In this episode of the Achieve Podcast, host Taylor Baker interviews Katie Birkelo, President of Aspire Professional Talent Solutions. Katie shares her 23‑year background in financial staffing, detailing her rise from senior roles at Robert Half and Ronstadt to joining Aspire two years ago to help expand the firm beyond its 20‑year Philadelphia base. She explains how Aspire grew from a two‑person operation to a 15‑person team and is poised to add 10‑15 more staff while acquiring a small IT staffing firm. Katie outlines the macro forces that make finance and accounting staffing a stable, recession‑resilient market: a chronic shortage of CPAs (≈30,000 retirements per year), the non‑glamorous nature of the work, and the perpetual need for companies—whether thriving or struggling—to “count the money.” She recounts how Aspire navigated multiple economic cycles, from the post‑dot‑com bust to the 2008‑09 crisis, the COVID‑driven boom, and the recent chip‑shortage/CHIPS Act surge, emphasizing the importance of anticipating where dollars flow and positioning the firm ahead of those trends. The conversation moves to Aspire’s ideal client profile: small‑to‑mid‑size firms ($10 M–$500 M revenue) that lack in‑house talent acquisition or CFO capacity, with a current demand focus on controller and assistant‑controller roles. Industry hotspots include data‑center infrastructure, utilities, engineering, and construction. Katie describes the firm’s client‑acquisition strategy, which hinges on delivering an exceptional candidate experience, leveraging networks like the CFO Alliance, and nurturing long‑term relationships that often turn placed candidates into repeat clients. She identifies a sales‑marketing gap: while Aspire’s recruitment tech stack is advanced, the sales funnel still relies heavily on human relationship‑building; she sees untapped potential in applying AI and automation to sales outreach, provided the saved time is re‑allocated to high‑touch activities. Throughout, Katie stresses a people‑first philosophy—hiring better‑than‑self talent, maintaining authenticity, and recognizing that AI can augment but never replace the human element in staffing. She shares leadership lessons about hiring superior people and staying true to one’s style (“you can’t change a zebra’s stripes”). Looking ahead, Katie is excited about scaling the team, fostering entrepreneurial growth for employees, and operating at the intersection of technology, AI, and human capital to make the industry smarter, faster, and more efficient over the next five years. The episode closes with contact information for Aspire and the CFO Alliance, and a call to listeners to engage with the firm.
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Welcome to another episode of the Achieve Podcast, a show where we highlight leaders, creators, and entrepreneurs, those who are building meaningful businesses, shaping their industries, and having an impact. I'm Taylor, your host, and excited today to be joined by Katie Burchello, the president of Aspire Professional Talent Solutions, and you can find them at aspireexecutivesearch.com. .com, ExecutiveSearch.com. Katie, thank you for joining us today.
Thanks, Taylor. I'm excited to chat with you.
That's so— thanks for coming. I'm excited too. This is going to be a good one today. For those getting to know you and Aspire, give us a little bit of backstory on how you got into the space and who you're currently serving, because you have a few companies and a few things you've been working on that you do. So let us know.
Yeah, yeah. Uh, the long or the short of it is I spent I spent 23 years in financial staffing. So I spent 16 years with a Goliath at Robert Half, and then the last call it 6.5 years with the largest professional talent solutions group of Ronstadt. And in both of those ventures, I produced and led financial staffing solutions. So anything from senior accountants up to CFOs in both of those ventures. By and large, the last call it decade leading professionals in that base. I came to Aspire roughly 2 years ago to join my partner Dan Wagner, our founder, in scaling the business outside of Philadelphia. So we've been Philadelphia-based for 20 years, and my mission really is to, to grow, continue to grow in Philadelphia and scale our business outside of Philadelphia, launching our brand in Chicago, Denver, and some of the fastest growing markets in the U.S. That's awesome.
And how big is the team in the organization now?
We, you know, I joke about it, but it's 1000% true, Taylor. At this time, 2 years ago, it was me and Dan. Now we are up to 15 professionals, and we're on the cusp of acquiring a small IT staffing firm. So looking to go from what, what has been tremendous growth over the past 2 years to continuing that growth and adding anywhere from 10 to 15 more people over the course of the next 12 to 18 months.
Wow, that's impressive growth. What would you say has contributed to that growth primarily?
