For years I believed my clients would only stay if I did everything myself, and that belief kept my business, and my life, smaller than it needed to be.
As a part of this series, we had the pleasure to interview Kimberly Tara.
Kimberly Tara is a CPA and Certified Tax Planner who empowers profitable women entrepreneurs to build long-term wealth and reclaim financial freedom by transforming tax planning from a seasonal chore into a year-round strategy for keeping more of their earnings. She founded The Tara CPA Firm in 2016 and has grown it to a team of six while raising four kids in Charlotte, North Carolina, and in 2026 she launched TaxMove, a tax strategy tool for business owners who are profitable enough to owe the IRS real money but not yet ready for a full-service strategist. She is also the host of the Keep More Money podcast and the author of You Are POWERful, a 100-day journal for self-employed women.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to know how you got from “there to here.” Inspire us with your backstory!
Thank you for having me! So my story starts with me almost staying in public accounting. Years into my career, in the middle of tax season, I watched a manager across the hall FaceTime her three-year-old to sleep from her desk. She was pregnant with her second baby, and it was the fourth night in a row. On the drive home I couldn’t shake the question: I’ve been working for three years to become her in ten. Is that actually what I want? The answer was no.
So I left, and in 2016 I started The Tara CPA Firm. I hit six figures in the first twelve months, which looked like winning. By eighteen months in, I was completely burnt out. I was saying yes to everyone, charging less than I was worth, pregnant with my second, and missing bedtime with my own little one. I had become the woman in the cubicle, just in a different office.
The turning point wasn’t a dramatic breakdown. It was a pregnancy test. I did the math on what my life was about to require and decided this was not going to be sustainable, and I was going to fix it. With the help of a business mentor, I raised my prices, held my boundaries, and stopped trading every hour of my life for a dollar that never felt like enough.
Seven years in, with four kids at home, I faced the next big decision: stay small enough to carry it all myself, or hire and grow. Hiring scared me. So I grew the revenue first, and then I took a pay cut myself to bring on my first employee in November 2023. Today we’re a team of six.
That margin is what finally let me build TaxMove in 2026, an idea I’d been sitting with for five years, for the profitable business owner who owes the IRS real money but isn’t ready for a full-service tax strategy firm. Everything I do now comes back to one belief: a profitable business and a present life don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
Tell us about your typical day!
It depends on the day, and I’ve been in a season for a while now where my typical day looks pretty atypical. But here’s the general shape of it.
I work from 5 to 6:30 in the morning. That’s my quiet time for content creation and writing. I don’t look at my computer, my to-do list, or my phone. I focus on the one or two things I need to create, and I decide what those are the day before so I’m not spending that time figuring it out.
Then I get the kids ready, get myself ready, and get everyone out the door. When I come back, I have until 2 p.m. to work. First and foremost, I make sure I’m supporting my team with whatever they need from me, especially our tax team, who handles client fulfillment. The rest of that window is team calls, marketing calls, and networking calls.
I finish up by 2 so I can do the mom stuff. I set alarms for every call and every pickup so I don’t miss any of them. And something I’ve been working really hard on for the last 18 months or so is not looking at blue light after 7 p.m. and being in bed around 8:30 or 9. Since I wake up so early, I’m really trying to prioritize sleep.
What lessons would you share with yourself if you had the opportunity to meet your younger self?
I’d tell her three things. First, it doesn’t have to be you. For years I believed my clients would only stay if I did everything myself, and that belief kept my business, and my life, smaller than it needed to be.
Second, you can’t be the best at everything at the same time. Trying to be the best CPA, the best CEO, and the best mom all at once made me good at none of them.
Third, saying no isn’t the same as letting people down. Some of the best decisions I’ve ever made started with a no I felt guilty about.
Ok, thank you for sharing your inspired life. Let’s start with a basic definition to make sure that all of us are on the same page. How do you define Hustle Culture?
For me, hustle culture is always going after the next big thing. It’s always more, more, more. Busy, busy, busy. How can you do more? How can you make more? How can you look like you’re doing the most?
And I just don’t like it. I think “hustle” used to have a more positive connotation, and now it mostly carries a negative one.
Now let’s discuss an alternative to Hustle Culture. To begin, can you share with our readers a bit about why you are an authority on the problems that come with Hustle Culture?
