Brandy Vannoy, Managing Partner, Johnson Lambert

In an interview with Invest:, Brandy Vannoy, managing partner of Johnson Lambert, discussed how the firm is balancing its core compliance work with a growing advisory focus as client needs evolve. “We can combine our knowledge with the needs we are seeing across clients and provide a solution that helps them make better decisions,” Vannoy said.

What changes over the past year have most impacted your clients, and how has that influenced your advisory approach?

We specialize primarily in insurance, and the market naturally shifts. We work with commercial clients as well as captive insurance companies, which are essentially self-insurance vehicles. When the insurance market hardens, we typically see an increase in captives. When it softens, it becomes easier to obtain commercial insurance, and clients shift back in that direction.

That creates a nice hedge for us because we operate in both spaces. Over the last several years, we have seen a lot of growth in the captive insurance area, which has been positive because we are heavily invested in helping clients set up captives, especially from a tax advisory perspective. If that activity slows as the market softens, we can shift resources to support the commercial side, where we often see more M&A activity and other nonroutine transactions. Depending on the climate of the insurance market, we can pivot and deploy our advisory services accordingly.

How would you describe the economic environment for your clients, and what key pressures are shaping their financial decisions?

Although the market is starting to soften somewhat in the insurance space, we have not yet seen a slowdown in captive formations, but that could be coming. The pressures behind those shifts come down to whether clients can obtain insurance commercially. If they cannot, they start looking at the captive space.

We are also seeing increased demand for technology-related and cyber insurance. Technology and AI overall are creating new opportunities and challenges for our clients. They are trying to determine the best use for AI and automation, and interpret what the use of these tools could mean from an insurer’s perspective. 

What are the most important tax and compliance developments organizations should be planning for?

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act required new tax laws to be implemented in the 2025 and 2026 tax years. While we did not see a huge effect across most of our corporate clients, there was more impact in the individual tax space.

More broadly, tax change has become much more common. Earlier in my career, changes to the tax code were relatively rare. Since the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2017, it feels like there have been major overhauls almost every year. I think that is becoming the new norm.

On the audit side, I expect greater standardization as well. We work in a highly regulated industry, particularly in insurance, where clients are not only subject to audits but also to regulators who evaluate them on performance and other metrics. As AI, automation, and sustainability initiatives gain importance, I expect regulators to increasingly incorporate these factors into their company assessments. While the necessary guardrails are not yet fully in place, I believe we should anticipate further regulation in these areas.

How are your clients adjusting their financial strategies to manage risk while still pursuing growth opportunities?

We are seeing strong interest in understanding how to adapt, where AI and automation can be used effectively, and how governance should be handled alongside that. We have completed several engagements centered on helping clients identify where AI can be incorporated and how to do so within the right frameworks. Clients want to know how to navigate the risks that come with automation and make sure they have the right controls in place.

What trends are you seeing in how organizations are prioritizing investments?

Investment activity has definitely picked up. A year ago, many companies said they were starting to invest in new technology. Over the last year, that has moved to be a priority for most companies. Organizations now understand that if they want to remain competitive and keep pace with the market, it is clear that meaningful investment in technology is essential.

How is technology, including automation and AI, changing the way accounting and advisory services are delivered and valued?

Internally, AI is helping move people away from highly repetitive tasks. This makes jobs more interesting; however, those early tasks provide a great deal of foundational learning. The challenge for employers is how to help people develop the same level of understanding they previously gained from years of doing those tasks in a quicker way.

Professionals may no longer be doing the work manually, but they need to be able to review the output from an AI tool critically, determine whether the information is correct, and what it means. That is a major upskilling challenge.

I also think we face a shift in thinking about the value of services. Accounting has long been measured by hours. As automation reduces hours, there is a tendency to expect lower fees. However, the value of the service is not lower. We are actually seeing additional value we can provide to our clients because firms can look at larger samples, perform deeper analysis, and provide more advisory insight rather than just compliance work.

The real challenge is in trying to shift the focus to be more about value versus the actual time it takes to do a job. Firms are investing heavily in technology, and while that may reduce hours over time, it will take time to recoup those investments. The quality of the product is also improving, so clients are often receiving more value, not less.

What makes North Carolina distinctive right now, and where are you seeing the strongest opportunities across industries?

North Carolina continues to attract people at a high rate. Year after year, the state remains strong in terms of net in-migration.

With greater workplace flexibility, more people can choose where they live, and North Carolina has become one of the places that offers both opportunity and relative affordability. That creates advantages for businesses because it expands the talent pool. As more people move to North Carolina, the broader economy also strengthens, which makes the state even more attractive.

What are your top priorities for Johnson Lambert, and how do you see client needs evolving over the next couple of years?

Our biggest priority is continuing to build out our advisory services. We will always provide tax and audit, but with the tools now available and clients asking for more help with established providers, we are focused on being a stronger service partner.

That means going beyond providing a compliance service and helping clients use and analyze their data to make better business decisions. Because Johnson Lambert is so niche-focused in the insurance and nonprofit sectors, we see recurring patterns and trends across similar clients. That gives us a unique position to provide advisory services at a higher level.

We take pride in being industry experts, and that allows us to have more valuable analytical conversations. By combining our technical knowledge with the trends we are seeing across industries, we can provide insights that support our clients across a wider range of their business needs. 

Is there anything else you would like to add?

One of the major topics in accounting right now is private equity investment and the amount of capital flowing into firms. Even for firms that are not pursuing private equity investment themselves, that trend is forcing the industry to rethink how it operates. It is creating more pressure to be agile, to focus on growth, and to pay closer attention to competition.

I think that is ultimately positive. It is pushing what has traditionally been a fairly sleepy industry to think more actively about opportunity, about what it may be missing, and about how to grow in a more intentional way.