For the Top 100 Firms, 2026 Is the Year of the Client

The Top 100 Firms have a new growth strategy for 2026, and it's not more M&A or AI. It's clients. Not in the "of course we care about clients" sense — in the deliberate, strategic, measurable sense. Firms are restructuring account planning, rebuilding CRMs, and training staff to think like advisors instead of compliance engines. If you run a firm or advise one, here's what the Top 100 are doing right now.

Client-Centricity as Strategy (Not Slogan)

Cherry Bekaert's CEO Michelle Thompson spelled it out: their 2026 strategy includes advisory expansion, M&A, and tech — but the standout piece is the "Trusted Advisor" initiative, designed to strengthen client relationships through account prioritization, structured account planning, and consistent experience standards.

Thompson's take: "This initiative is not a checkbox exercise. It's about driving real behavior change across the firm to improve cross-selling and elevate client engagement."

Translation: firms are holding partners accountable for client relationships in the same way they hold them accountable for revenue. That's new.

Growing So Clients Can Grow

Aprio CEO Richard Kopelman framed it even more directly: "Aprio's 2026 growth strategy is client-centric and grounded in a simple principle: We are growing so our clients can grow, too."

One example: Aprio launched a legal practice in 2025 and is expanding it in 2026. Why? Because clients face intertwined legal, tax, operational, and financial decisions that can't be solved in silos. The firm isn't adding legal because it's trendy — it's adding legal because their clients' problems require it.

That's the shift. Firms are building services around client needs instead of hoping client needs line up with their existing services.

Intentional Client Selection

RKL CEO Ed Monborne took it a step further: "Our strategy centers on intentional client selection and developing solutions that address our clients' evolving needs."

Intentional client selection means firms are curating their client base. Not every client is a growth opportunity. Not every client is profitable. Not every client is worth the partner time required to serve them well.

Firms are proactively reviewing their service mix and portfolio to align capabilities with emerging market demands. That's code for: we're dropping low-value clients and doubling down on high-value ones.

The Client Experience Overhaul

Sensiba's chief growth officer Nick Lew Ton described it as "optimizing the full client journey to eliminate friction points." That includes onboarding, service delivery, pricing, and follow-up. The firm is leveraging IT and AI to deliver a unified experience across all touchpoints.

Key phrase: "Our focus is on understanding and anticipating client needs at every stage of their journey." That's product management thinking applied to professional services. Firms are mapping client journeys the way tech companies map user experiences.

Modernizing Go-to-Market

If you're going to focus on clients, you need to figure out how to get the right ones in the door. That's pushing firms to rebuild their marketing and business development operations from scratch.

SC&H's chief marketing officer Colin Kendall: "We are in the midst of a comprehensive rebuild of our CRM and sales processes to better align marketing, business development, and service delivery."

The goal? Clearer visibility into pipeline and performance, better insight sharing across teams, and a more proactive, consistent approach to client engagement — especially across complex, multiservice relationships.

Schellman CEO Avani Desai echoed the same theme: "We will continue to expand our go-to-market and marketing teams and sharpen how we tell our story across the market." The firm is expanding beyond traditional B2B into health care and financial services, which requires a different marketing approach.

AI-Enabled Marketing and Business Development

Firms are also using AI to turbocharge their sales and marketing efforts. Your Part-Time Controller's COO Heidi Pelczar: "2026 will be the first full year of implementation for several new AI-enabled tech tools that will support our sales, marketing, and business development initiatives."

YPTC is targeting clients at the intersection of geography and nonprofit subsector to demonstrate sector-specific expertise. That's hyper-targeted positioning, and it's only scalable with AI-powered tools that can surface the right leads.

The Usual Suspects Still Matter

Client focus doesn't mean firms are abandoning AI, advisory expansion, M&A, or talent strategies. Those are still happening — but they're being reframed through a client lens.

Bennett Thrasher CEO Jeff Call: "We are leaning into technology, automation, and AI to help our professionals shift away from lower-level compliance work and move into more consultative, advisory roles earlier in their careers."

That's AI for client service, not AI for efficiency alone.

RKL's Monborne on advisory: "Our clients value holistic advisory services over purely compliance-based support. We are committed to embedding an advisory mindset throughout the firm. This includes comprehensive training programs to equip our workforce as best-in-class advisors."

That's advisory training for client relationships, not just for revenue diversification.

M&A Is More Disciplined

Mergers and acquisitions are still happening — private equity money is flooding the profession, and five of the new firms on this year's Top 100 list had outside investors — but firms are taking a more disciplined approach.

Doeren Mayhew CEO Chad Anschuetz: "Our 2026 strategic priorities are centered on disciplined, fast-paced inorganic growth while market conditions remain favorable." The firm acquired 15 firms in the past 12 months, but the emphasis is on disciplined growth.

Mauldin & Jenkins COO Kristen Lord: "Our strategies are a balance of M&A and organic growth. We are not currently looking to add any new geography to our footprint in the next 12 months, but we are always looking for in-market opportunities."

That's a shift from "grow everywhere" to "grow where it makes sense for our clients."

What This Means for Firm Leaders

If you run a firm — or advise one — the Top 100 are signaling that 2026 is the year to get serious about client relationships. That means:

• Account planning that's structured and measurable, not ad hoc

• CRM and sales process overhauls to align marketing, business development, and service delivery

• Intentional client selection — curating your client base, not just adding revenue

• Training staff to think like advisors, not just compliance technicians

• Using AI and tech to eliminate friction in the client experience

The firms that win in 2026 aren't the ones doing the most M&A or deploying the most AI. They're the ones that turn those tools into better client relationships. That's the strategy.