Accounting is a black-and-white world. Numbers balance or they don’t. So, it’s tempting to apply that same checkbox logic to hiring.
Does the candidate have the credentials? Check.
Can they do the work? Check.
Hired.
I’ve made that mistake more than once and I’ve seen it play out dozens of times with other firms. Along the way, I’ve learned that technical competence will get someone through the door, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. The other half of the equation is fit. And fit is a lot harder to measure on a resume, especially when you’ll never share a physical office with this person.
So how do you hire someone you’ve never met, for a role that requires trust, precision, and judgment — and actually get it right?
Accounting attracts people who like clarity. That’s a strength, but it can become a blind spot in hiring, especially when you’re under pressure to fill a role fast. The talent crisis in this industry is real. When the pipeline is thin and the work is piling up, it’s easy to look at a resume that checks every technical box and think the decision is made. It’s not. In a remote setting, that mistake is even more costly.
In a shared office, you can catch problems early. You can notice when someone goes quiet, observe how they handle a tough client call, and course-correct in real time. When your team is distributed, those warning signals are harder to see. By the time you realize something’s off, weeks of client work and team trust may already be affected.
Hiring and firing takes so much time and energy. It’s important to get it right.
The right environment doesn't just retain people. It also brings out work and growth you didn't see coming. On the flip side, the cost of a bad hire isn't just the time it takes to replace them. It's the clients who felt the gap, and the team that had to carry it.
People don’t give enough credit to gut checks.
When I interview a (remote) candidate, I’m paying attention to things that don’t appear on any skills checklist:
And of course, I pay attention to whether they get thoughtful or defensive when hard questions come up.
The gut check is really about recognizing red flags that may not be obvious from looking at a resume. None of those things show up on a resume. I’ve seen them show up as early as Day 1, though, and they usually make an appearance by Day 30.
Over the years, I’ve built some structure around this. Assessment tools, personality tests, and platforms like WizeHire help screen for communication style, personality patterns, and reliability indicators that a resume can’t capture. They’re not a replacement for judgment, but these tools add a layer of data that makes the conversation sharper.
LinkedIn has become one of my most underrated hiring tools, especially when it comes to vetting. Who do we have in common? Who in our shared community can speak to this person’s character? The accounting world is smaller and more connected than it sometimes feels. Use that.
I didn’t build a remote-first firm primarily because it’s efficient, although it is. I built it because I believe deeply in creating flexible work opportunities for women, especially those navigating the impossible math of childcare and career ambition. That belief is rooted in my own experience and in what I watched talented women walk away from because traditional work structures didn’t leave room for their lives.
When I hire, I’m not just filling a seat. I’m deciding whose opportunity I’m going to invest in and what kind of firm I want to run. People who feel seen and trusted stay longer.
For a remote accounting team, it’s anything but.
To me, cultural fit means:
The right hire for a remote accounting team is someone who takes ownership of their work, their communication, and their impact on the client relationship. That quality is harder to screen for than a QuickBooks certification. But it’s the one that determines whether your firm grows or stalls.
Build your process around finding that signal. And when you find the right person, invest in them. That’s the best business decision you’ll make.