In episode 164 of The Woodard Report Podcast, Heather Satterley sits down with April Rinne, futurist, speaker, and author of Flux: 8 Superpowers for Thriving in Constant Change. Their conversation explores a challenge every accounting professional is facing right now: how to lead, adapt, and stay grounded in a profession and in a world that seems to be shifting faster than ever.
From AI and industry consolidation to staffing shortages and changing career paths, Heather and April unpack what it means to live and work in a constant state of flux and how professionals can build the mindset and practices needed to thrive in it.
April explains that most of us develop our attitudes toward change very young, often through experiences that never make it onto a résumé or LinkedIn profile. “A lot of those early experiences have a profound effect on how we come to see change.”
Childhood moves, family disruptions, shifting friendships, and other formative moments all shape whether we tend to welcome change, resist it, or fear it. April’s work helps people understand those patterns so they can respond to uncertainty more intentionally.
She also distinguishes between ordinary change and what she calls flux. It’s not just one transition, but the feeling that “everything is changing all at once.”
One of the most resonant ideas in the conversation is that people generally like the changes they choose and they struggle more with the ones they didn’t see coming. “Most humans, we love the changes we choose. We love the changes we opt into.”
New jobs, new relationships, and new opportunities often feel exciting because they carry a sense of agency. The harder changes are the ones that disrupt plans, create uncertainty, or feel out of our control. That is where April says mindset matters most.
Her central argument is that professionals can learn to see even unwanted change as an opportunity to learn, grow, and improve, but only if they first understand how fear shapes their reactions.
April and Heather spend time exploring how fear influences decision-making. According to April, fear doesn’t just make people uncomfortable; it limits what they can see. “Fear reduces your short-term memory… but it also reduces your peripheral vision.”
That means when people respond to change from fear, they lose both the ability to think clearly in the moment and the ability to see the bigger picture. For leaders, that’s especially dangerous in times of rapid transformation.
Heather connects this idea to the accounting profession, where many practitioners are facing overlapping pressures: AI adoption, staffing shortages, consolidation, and shifting client expectations. April’s point is that these pressures are real, but professionals still have agency in how they respond.
April offers a thoughtful observation about why change can feel especially difficult in accounting. “Lawyers and accountants are among the two vocations that generally have even harder times with change.”
Her reasoning is simple: both professions are trained to look for answers, rules, and precision. Accountants are used to finding the right number. Lawyers are used to finding the right precedent. But today’s world often presents ambiguity instead of clarity.
That tension can make the current moment especially uncomfortable. At the same time, April encourages listeners to give themselves grace and focus on becoming more “future fit” rather than waiting for certainty to return.
One of the most practical parts of the conversation centers on April’s idea of the “career portfolio.” Instead of viewing a career as a ladder to climb, she encourages people to see it as something they can curate. “See it as a portfolio that you can curate, like an artist or an investor or an executive would.”
This concept is especially relevant for accounting professionals, whose work often spans advisory, operations, systems, coaching, and strategic insight. Heather notes that many accountants are already functioning this way without necessarily labeling it as such.
April argues that this broader view of career is becoming essential in a world where job structures, professional paths, and workplace expectations are changing rapidly. A job can be taken away. A portfolio of skills, experience, and perspective belongs to you.
Another standout theme from the episode is one of April’s superpowers: running slower. At first glance, that sounds counterintuitive in an environment where the pace of change keeps accelerating. But April is not advocating passivity. She is calling for intentional pacing. “The way you deal with that is understanding and knowing and practicing and being able to slow your inner pace of change.”
For April, “run slower” means pausing long enough to understand what really matters, separate urgency from noise, and make sure you are moving in the right direction. Heather shares her own practice of slowing down by searching for four-leaf clovers, a ritual that helps her notice more, think more clearly, and reconnect with wonder.
April’s point is that clarity, innovation, and resilience often come not from going faster, but from creating the space to think differently.
This episode lands at the right moment for the accounting profession. As practitioners face increasing complexity, April’s message is both grounding and empowering: the future will not become less uncertain, but we can become better at navigating it.
Her framework offers more than inspiration. It gives accounting professionals a practical way to think about uncertainty, leadership, and personal agency in a rapidly changing Strange New World.
April Rinne will continue this conversation with the profession as a featured speaker at Scaling New Heights 2026, where she will expand on the ideas explored in Flux and their application to today’s business landscape.
🎧 Listen to the full episode at woodard.com/podcast.
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This article was written with the assistance of AI and edited by a human.