-on-One
AI can generate status summaries, meeting notes, task lists, and preliminary insights.
That should reduce time spent collecting information.
It should increase time spent evaluating:
- Whether the output is correct
- Which assumption creates risk
- What requires professional judgment
- How the employee reviewed the work
- What the client should understand
- Who owns the final decision
Appropriate AI uses
- Draft an agenda from approved workflow data
- Summarize prior commitments
- Identify repeated review-note categories
- Draft meeting notes for human review
- Create practice scenarios using sanitized information
Required safeguards
- Use only approved tools and data
- Protect client and employee confidentiality
- Verify summaries and action items
- Do not use AI sentiment or performance scores as the final judgment
- Do not record or transcribe without appropriate policy, notice, consent, and legal review
- Keep the manager responsible for feedback and decisions
Microsoft’s 2026 Work Trend Index argues that as AI takes on more execution, organizations need to redesign work so people direct, decide, and own outcomes. That is exactly where the manager one-on-one should move.
For the accounting-specific transition, read Accountants Are Shifting From Preparers to Reviewers.
Copy-and-Use CPA Firm Manager One-on-One Template
CPA Firm Coaching One-on-One
| Employee and role | |
| Manager | |
| Meeting date / next meeting | |
| Current development outcome |
1. Employee preparation
| Topic | Employee Notes |
|---|---|
| Most important result since last meeting | |
| Top priority before next meeting | |
| Decision, risk, or obstacle | |
| Feedback or development topic | |
| Open commitments |
2. Recognition and progress
3. Priorities, workload, and risk
| Priority / Risk | Employee Recommendation | Decision / Authority | Checkpoint |
|---|---|---|---|
4. Coaching situation
| Situation and evidence | |
| Employee reasoning | |
| Standard / context | |
| Next behavior and evidence |
5. Development and next-role evidence
| Capability | Practice / Assignment | Success Evidence | Support / Review | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
6. Commitments
| Commitment | Owner | Evidence / Deliverable | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|
7. Meeting quality check
☐ At least one meaningful feedback or recognition point was discussed
☐ The employee’s reasoning was explored
☐ A development outcome remained visible
☐ Employee and manager commitments are documented
☐ The conversation reduced rather than increased dependence
☐ Another resource or escalation was identified where needed
100-Point Manager One-on-One Coaching Scorecard
| Manager Capability | Points | Strong Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Preparation and consistency | 10 | Meets reliably, reviews evidence, and protects the recurring conversation |
| Priority and workload clarity | 15 | Clarifies outcomes, tradeoffs, deadlines, authority, and capacity |
| Listening and developmental questions | 15 | Makes reasoning and context visible before supplying answers |
| Recognition and corrective feedback | 15 | Uses timely, specific evidence and defines the behavior to repeat or change |
| Accounting judgment coaching | 15 | Explores facts, risk, support, options, recommendation, authority, and escalation |
| Development and next-role connection | 15 | Links work to capability, practice, evidence, and career progression |
| Accountability and follow-through | 10 | Confirms commitments, follows up, and addresses repeated nonperformance |
| Independence and manager leverage | 5 | The employee increasingly investigates, recommends, decides, and uses the right resources |
Suggested interpretation
- 85–100: Strong coaching habit that supports performance, development, and independence.
- 75–84: Useful meeting with targeted improvement needed in one or two manager behaviors.
- 60–74: Inconsistent coaching; likely dominated by status, answers, or weak follow-through.
- Below 60: Redesign the meeting and develop the manager before relying on the process.
Completed Example: Staff Accountant With Repeated Late Escalation
From Deadline Chasing to Stronger Workflow Judgment
| Employee preparation | The employee identifies three returns waiting on client documents and recommends moving one internal checkpoint. |
| Recognition | The manager recognizes that the employee found an unusual shareholder-loan entry and escalated it with supporting documents and a preliminary recommendation. |
| Pattern discussed | Two recent returns reached their midpoint checkpoints without material missing documents being escalated. |
| Employee reasoning | The employee expected the clients to respond and did not want to interrupt the manager until the issue was certain. |
| Coaching | The manager distinguishes escalation from transferring ownership. The employee should continue pursuing the client while surfacing material deadline risk at the defined checkpoint. |
| Development connection | Early issue escalation is identified as required evidence for greater workflow and senior-level responsibility. |
| Employee commitment | Use assignment-start and midpoint open-item checks for the next six returns and bring any material unresolved item with a recommendation. |
| Manager commitment | Clarify which open items are considered material and review the first two midpoint checks within one business day. |
The manager did not personally chase every client or merely remind the employee to be more proactive.
