Your Quick Scrub
- Problem: You are burning out your best people on low-value work because you can’t fill open seats.
- Data: 99% of accountants report burnout, largely driven by unreasonable volume, not complexity.
- Fix: Shift transactional work to a fractional team to protect your in-house talent for high-value strategy.
The “unicorn” accountant is extinct. Over 300,000 accountants and auditors have left the U.S. workforce in the last three years, shrinking the talent pool by nearly 17%^1. If you’re waiting for the perfect Senior Accountant to walk through the door and solve your capacity issues, you’re fighting a losing battle.
The crisis isn’t just about who you can’t hire; it’s about who you are about to lose. When you can’t fill seats, the work doesn’t disappear; it lands on the desks of your remaining high-performers. That is a recipe for burnout and turnover. You need a protection strategy, not just a recruiting plan.
The Math Problem: You Can’t Hire Your Way Out
Let’s look at the numbers. This isn’t a temporary cycle; it is a demographic cliff. According to recent industry data, 75% of current CPAs are at or nearing retirement age2. The knowledge base is evaporating.
And the pipeline isn’t refilling fast enough. The number of candidates sitting for the CPA exam has dropped significantly, creating a massive gap between demand and supply. Even when you manage to hire an entry-level accountant, attrition remains high: nearly 22% leave within a year3.
That means if you hire someone today, there is a one-in-five chance they will be gone within a year. The “churn and burn” hiring model is mathematically broken. You need a different equation.
The Burnout Trap: Volume vs. Value
Your current team isn’t quitting because the work is too hard. They are quitting because the work is relentless and repetitive. Recent studies show that a staggering 99% of accountants suffer from some level of burnout, with “work overload” cited as a primary driver4.
When a strategic Controller spends their week cleaning up bank reconciliations because you’re short-staffed, everyone loses. You’re paying premium rates for administrative work and pushing your top performers toward the door.
The “Protection Strategy” is simple: split the role.
- Keep Strategy In-House: Your internal team owns the culture, the complex decisions, and the stakeholder relationships.
- Outsource the Grind: Move the high-volume, transactional work, reconciliations, AP/AR, general ledger maintenance, to a fractional team.
This approach protects your top talent and gives them space to do the work they actually enjoy.
The Variable Cost Shield
Beyond retention, this is a financial safety play. Carrying a heavy fixed-cost headcount in an uncertain economy is risky. Traditional hiring locks you into salaries, benefits, and recruitment fees that don’t scale down when business slows.
Outsourcing converts those fixed liabilities into variable costs. Industry analysis suggests that leveraging offshore or fractional talent can reduce operational costs by 50% to 70% compared to traditional hiring5.
But the real win isn’t just the savings; it’s the flexibility. Outsourcing gives you a “cash flow shield.” You pay for the capacity you need, when you need it. If you grow, the team scales up instantly. If you need to tighten the belt, you scale back without layoffs.
How Scrubbed Can Help
You don’t have to overhaul your entire department to fix this. Scrubbed’s Direct Client Services team acts as a seamless extension of your office, handling the heavy lifting so your in-house leaders can get back to strategy.
We plug directly into your workflow to handle:
- Fractional Accounting & Bookkeeping: We take over the day-to-day grind: AP/AR, reconciliations, and general ledger maintenance.
- Month-End Close Support: We accelerate your timeline by preparing workpapers and preliminary reports before your Controller even logs on.
- Audit Readiness: We keep your schedules clean and documentation organized year-round, so audit season isn’t a fire drill.
- Technical Accounting: We handle complex ad-hoc projects (like lease accounting or rev rec) that bog down your core team.
Let’s discuss plugging your talent gap before you lose another key player.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael John (MJ) David heads Direct Client Services at Scrubbed, guiding global controllers and CFOs through talent shortages and process bottlenecks. A former Grant Thornton assurance associate turned outsourcing strategist, MJ has led teams of 150 accountants across e‑commerce, cleantech, real‑estate, and SaaS verticals. He writes the way he leads—candid, metric‑anchored, and solutions‑oriented—so busy finance leaders can act quickly.
Sources:
- Accountancy Age. (2022, July 27)
Survey reveals 99% of accountants suffer with burnout.
https://www.accountancyage.com/2022/07/27/burnout-sweeps-through-accounting-industry-causing-surge-in-mistakes-on-the-job/ - Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025).
Accountants and Auditors: Occupational Outlook Handbook. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/business-and-financial/accountants-and-auditors.htm - Ramp. (2025, January 7).
Accountant shortage: Understanding the impact on businesses.
https://ramp.com/blog/accountant-shortage
SmartVault. (2024, April 26). The great accounting exodus – Part 1: Why over 300,000 CPAs left the profession. https://www.smartvault.com/resources/the-great-accounting-exodus-part1/ - Software Oasis. (2025).
Entry-level accountant retention rates: 2025 industry analysis.
https://softwareoasis.com/entry-level-accountant-retention-rates/ - Sourcefit. (2025).
Why Outsourcing Accounting in 2025 Makes More Sense Than Ever.
https://sourcefit.com/outsourcing-blog/why-outsourcing-accounting-in-2025-makes-more-sense-than-ever/
