WALRUS
Less process. More thinking.
The Walrus is a nod to Lennon, Ferris Bueller, and a simple idea: don’t get trapped by “isms.”
Accounting has enough of them. Software-ism. Automation-ism. We’ve-always-done-it-this-way-ism. And now AI-ism.
Start with the problem. Use the best tools. Understand the answer.
Because the objective isn’t to automate accounting. It’s to eliminate the work that keeps accountants from thinking.
OPS describes the work. Walrus describes the philosophy behind it.
OPS Accounting began as a practical name for Operations Accounting — accounting built around the way a business actually operates.
That idea still matters. But over time, the work evolved into something broader: a way of thinking about accounting itself.
Walrus grew out of that evolution.
OPS Accounting
The operating practice. Accounting, business tax, financial reporting, systems and advisory work for businesses and their owners.
Walrus
The philosophy and method behind the work: understand the business first, use the right tools for the problem, and keep professional judgment at the center.
OPS is short for Operations Accounting. Walrus is the why behind the work.
For now, Walrus lives inside because this is where the method was built, tested and refined in real client work.
Over time, Walrus will become its own destination for the broader accounting philosophy, methodology and training. OPS Accounting will remain the professional practice serving businesses and their owners.
Same foundation. Clearer philosophy.
Built from 30 years inside the work.
Born in Chicago.
Walrus was founded by Ted Gales, a Chicago-based practicing accountant with three decades of experience working with businesses ranging from startups and closely held companies to large, complex organizations.
His career has included serving as controller for one of the nation’s largest independent restaurant groups, with approximately 60 locations across 17 states; advising growing companies that went on to qualify for the Inc. 5000; and working in structured finance for a major international bank during the financial crisis.
During COVID, Teddy developed an automated spreadsheet model for the Employee Retention Credit that dramatically accelerated the calculation process, helping businesses identify and calculate more than $100 million in ERC credits.
He also launched a YouTube training series to teach other accounting professionals how to navigate the ERC and use the methodology. The response went beyond viewers looking for free instruction—people began asking to buy the training and the tools behind it. That experience revealed something important: practical accounting knowledge, paired with well-designed models and clear teaching, could become a product in its own right.
That was an early proof of what would eventually become Walrus.
But most of his career has been spent working directly with small businesses, entrepreneurs and startups—building financials, solving accounting problems, untangling systems, preparing business tax returns, and helping owners understand what their numbers are actually telling them.
Walrus is a product of that experience—and of Chicago.
Practical, independent, skeptical of unnecessary complexity, and built around getting the work done. That experience became the foundation for the Walrus Method: understand the business first, use the right tools for the problem, and keep professional judgment at the center.
Better accounting doesn’t come from more process. It comes from understanding the business, understanding the numbers, and using the right tools to connect the two.
Ted Gales
Founder, Walrus
Chicago
It’s a fair question.
The name has a history. Lewis Carroll gave us the Walrus. John Lennon turned the Walrus into something wonderfully strange. Years later, Ferris Bueller picked up the reference while riffing on Lennon’s rejection of “isms.”
Walrus carries that idea into accounting: don’t let a system, platform or trend do the thinking for you.
That doesn’t mean rejecting software, automation or AI. It means putting each one in its proper place: as a tool.
Walrus lives at because OPS Accounting is where the method was built, tested and refined in real client work.
Start with the problem. Then choose the tools.
Walrus didn’t start with AI.
It started with Excel.
Long before generative AI became part of the conversation, the method was being developed in practice to solve a practical problem: sometimes the conventional accounting-software workflow was simply not the best way to get reliable financial information.
We began working directly with source data—bank activity, credit cards, payroll, accounting exports and other records—and building structured Excel models to standardize, map, reconcile, review and report the activity.
The accounting software and the accounting are not the same thing.
The platform is a tool. The ledger is data. The financial statements are an accounting conclusion. The accountant is responsible for understanding how those pieces fit together.
The philosophy didn’t change.
The speed did.
AI didn’t create the Walrus Method. It removed many of the constraints that were holding it back.
Standardize faster
Interpret messy transaction descriptions and normalize large datasets with dramatically less mechanical work.
Map intelligently
Accelerate classification and mapping while keeping accounting logic and professional review in the loop.
Find exceptions
Spend less time touching every transaction and more time investigating the transactions that actually deserve attention.
Report more often
A model built for efficient after-the-fact accounting can now support useful financial reporting on a much more frequent basis.
The machine does more of the mechanical work. The accountant does more of the accounting.
Understand first. Configure second.
Accounting software is an important tool. But opening the software and immediately beginning to categorize, correct and rebuild isn’t always the most efficient way to understand a business.
