Geoffrey Gallo, Partner ‑ Advisory Services & Practice Development, Hernandez & Company (H&CO) – Orlando

April 2026 — Invest: spoke with Geoffrey Gallo, partner for advisory services and practice development at H&CO, about how global talent, technology, and a forward-looking mindset are reshaping advisory services for growing businesses in Orlando and across Central Florida. “Those folks who do not embrace artificial intelligence in my industry will be replaced by those who do,” Gallo said.

How has the advisory and accounting industry continued to evolve beyond traditional compliance work?

For us, it starts with the fact that we operate a little differently than a traditional CPA firm. H&CO acquired my legacy firm, Grenin Fender, in November 2023, and our approach in Central Florida has been full-service advisory for small and midsized businesses. That kind of work is labor intensive because it depends on experience, judgment, and the ability to translate complexity into clear, practical decisions.

What has made the biggest difference is that H&CO has a worldwide workforce. We operate in 30 countries, and there are about 1,000 people in the broader group. About 200 of them are based here in Florida across five offices, and that is the U.S.-based CPA firm. The workforce reflects where our clientele comes from, so we’re multilingual and we can hire skilled professionals to do the granular accounting and compliance work. In theory, that frees up the more experienced people to focus on advisory.

Every CPA firm fights the same problem: there just aren’t enough skilled people. Demographically, there’s a gap in the pipeline, especially among professionals under 45. Accounting is also deadline-driven. If you’re doing tax, audit, or financial statements, there are deadlines attached to everything, and that naturally creates pressure.

Because H&CO invested in global teams and technology, we can build an advisory services platform while still getting the detail work done. A lot of what I do personally has evolved into advising second-stage businesses, generally under $75 million in revenue and under 250 employees. We’ve also moved to what I call the tip of the spear: commercial and residential real estate brokers. They’re on the front end of expansion, and when growth is happening, business owners need advice.

Clients often come in for one technical need, but the real value is helping them connect the dots. I had a new client come in through a referral source, a $50 million company, and all they initially wanted was a cost segregation study. Once we started talking, the conversation expanded into asset protection, estate planning, real estate strategic planning, tax compliance, and accounting. That level of advisory is hard to deliver unless you have a structure that allows others to handle the underlying work at scale.

Artificial intelligence is accelerating that shift. As a firm, we are ahead of the curve. We have programmers in South America who have been building AI bots for years, and those tools help connect systems and streamline how we deliver work. AI is going to replace a lot of basic bookkeeping and certain compliance functions. Tax compliance will become more automated, and some things will be created with the press of a button.

But the client is still starving for face-to-face interaction and clarity. Technology creates time and margin, and the firms that embrace it will use that margin to deliver better advisory services. Those folks who do not embrace artificial intelligence in my industry will be replaced by those who do, and the firms that adapt will be the ones that can simplify complexity and guide clients through decisions with confidence.

What recent initiatives or expansions best demonstrate H&CO’s evolution?

In Central Florida, we looked like other CPA firms until H&CO acquired us. Over the last two years, we’ve been integrating a global, technology-based business model. That requires a different kind of professional. It’s not only about sitting behind a computer and producing a tax return. You have to manage teams that may be in Colombia, India, Hong Kong, Miami, and elsewhere, and that means learning how to lead across places, systems, and time zones.

Traditionally, the staff side of accounting is not always entrepreneurial. Partners and founders often are, but many staff members are trained for process and precision, not necessarily for building and running a book of business. H&CO’s model works because it has reduced costs through global labor and technology, and that allows the firm to create a profitable platform where people can rise and take on leadership responsibility.

When you hear our CEO, Armando Hernandez, talk about the firm, the message is consistent: do more of the same, but make it easier for clients and for our people. The mission statement reflects that. It’s not typical for a professional services firm to say its purpose is helping families and businesses conquer new frontiers. That doesn’t sound like a traditional CPA firm, and it’s intentional. We are helping others do what we did as an organization.

If you look at the firm today compared to 15 years ago, the growth has been dramatic. What excites me most is not only the scale, but the maturity of the people. When professionals start thinking like business owners, they become proactive. In accounting, people tend to look backward. Accounting is yesterday. Tax is last year. Financial statements reflect the past. What H&CO has built culturally is a constant push to look forward.

When you look forward, you can help clients plan, invest, and manage risk before a problem becomes expensive. That mindset shift is one of the biggest milestones I’ve seen, and it changes the way we serve clients in a growing market like Central Florida.

With economic uncertainty nationally and globally, how have client expectations evolved around risk management?

Risk management can mean a lot of things, but if you tie it to real-world decisions, like supply chains, tariffs, and technology threats, you start to see how expectations have shifted. Clients are more cautious, but they are also more demanding of perspective. They don’t want someone who only explains what happened. They want guidance on what could happen and how to prepare.

A major issue for many U.S. importers and midsized businesses is overreliance on one or two sources of supply. I came out of a family business, and we learned the hard way that concentrating production in one place is a mistake. In our clothing business, we never allowed more than 20% of production to come from any single location. That kind of diversification is a practical risk management strategy.

I also learned a lesson from the Japanese approach to manufacturing. They built a global supply chain and a global manufacturing base across many regions. They hedge currency exposure, labor costs, and geopolitical shifts by operating in multiple economies. In the automotive industry, for example, they have plants in many major markets around the world, including the United States, and they employ millions of Americans through U.S.-based manufacturing. That’s risk management done proactively.

The United States learned harsh lessons during COVID about supply chain concentration and the need to onshore critical industries. The cost of making a mistake today is far higher than it was decades ago. If you are going to take risks, you need people around you who understand both the global and local economic environments, and who can help you evaluate tradeoffs before you commit.

Clients are also hyper-focused on cybersecurity because too many businesses have been burned. One incident can cost a company its operations, reputation, and future. That has changed expectations. Clients want their advisers to understand business broadly, not only accounting and tax, because business decisions today are interconnected. A supply chain disruption, a tariff shift, or a cyber breach can become a financial and operational crisis quickly.

From my perspective, it’s incumbent on professionals like us to understand business, not just our sandbox. My sandbox is not only accounting and tax. It’s understanding the business climate so we can guide clients toward informed decisions. If growth occurs, we can help them protect wealth and reduce taxes, but those are outcomes of broader planning.

Clients are looking for objectivity. They’re looking for someone who can see the whole picture. That’s why the global perspective matters, and it’s why the model matters. When you have the right people doing the detailed work and the right tools supporting them, you can spend more time where the client really needs you: helping them think clearly about what’s next.

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