You know, I— it's an interesting time to be in our business, Taylor, and I say that because in staffing we walk in lockstep with the economy. And so when unemployment goes up, the need for companies to utilize us might go down because they can find professionals on their own. When unemployment is down, the supply and demand really does lend itself nicely to staffing firms. We're in a unique space in that we service accounting and finance professionals, accounting and finance departments. And there are two things that make that really stable. The first is the supply and demand will never fix itself. There's something like 30,000 CPAs retiring every year, and there's a third of that with recent college graduates. So we're losing qualified accounting and finance professionals every year. And we're not replenishing that group of professionals, namely because it's not very glamorous, right, Taylor Baker Baker? Like, we all joke that CPAs and accountants are in their spreadsheets, and they are. It's not very sexy. So that supply and demand won't fix itself, at least not in my lifetime. So our growth has really lent itself to the supply and demand piece. And then secondly, when companies are faced with uncertainty, and whether that is that they're a mid-sized company that's growing, or they're unsure whether they're going to, to develop a product and sell, or they're looking at maybe a private equity infusion or acquisition, they're not sure if they need to hire permanent professionals. Well, we service both that permanent capability and the contract capability. So where we might not have tremendous growth on one side of the business, the other side, which, you know, again, could feed that uncertainty. Companies always have to have people doing that work. So I say it, whether you're doing well or poorly, somebody has to count the money. So it creates some stability in the finance and accounting space for the way that we service our customers.
That makes a lot of sense. And I like that security. And wow.
So do I.
Especially with all the changes in the economy right now. And so a lot of the uncertainty. So that's, that's beautiful for people to know that. So looking back for you, what turning points, positive or negative, have molded the way you think about and run the organization?
You know, I, I, I think after 24 years and half having spent time in this industry walking through multiple different economic cycles, right? I started in the business right after the dot-com bust of 2003. Uh, some of my best years and the team that I had the most success supporting were through the financial crisis of '08, '09, and 2010. And then we had a great, a great growth boom going, you know, into '17, '18, and '19. Then COVID comes and we have this blip of a challenge. Our industry, Taylor, experienced a tremendous boom post-COVID. Because of the COVID dollar infusion, because of just the way that the market shifted, we were able to take advantage as an industry of a tremendous amount of temporary capability. And now we're on this— we're in this post-COVID space. When I think about what has serviced our business today, my business today, the teams that I get to support well, it's recognizing where the dollars are going. And having a strategy to put yourself in that space before the dollars get there. And I'll give you a great example. So through the COVID times, right, money was infused into things like COVID kits where you're packaging a kit. Well, I worked with Ronstadt where we did 60% of our business in the light industrial space. Well, somebody had to package the shot kits, if you will. So we were placing professionals into that environment. And in Denver, Denver Mattress went from creating mattresses to, to using their, their assembly line to create N95 masks. So making sure that we were ahead of where, where manufacturing shifted during that time was critical. And then even more so I'll give another example of during that time, the chip shortage and the challenges in the semiconductor industry. Well, there was an infusion of the CHIPS Act, which gave money, federal, federally funded dollars to US-based manufacturing facilities that were creating those chips, those semiconductors in the US. Well, in accounting and finance, somebody has to track that money. Somebody has to audit that money. So that's not a professional that a company is going to hire long term. They are going to bring that professional and on a consulting basis to monitor that. So where my teams have had a tremendous amount of success is staying ahead of that strategy and not sort of, you know, I say the Eeyore approach, not saying, oh, bother, the economy is challenging, things will be hard. Choose your hard, right? Yes, the traditional method might be hard, but there's always somebody who's growing. And if you can align yourself with those businesses, you'll find that growth. So, you know, again, I would say through all of those economic cycles, being a part of teams that strategically put themselves in places to continue to grow was critical.
I love that. So who is your ICP right now? Who are you targeting and helping the most with your—
Yeah, it's interesting. So, and you'll see this in any jobs report, right? My husband jokes with me that the jobs report comes out the, the first Friday of every month and he's like, oh, it's the, the Friday after Thanksgiving. I'm like, no, it comes out the first Friday of every month. You'll see this in any of our jobs reports, right? That the economy is creating fewer jobs today than say it did in 2023. I'm okay with that. And here's why. That we were replacing jobs that were lost in 2020, in 2021, '22, and '23. All of those great jobs numbers came from replacing jobs that had been lost during COVID We're finally in a position now as an economy where the jobs that are being created are much like what we saw in 2018 and '19, where it's It is what I would describe as flat but still stable. And the— our traditional customer is somewhere in that small to midsize space. So call it anywhere from $10 million a year in revenue. So we service a lot of entrepreneurs and, and growing businesses up to maybe $500 million a year in revenue. The large enterprise customers— and we see this— those organizations have been impacted the most by layoffs. So at Aspire, we service that small to midsize organization. Maybe they don't have a full-time talent acquisition person. Maybe they don't want to bring on a full-time CFO because they don't know what their long-term plans will be as far as succession planning or selling, but they know that they need to bring somebody in today. We do a lot of work in that small to midsize space and senior accountant above. So where we see the highest demand, and you can see this again from any jobs report, I see a lot of demand right now in that controller, assistant controller plus space. And then as far as industries, we'll work in any industry, Taylor. But again, strategically, there are industries that are growing. And before we started to record, you and I were talking about this, data centers, those are fed, of course, by the need for AI and that necessity that's feeding the entire economy. But what's crazy is we don't think about who builds those, right? The fastest growing industries, the most stable industries today are in that trade space. Utility, engineering, construction. We service a lot of those small to mid-sized companies that are supporting the growth on the utility and energy side right now.
