Accounting
The MP Elite on stacking the pipeline
Published
7 months agoon

Accounting’s top managing partners are doing what they can to ensure there will be new generations of people they can lead — and tap to succeed them — in the coming years.
For all eight of this year’s MP Elite honorees, the strategies for solving the pipeline problem fall into a few general categories. And they also span a timeline from immediate application to long-term planning.
As stated by Sikich CEO Christopher Geier: “To address the shortage of people entering the accounting field, the profession needs to undertake a comprehensive and forward-thinking approach. This strategy should not only tackle immediate perception issues but also lay the groundwork for long-term sustainability and appeal.”
Public perception
The MP Elite agree that a good start for the accounting profession is better branding.
For RKL CEO Edward Monborne, this translates into creating “compelling narratives and marketing communication efforts that shift perceptions of the old accounting model to the exciting possibilities that exist in today’s dynamic advisory environment.”

“The accounting profession faces a significant challenge in how it’s perceived, particularly by younger generations,” said Geier. “To combat this, we need to launch a multi-tiered education and awareness campaign.”
Geier’s proposed campaign includes two parts:
- Start early. “Introduce the exciting aspects of accounting careers to high school students. This could involve interactive workshops, guest speakers from diverse accounting backgrounds and hands-on projects that showcase the analytical and problem-solving nature of the profession.”
- Highlight diverse career paths. “Demonstrate that accounting is not just about numbers, but about strategic thinking, leadership, and driving business decisions. Showcase success stories of CPAs who have become CEOs, entrepreneurs and influential board members.”
Aaron Dawson, CEO of Opsahl Dawson & Co. Advisors, is also well aware his firm is on the front lines of combatting outdated notions of accountants.
“We believe that CPA firms have an image problem,” he explained. “There are several things that we’re doing to keep the image of public accounting enthusiastic.”
Among those is an involvement with the firm’s local colleges, including WSU Vancouver — Washington State University where firm members attend career fairs, speak at their classes, and invite students to the office to immerse them in the possibilities of an accounting career.
Closer partnerships
Dawson emphasized that the relationships with these educational institutions span longer than the duration of a career fair.
“We also make it a priority to stay connected with the faculty and the administration because we need to be well known not just at the student level, but at every level,” Dawson said. “That visibility is good not only for our firm but for our profession as a whole.”
His fellow MP Elite honorees agreed that educational partnerships are key to attracting future accountants.
“Partner with universities and colleges to offer programs that build a robust pipeline of candidates, such as the partnership we’ve fostered with several area colleges to offer onsite externships,” said Monborne.
Bartlett, Pringle & Wolf hosts a “Discover BPW” day for local college students majoring in economics and accounting, according to managing partner Eileen Sheridan. “This initiative allows us to connect with accounting students, explaining our work and generating enthusiasm for the field,” she said. “The day is filled with activities, community service, tours and interviews, making it engaging and informative for all involved.”
Additionally, Bartlett, Pringle & Wolf offers a comprehensive intern program for junior and senior students.
Al-Nesha Jones, founder at ASE Group, also fosters these early relationships.

tamara fleming photography
“I mentor graduate students in Montclair State University’s accounting program, providing essential guidance for their transition into the profession,” she explained. “Additionally, we offer paid internships to give students practical, hands-on experience.”
Geier is also a proponent of university involvement: “Work closely with accounting programs to ensure curricula are aligned with industry needs and showcase emerging specialties like data analytics, sustainability accounting and cybersecurity risk management.”
More (career and licensure) flexibility
Speaking of specialties, the MP Elite stressed the importance of publicizing the diverse career paths available in accounting.
“Be open to creating career paths in adjacent professional areas like data analytics, cybersecurity, M&A and more,” Monborne advised firms.
Jay Rammes, managing director at Barnes Dennig, would agree, as a proponent of “investing in [talent] and showing them a path that’s challenging and rewarding. And as the firm grows, we’re continually creating new career paths and new opportunities for growth.”
Firms should also promote the aspects of accounting that go beyond career trajectories, according to Geier, who listed a few areas younger employees prioritize — so firms should, too:
- Industry impact and purpose, as “today’s professionals, particularly younger generations, seek careers with meaning and impact.”
- Economic influence: “Clearly articulate how accounting plays a crucial role in local, national, and global economies, driving growth and stability.”
