In November, Prevail Accountancy founder Kasia was invited onto the Accountants Success Secrets podcast with Mark Lee and Philippa Haynes. It was a great opportunity to take the time to stop, consider and to quietly reflect on just how far we’ve come.

The Accountants Success Stories podcast features a different accountant each week, inviting each contributor to reflect on their own journey and career and what has made them successful. It was a real honour to join Mark and Philippa and be part of their illustrious roster of guests.

Time to reflect

It’s not often one gets chance to sit back and reflect on one’s own career and professional journey. But this wide-ranging discussion gave Kasia a chance to do just that!

Prevail founder Kasia says she certainly found the opportunity to reflect on how far Prevail Accountancy has come to be really humbling – and thought provoking. It made us think that maybe we should all be making more time for personal reflection every now and then. Our thanks go to Mark and Phillipa for creating this space for Kasia.

Prevail Accountancy: A business born out of adversity

Accountants Success Secrets’ hosts Mark and Philippa were keen to hear how Prevail Accountancy began. Kasia recalled, “I had no choice! It began purely through word of mouth, with recommendations from construction companies.”

In 2005, Kasia was working with her then-husband, running a construction company with a large contractor workforce – of up to 80 people at times. However, when the 2010 crash held back construction investment, business contracted sharply. At the same time, the marriage was failing.

Coming out of the downturn and a divorce, Kasia achieved her Chartered Management Accountant certification. Many of the subcontractors and construction companies with whom she had previously worked continued to seek out her expertise. They valued Kasia’s attention to detail and her in-depth understanding of the construction industry. This readymade customer base expanded slowly as personal recommendations grew.

An early convert to digitalisation

We know that the construction industry is notoriously slow to adopt digital technologies. However, Kasia was an early proponent of the digitalisation agenda. Xero had launched in the UK in 2008 and Kasia was quick to recognise its advantages over the traditional approaches used by so many SMEs at the time. She became Xero certified in 2013.

While not everyone in the industry was ready to hear about the advantages of digitalisation back then, the pandemic made it clear that cloud-based software has some serious advantages in terms of agility, remote working and collaboration. Today, many more SMEs want to understand how to digitalise their own back-office operations.

Pushing the agenda on budgeting and forecasting

Interestingly, Kasia shared that in the early days of the business, it wasn’t only the need to digitalise and facilitate real-time financial reporting that got pushback. Many firms didn’t understand the need for real-time financial reporting in the first place, because they weren’t prioritising budgeting and forecasting.

Mark suggested to Kasia that – as Prevail grows – more construction industry businesses will stay in business longer and be more profitable. In an industry with very high failure rates, increasing the likelihood of success is critical.

Kasia agreed, telling Mark, “If profits are going down, there must be a reason! Understanding what those reasons are is critical. That’s why it’s so important to be able to control projects in real time.”

Resilience is critical – in life and in business

During the podcast, Kasia also shared the harrowing story of the fatal accident in which she was involved in Scotland in February 2020. The resilience which she showed on that snowy hillside continues to drive her to succeed in life and in business.

Kasia was lucky to be able to climb back to safety – and did so with serious injuries. The 150-metre climb took her four and a half hours.

“I celebrated every rock I passed as I went up that mountain,” Kasia told Mark and Philippa. “And that’s what I tell all of my clients: don’t give up. And celebrate every little win along the way.”

Since that dark day, Kasia’s resilience and desire to succeed has seen Prevail grow from strength to strength. Just three years later, Prevail won at the Accounting Excellence Awards. Our recognition in the industry continues to grow from strength to strength: in 2025, Prevail Accountancy won the Accounting Excellence award for digital transformation.

It is testament to Kasia’s resilience and – we hope – a small tribute to the other team member who was not so lucky. When faced with adversity, we must recognise that not everyone is able to fight another day and that knowledge should fuel our own resilience to continue – however hard the journey.

Kasia admitted to Mark and Philippa that she hopes Prevail Accountancy brings that spirit to each business with which we work. Our goal is to help them to continue and to be successful – whatever challenges they are facing.