That makes a lot of sense. And what's been working well for you guys to attract and retain good clients and customers?
Yeah, I would say that the first thing that we do is attract and retain good candidates. And that, you know, we align ourselves with organizations like the CFO Alliance where we can be part of a 9,000-member organization where that room is full of CFOs that are either gainfully employed for small to mid-sized organizations, fractional for small to mid-sized organizations or maybe in transition. And so we're in those rooms nationally and we find great talent in that space. But I say this with, with a big smile. The best client I have today was the first candidate I placed in 2003, and he and I have worked together for 20-plus years. Wow. Senior accountants don't say senior accountants. They become accounting managers and assistant controllers and controllers. And so in our industry, Taylor, where we can take good care of a candidate, they eventually become our best client. And that's really been the approach that I've taken in production and that I hope my team continues to take and making sure that we create a good candidate experience and that candidate eventually decides to hire through us.
That makes a lot of sense. That organic growth that happens. So where— when it comes to your sales and marketing and outreach, where do you still see opportunity or money on the table?
Yeah, I think that if we could infuse tech stack and AI into a sales strategy the way that our industry has infused tech stack into the recruitment part, my problems would be solved, right? We're not quite there as an industry yet. We do a really good job as an industry, and Aspire specifically, I think we've got a tech stack that's second to none. But where we can't replace that human factor is in that long-term sales funnel approach and making sure that we're connecting with the right buyer frequently enough for them to want to build a relationship with us and buy from us. We're in a very competitive industry. And so making sure that that buyer thinks of, of Katie Burklow or Aspire when they have a hiring need or when they have a consulting opportunity really is only born from multiple sales touches and the fostering of that long-term relationship that, that starts in rooms like the CFO Alliance rooms or other networking groups and does not fall off when it comes to face-to-face meetings or multiple different phone calls.
Yes. And that— I'd love the transition right there because there's so much question around the AI aspect that people have, and, and, and it can augment and help human connections, but it can't replace that human-to-human, heart-to-heart connection. Yeah.
Yeah. Cool.
Where have you guys found ways to utilize AI and automation?
Yeah, it's interesting because there are so many products out there, and as a business owner, if you were to ask me 2 years ago, again, I came from the 2 largest firms in the world. So I had a senior vice president that managed the products, and they would come to me and say, here's a product, what do you think of it? Um, now I'm on the forefront of it, and I have a sales enablement team and an excellent COO, um, and Chris Piccarello, who we just appointed, who makes me look smarter than I am. Uh, and where, where I would say we've had tremendous growth is looking back 2 years and saying, okay, what's the appropriate tech stack for both sides of our business? What's the right tech stack for the recruit side and what's the right tech stack for our sales side and not taking a one-size-fits-all approach to that because what works really well on recruitment might not work well on the sales side. And again, that's where I think we still have to have that human touch and making sure that regardless of what we insert in that automation and the AI piece, having our professionals then reallocate their time to something else. If they're TechStack and we've got a great product that does a fantastic job offering our candidates multiple touches as a prospect, right? Once that product is, is fine-tuned and working well, then our team has to tailor— take that 30% of the time that they would have spent doing that and reallocate it to sales or reallocate it to meetings right? That's where I think the average business really struggles, is holding people accountable to, okay, now you've spent money on this great piece of technology that's going to save you 30% of your time. Let's sit down and figure out where you're going to reallocate that. And that's really where I've seen our team have a great amount of success, is, is the reallocation and realignment of their time.
I love that. Retooling skills, talents, time. Like, because it gave it to you, what do you do with it?
Yeah, and being accountable to it, right? Like, I think that becomes really important if you're going to that early adoption and then recognizing, okay, now I— and now we've invested in giving me some time back, what do I do with that time? Becomes really important.
I love that. So if you look at the business and you had a trajectory, trajectory you're heading on, if you had to focus on one constraint to focus on and solve over the next 90 days, what would it be?