- Social responsibility.
- Personal values.
In addition to firms offering more options in professional development, many MP Elite agreed the profession as a whole could follow suit by loosening up CPA exam requirements.
“Revise the 150-hour requirement,” urged Geier. “Consider replacing part of this with relevant work experience, allowing for a more practical and appealing route to qualification.”
Additionally, he recommended integrating technology and AI into the exam.
Technology investment
Technology as a whole was oft-mentioned by the MP Elite as a big attraction for the next generation.
Carla McCall, who in addition to being managing partner at AAFCPAs is the chair of the American Institute of CPAs, advocates for technology integration and the evolution of the accounting business model to better promote accounting careers.
“We are super excited about how automation is changing our industry, and it can’t come fast enough,” says Carla. “This is such an exciting time to be in our profession, and we hope our young professionals realize the amazing opportunities there are to be a part of this shift, which is creating even more diversity of work and leadership opportunities.”
Monborne urges firms to “invest in innovation and technology to drive better efficiency by leveraging AI, data analytics and blockchain.”
And Geier advocates for firms to “provide ongoing training in emerging technologies and data analysis techniques to keep the workforce at the cutting edge.” They should also better showcase their innovation, he added: “Highlight how technology is transforming the role of accountants from number crunchers to strategic advisors and decision-makers.”
Cultural fit
Of course, as any good leader of any good firm would say, culture is of paramount importance to attracting the right people. And integral to any great culture is an environment of inclusion.

Photo by NicoleConnolly.com
In her inaugural address as incoming AICPA chair, McCall emphasized the importance of diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging as key elements to growing the pipeline.
These efforts are part of McCall’s “broader goal to push the needle of progress and continue the work of past AICPA Chairs in driving diversity and inclusion within the profession.”
This should begin early, according to Monborne, who advises: “Invest in inclusive recruiting practices that build pipelines within underrepresented groups.”
“Actively engage with minority schools and underrepresented communities to showcase accounting as a viable and rewarding career path,” said Geier.
For Jones, inclusivity is intertwined with flexibility.
“The accounting profession should address the pipeline problem by focusing on mentorship, flexible career paths and inclusivity,” she said. “Engaging students early through educational partnerships and offering practical, real-world training can spark interest in the field. Creating flexible, remote work opportunities and fostering inclusive environments will make accounting careers more attractive to a diverse range of individuals. Actively working to eliminate the stereotype that our industry has been plagued by for decades (that successful accountants are burned out accountants) requires a collective effort and can be achieved through support networks, mentorship and even public awareness campaigns to showcase our impact on the economy as a whole, and how rewarding and versatile an accounting career can be.”
Rammes also emphasized flexibility. “It’s understanding what new generations of talent are looking for in their careers and meeting them where they are,” he explained. “Flexibility is huge, and by that I don’t mean remote work though that’s part of it. Talent just entering the field wants to be in the office at least part of the time, learning and building relationships, and we’re leaning into that while emphasizing true flexibility that enables people to effectively balance their personal and professional lives with reduced stress and greater peace of mind.”
At ASE Group, Jones, like her fellow 2024 MP Elite, practices what she preaches: “We intentionally create a desirable, people-first work environment with remote work options, a year-round four-day work week, and comprehensive benefits like 401(k) matching, bonuses and paid time off for all team members.”
Even with all their proposed ideas, the MP Elite acknowledged the pipeline problem remains an urgent one without simple solutions.
“The pipeline is such a systemic problem, and I don’t know that we have a solution for it as an industry yet,” said Rammes. “While we work together to solve it — and we have a long history of solving the toughest challenges — we have to keep moving forward, testing new ideas and scaling what works.”
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What becomes of the broken-hearted; the earth moved; Kreative accounting; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
Providence, Rhode Island: Four Florida residents have been convicted and sentenced for what authorities called one of the largest schemes to defraud CARES Act programs.
The defendants defrauded various federally funded programs of more than $4.8 million, and each of the defendants pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. The schemes involved obtaining and using stolen ID information to submit fraudulent applications to multiple state unemployment agencies, including the Rhode Island Department of Labor and Training, and to submit fraudulent Economic Injury Disaster Loans and Paycheck Protection Program loan applications. The defendants also submitted fraudulent applications in the names of other persons to federal and state agencies to obtain tax refunds, stimulus payments, and disaster relief funds and loans.