Because I’ve lived it. I’ve burnt out three times since I started my own practice, and burnout was the whole reason I left corporate accounting in the first place. Always trying to make more, do more, get that next client, be the best, and also be the best mom just isn’t practical or realistic. It makes you good at nothing, including the two things I wanted to be good at most: being a CEO and CPA, and being a mom.
So I’ve been there and done that. Having four kids has taught me what my priorities truly are, and it’s really hard in this day and age to stay true to those values and close the rest of the world out. And as a CPA, I see the other side of it in the numbers. A big top-line revenue number doesn’t always mean a business owner is keeping much of it.
The specific term “Hustle Culture” may have been popularized in the 2010s, but the concept behind it and the behaviors that come with it can be traced back hundreds or perhaps even thousands of years. From your vantage point, experience, or research, what were the main drivers of Hustle Culture?
I think social media is the main driver of hustle culture. When influencers came along, people started making money by living their lives and putting them on social media for everyone else to see. I think that’s what really created it. Being busy and always producing became something to show off.
I work in the marketing industry, and so I’m very cognizant of this question. What role do you see that marketing and advertising has played in creating the frenzy caused by Hustle Culture that many of us feel?
It ties right into what I just said. Influencers, creators, and brand partners on social media are making it all look glamorous and fun and easy. Everyone is sharing the highlights. They’re not sharing the behind the scenes of what it took to get there. That’s really where marketing and advertising have played into the frenzy, because we end up comparing our real, everyday lives to someone else’s highlight reel and deciding we must not be doing enough.
Can you help articulate the downsides of Hustle Culture? Why is this an unsustainable work paradigm?
Look, there are upsides to hustling. There are seasons and times where you do need to hustle a little bit: late nights, early mornings, working and doing more. We all have those.
Where it becomes an unsustainable work paradigm is when we get caught in a trap that we can’t get out of. Hustle becomes how we value our worth, who we are, whether people love us, and whether they see us as successful. That’s the part that becomes a problem. And on a practical level, nobody can hustle forever. Your body literally gives out.
Let’s now discuss Focus, the opposite of Frenzy. Can you please share one area of your personal or business life where you simplified things and then felt less frenzied and more fulfilled? Can you please explain?
I have so many, but the biggest one was hiring someone to help fulfill on the client side and allowing it to simply not be me. For years I thought it had to be me, because I believed that was the only way my clients were going to stay.
At first it was actually a little more frenzied. We had to train her, and we had to transition clients so they got used to talking to her. But it has been so impactful, not just for the business growth we’ve had, but for my ability to actually turn off. When I go on vacation, or to a conference or a speaking engagement, I can be there, because I’m not being pinged every second and constantly thinking about all the other things I need to get done.
What life experiences have you adopted in your business or personal life that have left you more satisfied? Can you please explain?
In 2026, I went back to reading on my Kindle every night for 10 to 15 minutes. And I mean a fun book. Not a workbook, not self-help, not professional development, none of that. Just for fun, with not really anything to be learned from it.
At first it felt so luxurious that it felt wrong. I kept thinking I should be working, or with my kids, or doing something around the house. It felt almost lazy, like, how dare I take 10 to 15 minutes to do something enjoyable? But I love to read. I always have. And that small habit has made me a happier person.
Okay, fantastic. Here is the main part of our interview. In your opinion, how can we break the addiction to being busy or trying to find the next big thing? How can people truly focus on tasks that make THE difference to their business and lives giving them satisfaction or life purpose alignment? Based on your experience and your area of expertise, can you please share “Five Ways To Move From Frenzy to Focused”?
- Focus on your revenue-generating activities.
We are all so guilty of wanting to do the easy stuff, or the things that get the most items checked off our to-do list. But those aren’t necessarily the revenue-generating activities in our business, the things that actually move the needle forward. That’s a big reason I decide the night before what my one or two priorities will be for my 5 a.m. quiet time, so the important work gets done first instead of whatever is loudest.
2. Focus on your profit, not your revenue.
Especially in marketing and on social media, we hear those big top-line gross revenue numbers. But people aren’t talking about how much they’re keeping after they pay their expenses and their taxes. What actually matters at the end of the day, what actually provides for your family and lets you say “I have enough,” is your profit and how much you pay yourself. Not a big number for your gross revenue.