The conversation clarified the standard, examined the employee’s reasoning, connected the behavior to readiness, and created evidence for improvement.
What Should the Firm Measure?
Consistency
Meetings held, cancellations, preparation, agendas, and commitments reviewed.
Meeting Quality
Useful feedback, priority clarity, employee voice, coaching, development, and accountability.
Performance Change
Review-note trends, timeliness, quality, escalation, communication, and commitments.
Capacity Created
Manager rescue, interruption load, employee independence, review coverage, and next-role readiness.
Process measures
- Percentage of scheduled meetings held
- Late cancellation rate
- Employees submitting agendas
- Meetings ending with documented commitments
- Manager commitments completed on time
Employee-experience measures
- Priorities are clear
- Feedback is useful and timely
- The manager listens and understands the work
- Development expectations are visible
- The employee knows when and how to escalate
- The employee can raise workload and risk without retaliation
Performance-development measures
- Repeated review-note rate
- First-pass acceptance
- On-time internal checkpoints
- Early escalation
- Client communication readiness
- Development assignments completed
- Responsibility expanded successfully
Manager-capacity measures
- Unplanned interruptions
- Repeated procedural questions
- Manager rescue time
- Work awaiting manager decisions
- Employees bringing recommendations rather than uninvestigated problems
Do not judge meeting quality only by employee satisfaction.
A useful manager may deliver difficult feedback.
Measure clarity, action, development, fairness, trust, and performance change together.
Common CPA Firm One-on-One Mistakes
Reading the status dashboard aloud
Review exceptions before the meeting and use the conversation for decisions and coaching.
Manager owns the entire agenda
Require employee preparation while allowing the manager to add important topics.
Answering before asking
Understand facts, investigation, options, and the employee’s recommendation first.
Saving all feedback for the meeting
Give time-sensitive feedback close to the work and use the one-on-one to examine patterns.
Giving only corrective feedback
Recognize strong work specifically enough that the employee knows what to repeat.
Avoiding difficult performance issues
Address evidence early and use the firm’s documented HR and performance process when required.
Turning the meeting into therapy or HR
Listen with care, but involve qualified resources for mental-health emergencies, harassment, discrimination, accommodation, legal, or employment matters.
Discussing development without assigning practice
Every development outcome needs work, support, evidence, and a review date.
Canceling through busy season
Shorten the meeting and focus on risk, workload, decisions, and one transferable lesson.
Using identical questions for every employee
Adapt to role, capability, current work, personality, workload, and development needs.
Documenting nothing
Record decisions and commitments. Avoid creating unnecessary sensitive narrative or recording meetings without appropriate policy and legal review.
Confusing availability with coaching
An open door does not replace a predictable developmental conversation.
How SkillAbility Helps Managers Coach Beyond Status Updates
One-on-ones improve when the manager is not responsible for teaching every repeatable process from memory.
The SkillAbility Coaching Pathway
Structured accounting, tax, payroll, software, workflow, documentation, self-review, and assessment create evidence managers can discuss.
Scenarios surface client communication, financial interpretation, skepticism, advisory thinking, business context, and escalation behavior.
Managers practice delegation, coaching, feedback, accountability, client leadership, firm economics, succession, and future-partner development.
The one-on-one can then focus on:
- What performance evidence means
- Why a mistake occurred
- How judgment should improve
- Which responsibility should expand next
- How the employee becomes more independent
For the complete manager-development framework, read Accounting Manager Training.
For the firmwide system, read Accounting Workforce Development.
A strong one-on-one does not make the employee better at reporting status. It makes the employee better at prioritizing, deciding, communicating, learning, and owning the work.
Frequently Asked Questions
What should a CPA firm manager discuss in a one-on-one?
Discuss priorities, workload, decisions, risk, feedback, recognition, review-note patterns, professional judgment, barriers, client communication, development goals, next-role evidence, and employee and manager commitments.
How is a one-on-one different from a status meeting?
A status meeting reports where work stands. A one-on-one uses current work and evidence to clarify priorities, coach performance, develop judgment, address barriers, build capability, and create accountability.
How often should accounting managers meet one-on-one with staff?
Weekly is a practical starting point for new hires, developing employees, changing roles, and busy periods. Established seniors may meet weekly or biweekly depending on workload, risk, and development needs.