The scheme involved using the stolen information to open bank accounts to receive, deposit and transfer fraudulently obtained government benefits and payments and to obtain debit cards to withdraw the money.
Sentenced were Florida residents Tony Mertile, of Miramar, identified in court documents as the leader of the conspiracy, to six years in prison; Junior Mertile, of Pembroke Pines, sentenced to 54 months; Allen Bien-Aime, of Lehigh Acres, to four years; and James Legerme, of Sunrise, to four years. All four were also sentenced to three years of supervised release to follow their prison terms.
The government moved to forfeit a total of $4,857,191, or $1,214,294.75 apiece, proceeds of the conspiracy. The defendants have also forfeited hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of Rolex watches and assorted jewelry and more than $1.1 million in cash. Each defendant is also liable for $4,456,927.36 in restitution to defrauded agencies and financial intuitions.
Raleigh, North Carolina: Michon Griffin, 46, who engaged as a money mule (a.k.a. middleman) in an international romance scheme, has been sentenced to two years in prison and three years of supervised release after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering and to making false statements on her 1040.
Between 2021 to 2023, Griffin received more than $2 million from the scheme that she deposited into fictitious bank accounts that she controlled. She converted the money to virtual currency and wired the funds to overseas accounts controlled by her co-conspirators in Nigeria.
Griffin received some $300,000 from the romance fraud, which she did not report as income on her 1040 for 2021.
She was also ordered to pay $109,119 in restitution to the IRS.
Las Vegas: Tax preparer Keisy Altagracia Sosa has pleaded guilty to preparing false income tax returns.
Sosa has operated the tax prep business National Tax Service, and from 2016 to 2021 prepared and filed false federal returns for clients. These returns included falsely claimed dependents, and fictitious Schedule A and Schedule C expenses such as sales taxes paid and unreimbursed employee expenses.
Sosa continued to prepare false returns even after the IRS notified her that her returns appeared inaccurate and informed her that she may not be meeting due diligence requirements.
Sosa caused at least $550,000 in tax loss to the IRS.
Sentencing is June 11. She faces up to three years in prison, as well as a period of supervised release and monetary penalties.

Elk Mound, Wisconsin: Business owner Deena M. Hintz, of Eau Claire, Wisconsin, has been sentenced to a year in prison for failure to pay employment taxes.
Hintz, who pleaded guilty in December, owned and operated Jade Excavation and Trucking for nearly 10 years and at times had up to 15 employees. From 2017 to 2021, Hintz deducted more than $400,000 in federal employment taxes from employees’ pay and, instead of paying those taxes to the government, kept the money.
She was also ordered to pay $482,185.46 in restitution.
Littleton, Colorado: Tax preparer Thuan Bui, 60, has been sentenced to three years in prison and a year of supervised release and ordered to pay a $50,000 fine after pleading guilty to one count of aiding or assisting in preparation of false documents.
From about 2016 to 2021, Bui operated a tax prep business under several names, lying to clients that he was a CPA. On hundreds of returns, Bui overstated or fabricated expenses on Schedules C.
Philadelphia: Resident Joseph LaForte has been sentenced to 15 and a half years in prison for defrauding investors, conspiring to defraud the IRS, filing false tax returns, employment tax fraud, wire fraud, obstruction and other charges.
LaForte defrauded investors using a fraudulent investment vehicle known as Par Funding. Along with conspirators, he caused a loss to investors of more than $288 million.
He and conspirators diverted some $20 million in taxable income from Par Funding to another entity controlled by LaForte and nominally owned by another, then filed returns that did not report this income; he also received more than $9 million in kickbacks from a customer of Par Funding and did not report this income to the IRS. He paid off-the-books, cash wages to some employees, failing to report these wages to the IRS and not paying employment taxes.
The federal tax loss exceeds $8 million. He also caused $1.6 million in state tax loss to the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue by falsely reporting that he and his wife were residents of Florida from 2013 through 2019 when they lived in Pennsylvania.
Hampton Roads, Virginia: Two area residents have pleaded guilty to their roles in a refund scheme involving pandemic relief credits.