When the books are incomplete, inconsistent or simply need to be rebuilt, Walrus starts one level deeper.
We look at the underlying financial activity — bank accounts, credit cards, payroll, loans, revenue sources, owner activity, existing records and tax returns — and begin building a clear financial picture of the business.
That creates a foundation before the system is changed.
Why this matters
Jumping directly into an existing accounting file can combine several different jobs into one process: understanding the business, finding historical errors, reconstructing the accounting, designing the reporting and configuring the software.
Separate discovery from implementation
Walrus separates those jobs so the accounting can be understood before the software is rebuilt around it.
Source → Understand → Structure → Reconcile → Design → Implement
Once the underlying accounting is understood, QuickBooks or another platform can be built, cleaned up or reconfigured with greater intention — better classifications, a more useful chart of accounts, cleaner workflows and financial reports designed around how the business actually operates.
Excel can be a powerful place to build the foundation.
That’s where the Walrus Method began.
Rather than allowing the existing accounting system to define the problem, source financial data can be brought into a structured Excel environment where it can be standardized, mapped, reconciled and reviewed independently.
The accountant can see the financial activity as a whole before deciding how it should ultimately live inside the accounting system.
AI makes this process faster. It can help standardize descriptions, identify patterns, assist with classifications, build models and surface exceptions.
But the decisions remain accounting decisions. And the accountant remains responsible for understanding them.
The accounting software and the accounting are not the same thing.
Walrus isn’t about working around accounting software. It’s about understanding the accounting well enough to make the software work better.
Start with the source.
End with understanding.
Source
Begin with reliable underlying financial data.
Structure
Standardize it into a model we can control and reuse.
Map
Apply accounting logic. Let AI accelerate where appropriate.
Reconcile
Tie the model back to the source. Proof matters.
Review
Find exceptions, inconsistencies and things that make no sense.
Report
Produce financial information designed to be understood.
Think
Ask what happened, why, what comes next, and what to do about it.
Need the business tax return done right?
Business tax preparation is often the first reason a company reaches out to Walrus. That’s fine with us.
A tax return is more than a filing obligation. It is often the fastest way to understand how the business is structured, how the books are being maintained, where the reporting is weak, and where planning opportunities may exist.
S Corporations
Federal and state compliance, shareholder reporting, basis considerations, reasonable compensation issues, and coordination with the owner’s individual return.
Partnerships & LLCs
Partnership returns, partner allocations, capital activity, guaranteed payments, basis considerations, and owner-level coordination.
C Corporations
Corporate return preparation, state filings, tax-accounting review, and coordination with broader entity and compensation planning.
Business Owners
Where appropriate, the business return and the owner’s individual return can be coordinated so the tax picture is reviewed together rather than in isolation.
Start with the tax return if that’s what the business needs today. Build a better financial process from there if it makes sense.
Better accounting.
Not more accounting.
Walrus works with selected businesses and their owners through accounting, tax and advisory engagements. Some relationships begin with a business tax return. Others begin with financial reporting or a specific accounting problem. The goal is the same: spend less time processing and more time understanding the business.
Financial Reporting
Monthly, quarterly or year-end reporting based on what the business actually needs—not an arbitrary bookkeeping package.
Tax
Preparation and planning for S corporations, partnerships, LLCs, C corporations and their owners. Tax can be a standalone engagement or the starting point for a broader Walrus relationship.
Advisory
Cash flow, margins, KPIs, forecasting, entity analysis, tax strategy and decision support.
Financial Systems
Practical systems built around the business rather than forcing the business to conform to a software workflow.
Be a Walrus Accountant.
This isn’t another collection of clever AI prompts, and it isn’t another software certification. It’s a practical accounting methodology developed in an accounting practice before generative AI existed.
Excel built the foundation. Real accounting work refined it. AI accelerated it.
Learn the Method
Source data, reusable Excel models, mapping, reconciliation, exception-based review and accountant-prepared financial statements.
Use AI with Judgment
Learn where AI saves enormous amounts of time—and where the accountant still has to know enough to say, “That makes absolutely no sense.”
We don’t hate accounting software.
We just don’t work for it.
QuickBooks can be an excellent tool. So can Excel. So can Power Query. So can AI. Walrus is not about replacing one technology religion with another.
No software-ism. No Excel-ism. No AI-ism. Just accounting.
Use the best tool. Understand the result. Own the judgment.
Run with the Walrus.
Question the process. Use the tools. Know the numbers. Make the judgment.
10 S Riverside Plaza, Suite 875
Chicago, IL 60606
312-324-4829
hello@opsaccounting.com