How long should an accounting one-on-one last?
Many useful conversations fit in 30 minutes. Use 45 minutes when deeper development, judgment, role, or performance discussion is required. Busy-season conversations may be shortened to 15–20 focused minutes.
Who should prepare the one-on-one agenda?
The employee should normally prepare the first draft, including the main result, priority, decision or obstacle, development topic, and open commitments. The manager should add evidence, recognition, feedback, and firm priorities.
Should managers discuss every client and assignment?
No. Workflow should show normal status. Discuss exceptions, deadline risk, judgment, workload conflicts, manager decisions, repeated patterns, and development opportunities.
What questions help accountants develop judgment?
Ask what looks unusual, which fact could change the conclusion, what was investigated, what options exist, what the employee recommends, whether the decision is within authority, and when escalation is required.
How should review notes be discussed?
Discuss meaningful patterns rather than rereading every note. Identify the standard, why it mattered, what should have happened before submission, where else the issue may occur, and what evidence will show learning transfer.
Should one-on-ones continue during busy season?
Yes. Shorten them and focus on workload, deadlines, review capacity, client-information risk, decisions, wellbeing signals, and one transferable coaching lesson.
How do one-on-ones support promotion readiness?
They keep next-role expectations visible and connect current work to controlled practice, stretch assignments, feedback, and observable readiness evidence before the formal promotion decision.
How do managers create accountability without micromanaging?
Define the outcome, owner, authority, checkpoints, evidence, escalation triggers, and deadline. Let the employee own the work and follow up consistently on commitments.
Can AI prepare one-on-one agendas or notes?
AI may assist with approved workflow summaries, agenda drafts, prior commitments, note organization, and scenario creation. Managers must protect confidential information, verify outputs, and remain responsible for feedback and decisions.
Should one-on-ones be documented?
Document priorities, decisions, commitments, support, development activity, and dates. Follow firm policy and legal guidance for sensitive employee information, recordings, transcription, performance issues, or employment actions.
How do firms measure whether one-on-ones work?
Measure meeting consistency, preparation, priority clarity, useful feedback, commitment completion, review-note improvement, timely escalation, employee independence, development milestones, and reductions in manager rescue and repeated questions.
External Research and Authority Sources
- Gallup and Workhuman: Feedback Frequency, Recognition, and Engagement
- Gallup: Meaningful Weekly Feedback and Manager Span of Control
- Gallup: Manager Feedback Blind Spots
- Gallup: How Effective Feedback Fuels Performance
- Gallup: Feedback Is Not Enough
- AICPA: 2026 PCPS Top Issues Survey Findings
- AICPA: CPA Firm Competency and Development Resources
- AICPA: First-Time Manager Skills
- Microsoft 2026 Work Trend Index
- Google Search Central: Generative AI Search Optimization
The Bottom Line
Stop using one-on-ones to ask employees what they are working on.
The workflow should already answer that.
Ask what matters most.
Ask what is at risk.
Ask what the employee has investigated.
Ask what the person recommends.
Give specific recognition.
Address performance problems while the evidence is current.
Turn review notes into transferable lessons.
Connect present work to future responsibility.
Remove barriers the employee cannot remove.
Require ownership where the employee can act.
End with commitments and follow up.
Status tells you what happened. Coaching changes what happens next. Use the one-on-one to develop accountants who can think, communicate, decide, and own more of the work.
Protect Knowledge. Develop People. Scale the Firm.
Are your managers developing staff—or spending every one-on-one collecting status and answering the same questions?
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To one-on-ones that build capable, independent professionals,
Vincent Howard, CPA
Managing Partner, Howard, Howard and Hodges
SkillAbility for Accounting Firms
About the Author
Vincent Howard, CPA has practiced public accounting since 1990. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Accounting and a Master’s in Taxation from the University of Central Florida, founded his accounting firm in 1993, and serves as Managing Partner of Howard, Howard and Hodges. He helped grow the organization from three people to approximately 50 staff across multiple Florida locations and states. He has participated in PASBA since 1997, and the firm was named PASBA Firm of the Year in 2015. Since 2020, he has built and run the SkillAbility accounting workforce development platform, used by more than 1,000 accounting professionals across dozens of PASBA firms.
© 2026 SkillAbility for Accounting Firms. This article provides general educational information and does not replace legal, employment, human-resources, mental-health, accounting, tax, professional-standards, information-security, or regulatory advice.