Between October 2022 and May 2023, Kendra Michelle Eley of Norfolk, Virginia, filed eight 941s for Kreative Designs by Kendra LLC using the EIN assigned to another company, Kendra Cleans Maid Service. These forms covered four tax periods in 2020 and four in 2021. On each of the forms, Eley falsely reported wages paid and federal tax withholdings for 18 purported employees, knowing there were no such employees.
For the four forms filed for 2021, Eley claimed false sick and family leave credits and Employee Retention Credits, totaling some $975,000. In December 2022, the IRS issued two refund checks payable to the cleaning company totaling $649,050.
That same month, Eley and Rejohn Isaiah Whitehead, of Portsmouth, Virginia, opened a business checking account in the name of Kendra Cleans; signatories on the account were Eley and Whitehead. The two falsely represented the nature and extent of the business, including that it had 16 employees and that the average pay of each was $2,000. Eley funded the account by depositing one of the refund checks in the amount of $389,640. In January 2023, Eley wrote Whitehead two checks from the account totaling $60,000.
Whitehead’s sentencing is June 26 and Eley’s is July 9. They each face up to 10 years in prison.
Accounting
Accountants tackle tariff increases after ‘Liberation Day’
Published
5 hours agoon
April 3, 2025
President Trump’s imposition of steep tariffs on countries around the world is likely to drive demand for accounting experts and consultants to help companies adjust and forecast the ever-changing percentages and terms.
On April 2, which Trump dubbed “Liberation Day,” he announced a raft of reciprocal tariffs of varying percentages on trading partners across the globe and signed an
“A lot of CFOs are thinking they are going to pass along the tariffs to their customer base, and about another half are thinking we’re going to absorb it and be more creative in other ways we can save money inside our company,” said Tom Hood, executive vice president for business engagement and growth at the AICPA & CIMA.
The AICPA & CIMA’s most recent
“CFOs in our community are telling us that, effectively, they’re looking at this a lot like what happened over COVID with a big disruption out of nowhere,” said Hood. “This one, they could see it coming. But the point is they had to immediately pivot into forecasting and projection with basically forward-looking financial analysis to help their companies, CEOs, etc., plan for what could be coming next. This is true for firms who are advising clients. They might be hired to do the planning in an outsourced way, if the company doesn’t have the finance talent inside to do that.”
The tariffs are not set in stone, and other countries are likely to continue to negotiate them with the U.S., as Canada and Mexico have been doing in recent months.
“The one thing that I think we can all count on is a certain amount of uncertainty in this process, at least for the next several months,” said Charles Clevenger, a principal at UHY Consulting who specializes in supply chain and procurement strategy. “It’s hard to tell if it’s going to go beyond that or not, but it certainly feels that way.”
Accountants will need to make sure their companies and clients stay compliant with whatever conditions are imposed by the U.S. and its trading partners. “This is a more complex tariff environment than most companies have experienced in the past, or that seems to be where we’re headed, and so ensuring compliance is really important,” said Clevenger.
Big Four firms are advising caution among their clients.
“Our point of view is we’re advising all of our clients to do a few things right out of the gate,” said Martin Fiore, EY Americas deputy vice chair of tax, during a webinar Thursday. “Model and analyze the trade flows. Look at your supply chain structures. Understand those and execute scenario planning on supply chain structures that could evolve in new environments. That is really important: the ability for companies to address the questions they’re getting from their C-suite, from their stakeholders, is critical. Every company is in a different spot according to the discussions we’ve had. We just are really emphasizing, with all the uncertainty, know your structure, know your position, have modeling put in place, so as we go through the next rounds of discussions over many months, you have an understanding of your structure.”
Scenario planning will be especially important amid all the unpredictability for companies large and small. “They’re going to be looking at all the different countries they might have supply chains in,” said Hood. “And then even the smaller midsized companies that might not be big, giant global companies, they might be supplying things to a big global company, and if they’re in part of that supply chain, they’ll be impacted through this whole cycle as well.”
Accountants will have to factor the extra tariffs and import taxes into their costs and help their clients decide whether to pass on the costs to customers, while also keeping an eye out for pricing among their competitors and suppliers.
