Story by Liesel Schmidt
Benjamin Franklin is famously quoted saying, “… in this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” And with that certainty, there is an indisputable need for accountants—though, as old as the accounting industry is, it hasn’t quite kept up with the ever-changing face of technology to streamline processes that once required a great deal of manual work. For HubSync, giving CPA firms cloud-based technology to do their work is their raison d’etre, allowing firms better client communication and creating a superior experience.
Founded just over three years ago by long-term Alexandrian John McGowan, HubSync was created with the purpose of automating the entire end-to-end process for CPA firms and providing a modern, digital experience for clients. “My goal is that you might actually like filing your taxes after using HubSync,” says HubSync CEO McGowan. “I love solving business problems with technology. I started building technology solutions early in my career in the Big 4, and it is what drove me to start this company and bring our software platform to the industry. The tax process is fundamentally broken and remains largely paper-based.” This is where HubSync comes in. “We are building an amazing platform that is revolutionizing our industry with a great group of people,” McGowan notes. “I love waking up every day and working with our team and our clients. We built more functionality in 2021 than many companies have built in years, with more to come. The great thing about technology is that the journey never ends.”
For McGowan, that journey began nearly 30 years ago, when he started in the tax and accounting industry at KPMG and then later Deloitte. Now, his day-to-day as CEO requires him to wear a number of hats—a role in which he seems to thrive. “I do a little bit of everything,” he says. “I run our software engineering team, focus on business development and growth and—most importantly—work closely with our clients on digitizing their accounting firms. We are up to 60 people now, all working virtually from different geographical regions across the globe, so we are also focused on building an amazing work culture in the new norm of a distributed workforce.”
Naturally, it is crucial that HubSync maintain an edge, keeping up with the latest innovations in tech. “I spend time every day reading up on the latest and greatest technology,” McGown admits. “I have a reputation for sending my development teams new ideas all the time so that we can experiment with the latest innovations. I love pushing the envelope and innovating with new technology. It’s also my job to advise our clients on the adoption of these new ideas, so it is important to stay ahead of the eight-ball and in front of any incoming tech wave.”
'Productivity is my passion. If I can automate a task and make my life or the daily lives of my clients easier, then I will find a way to do it.' - John
More than just part of his work, technology is a passion for McGowan—which may be one of the reasons for his success. “Accounting is notoriously lagging behind the rest of the business landscape. There is so much opportunity for automation in our industry, using technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotic process automation,” he notes. “When I see inefficiencies in any process, I always want to solve them. It is really fulfilling when our clients tell us how much easier we’ve made their work lives.”