People, you know, and I think that in a world— it's interesting to me, in a world that has moved so fast on the AI front since 2022, I don't know that I will ever look at a business and say that it's not still about the people first. And in our industry especially, it's about people in three capacities, Taylor. It's either about the people that I have on the team that I'm lucky enough to partner with and lead every day. And making sure that I hire the right person at the right time that's a culture fit. Or it's about the candidate, again, people, finding the right candidate for our client at the right time at the right price. Or it's about the client, again, same thing. What do they need in their department? How are we assessing that? How are we making sure that that fit is the right long-term fit? That can't ever be replaced by a, by a boom of AI. And so For us to be able to hire the right people quickly enough to continue our growth and for us to be able to support the people for our candidates and our clients, the cornerstone is people. And that, that won't— I say this like I don't typically speak in definitives— that will never change. We're in the people business.
I love that. So looking back at your own journey, then the wins, the mistakes, what lessons stand out to you?
You know, I think where we as an industry and myself, I was lucky enough to become a leader really early in my career. And the lessons that continue to stand out to me and I think help me lead the team that I'm lucky enough to support today are two things. The first is not being afraid to hire people who are better than me. I am lucky enough to be supported by, or to support people who are just better than me. They make me look smarter than I am. And gosh, that feels good, right? So I learned that lesson really early in my career. I hired a gal, and I'll never forget it. When I met her, I thought, she is— she's 10 years my senior and she's going to be better than me. She's going to take my job. And I hesitated for maybe 10 seconds, Taylor. And she was still to this day one of the best hires I've ever made. And I was lucky enough to support her and lead her, but also be mentored by her. So that was a great lesson that I learned early on. And then authenticity in your business and in your leadership approach. I don't know that you can replace that. And I had somebody early in my career again say, I'm not good at taking time off, Taylor. I have lots of PTO and I like work. And she said to me, Katie, you can't change a zebra's stripes. And it's okay to like work. It's okay to, to own that. And again, I think that that's become a critical part of my ability to continue to grow businesses and, and help people grow in this industry is just remaining authentic to what the business needs are and what the people that I'm, again, lucky enough to support need.
I love that. Can't change a zebra's stripes. It's okay to like own what you enjoy, what, what's downstream, what, what feeds your soul, man. So last question for you, Katie. When you think about the next stages of the business, what are you most excited about?
To— I, you know, there's a lot, but I think being able to hire people on our team and help them feel that entrepreneurial growth that they might not be getting from a really large organization, that's exciting for me to be able to help them develop their own teams in the markets that we're continuing to grow in. That excites me. And then I— secondly, I think that this intersection of technology and AI and human capacity and the, the best way to develop both, that's exciting to be able to say, you know what, Businesses can't replace human capital with AI, but we can elevate skill sets. We can make ourselves smarter, faster, and more efficient. To be again at the intersection of that in our industry, in a people business, that's really exciting to see where it takes us over the course of the next 5 years.
Ah, I love that. It is exciting. I love that you're excited about it and you understand the balance between that. So for those who want to learn more, who want to reach out, uh, aspireexecutivesearch.com, LinkedIn, anywhere else you want to send them?
Send them to me on LinkedIn, aspireexecutivesearch.com, and, and with the CFO Alliance. If you're a CFO that is looking for networking opportunities and peer-to-peer connection, uh, that's a great strategic partner to work with.
And how could they be a part of that partnership?
There's a couple of different ways. The CFO Alliance hosts peer-to-peer talent roundtables in 9 markets in the US. And then we also host biweekly webinars that really speak to the challenges of the C-suite and the financial leadership space today. So, you know, either of those would be ways for CFOs and senior financial leaders to participate.
Okay. So any final thoughts for our listeners or those on a similar journey?
I, you know, buckle up and have fun doing it. And again, I don't know if there's an industry today or a small business that's growing, Taylor, that can't look at their human capacity and say, okay, like, let's find this meeting of great technology and great human capital and, you know, really create efficiencies around both and have fun doing it.
I love that. Get the right who's on your team.
So, yep, absolutely.
Those who want to learn more, reach out to Katie and the team. Thank you for coming on and joining us. And thank you to our sponsors of today's episode, Achieve Fractional, which provides fractional executive leadership for growing businesses. And if you enjoyed the episode, share it with a friend, with a colleague. If you're not sure where you're at or what strategy to employ and to, to develop, reach out to Katie and the team. They can look at it and map it out. Again, get— see the strategy, where the money's going, get there before it does. Like, Katie is great at that, and her team will help you out. So reach out, and we'll see you all in the next episode of the Achieve Podcast.