3. Say no to clients who aren’t a fit.
This one has changed everything for me. When you’re just starting out, sometimes you don’t feel like you have a choice. But there has to come a point where you say, this doesn’t fit what I’m trying to do. This client is causing me more mental load than they’re worth, and they’re taking up precious space for better-fitting clients.
4. Say no in your personal life, too.
This has been so big for me. Right after my third child was born, I felt so guilty for not offering to be the room mom for my two older kids’ classes. I was still working through all of the COVID PPP and EIDL loans with my clients, I had a brand-new baby, and we didn’t have childcare. I said no anyway. It was the first time I’d done that, and it was a huge moment for me. I told them, “I can’t commit to being the room mom, but I am here to help in any way that you need.”
I had to get past feeling like I was letting my kids down, letting the teachers down, and worrying about what the other moms would think of me. And you know what? I don’t know that any of them thought anything of me. If they did, they never said it to my face. What I learned is that I could still be there for my kids, and actually be there better, because I wasn’t strung out from saying yes to everyone and everything. That was a real game changer for me, in business and in my personal life.
5. Ask for help, and accept it when it’s offered.
First I learned to say no and stopped being the one who did all the things. Then I had to take it a step further and be willing to accept help when it was offered and ask for it when I needed it. That included asking my husband to take the kids to a birthday party so I could stay home and work, because I’d been with them all week. (What kind of mom were they going to think I was?) It included wondering what people would think if someone came to help us with our laundry, or what my clients would think if another tax professional was helping me and it wasn’t me doing everything.
We have to get past our own insecurities and the idea that we can do it all. Look, I can do it all, if I want to pull all-nighters, be a really horrible person to be around, and provide D-level work instead of A-level work. But that’s no way to live life, and it’s not what your kids want or what your clients want.
Most recently, our neighbor offered to host the fire pit and s’mores for our Halloween party. She said she didn’t want to step on my toes, and I said, “You are not. Thank you. I’m accepting help.” Then everybody started pitching in. I can bring this, I can bring that. The old me would have said, “No, no, no, don’t worry about it!” The new me said thank you. I even told the moms in our group chat how proud I was of myself for accepting the help.
How would you describe a work paradigm that is a viable alternative to Hustle Culture? What would it look like, and what would you call it?
I’m not good at naming things, but I would call it Sustainable Culture.
Here’s the thing with hustle culture: I have seen so many businesses come and go. They come, they make money, and they’re gone. They’re not building something sustainable, and a big part of that is that they’re not delivering something of quality.
Nobody can hustle forever. Your body literally, physically gives out. So Sustainable Culture is building a business you can keep running for the long haul, one that delivers quality work, pays you a real profit, and still leaves room for the life you started it for.
Do you have any favorite books, podcasts, or resources that have inspired you about working differently?
Yes, I’m a big reader! These are the ones that have shaped how I think about working differently:
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan. Success comes faster when you find the right people to help you instead of trying to figure out how to do everything yourself.
Buy Back Your Time by Dan Martell. How to delegate the low-value tasks so you can spend your time on the work that actually moves your business forward.
Clockwork by Mike Michalowicz. A system for building a business that runs efficiently without the owner doing everything.
Boundary Boss by Terri Cole. A guide to setting and keeping healthy boundaries, especially for recovering people-pleasers.
Present Over Perfect by Shauna Niequist. A reflection on choosing presence and slowing down instead of chasing perfection.
When Less Becomes More by Emily Ley. Simplifying your life and letting go of the pressure to do it all.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can inspire.
It would be the You Are POWERful movement. I need women to know that they have the power. They have the power to make money, the power to control their money, the power to make decisions, and the power to be confident.
They need to stop giving that power away to others, whether that’s a spouse, an accountant, or anyone else. You can (and should!) get help, but you never have to give away your authority. That’s the heart of my new book, You Are POWERful, a 100-day journal for self-employed women to recognize their power with money and shape the life they want.
What is the best way for our readers to continue to follow your work online?
Instagram is the best place to find me: @kimberlytaracpa. You can also learn more about my firm at taracpafirm.com, find TaxMove at taxmove.io (and @taxmove.io on Instagram), grab my journal at iampowerful.co, and listen to my podcast, Keep More Money, wherever you get your podcasts.
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. We wish you only continued success.
Thank you so much for having me!