“It’s just like accounting for any goods that you’re purchasing,” said Hood. “They often have tariffs and taxes built into them at different levels. I think the difference is these could be bigger and they could be more uncertain, because we’re not even sure they’re going to stick until you see the response by the other countries and the way this is absorbed through the market. I think we’re going through this period of deeper uncertainty. Even though they’re announced, we know that the administration has a tendency to negotiate, so I’m sure we’re going to see this thing evolve, probably in the next 30 days or whatever. The other thing our CFOs are reminding us of is that the stock market is not the economy.”
Amid the market fluctuations, companies and their accountants will need to watch closely as the rules and tariff rates fluctuate and ensure they are complying with the trading rules. “Do we have country of origin specified properly?” said Clevenger. “Are we completing the right paperwork? When there are questions, are we being responsive? Are we close to our broker? Are we monitoring our customs entries and all the basic things that we need to do? That’s more important now than it has been in the past because of this increase in complexity.”
Accounting
How to use opportunity zone tax credits in the ‘Heartland’
Published
5 hours agoon
April 3, 2025
A tax credit for investments in low-income areas could spur long-term job creation in overlooked parts of the country — with the right changes to its rules, according to a new book.
The capital gains deferral and exclusions available through the “opportunity zones” credit represent one of the few areas of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 that drew support from both Republicans and Democrats. The impact of the credit, though, has proven murky in terms of boosting jobs and economic growth in the roughly 7,800 Census tracts qualifying based on their rates of poverty or median family incomes.
Altering the criteria to focus the investments on “less traditional real estate and more innovation infrastructure” and ensuring they reach more places outside of New York and California could “refine the where and the what” of the credit, said Nicholas Lalla, the author of “
“I don’t want to sound naive. I know that investors leveraging opportunity zones want to make money and reduce their tax liability, but I would encourage them to do a few additional things,” Lalla said. “There are communities that need investment, that need regional and national partners to support them, and their participation can pay dividends.”
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A call to action
In the book, Lalla writes about how the Innovation Labs received $200 million in fundraising through public and private investments for projects like a startup unmanned aerial vehicle testing site in the Osage Nation called the Skyway36 Droneport and Technology Innovation Center. Such collaborations carry special relevance in an area like Tulsa, Oklahoma, which has a history marked by the wealth ramifications of the
“This book is a call to action for the United States to address one of society’s defining challenges: expanding opportunity by harnessing the tech industry and ensuring gains spread across demographics and geographies,” he writes. “The middle matters, the center must hold, and Heartland cities need to reinvent themselves to thrive in the innovation age. That enormous project starts at the local level, through place-based economic development, which can make an impact far faster than changing the patterns of financial markets or corporate behavior. And inclusive growth in tech must start with the reinvention of Heartland cities. That requires cities — civic ecosystems, not merely municipal governments — to undertake two changes in parallel. The first is transitioning their legacy economies to tech-based ones, and the second is shifting from a growth mindset to an inclusive-growth mindset. To accomplish both admittedly ambitious endeavors, cities must challenge local economic development orthodoxy and readjust their entire civic ecosystems for this generational project.”
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Researching the shortcomings
And that’s where an “opportunity zones 2.0” program could play an important role in supporting local tech startups, turning midsized cities into innovation engines and collaborating with philanthropic organizations or the federal, state and local governments, according to Lalla.
In
Other research suggested that opportunity-zone investments in metropolitan areas generated a 3% to 4.5% jump in employment, compared to a flat rate in rural places,
“It creates a strong incentive for taxpayers to make investments that will appreciate greatly in market value,” Tax Foundation President Emeritus Scott Hodge wrote in the analysis, “Opportunity Zones ‘Make a Good Return Greater,’ but Not for Poor Residents” shortly after the Treasury study.
“This may be the fatal flaw in opportunity zones,” he wrote. “It explains why most of the investments have been in real estate — which tends to appreciate faster than other investments — and in Census tracts that were already improving before being designated as opportunity zones.”
So far, three other research studies have concluded that the investments made little to no impact on commercial development, no clear marks on housing prices, employment and business formation and a notable boost in multifamily and other residential property,
The credit “deviates a lot from previous policies” that were much more prescriptive, Feldman said.
“It didn’t want the government to have a lot of oversay over what was going on, where the investment was going, the type of investments and things like that,” she said. “It offered uncapped tax incentives for private individual investors to invest unrealized capital gains. So this was the big innovation of OZs. It was taking the stock of unrealized capital gains that wealthy individuals, or even less wealthy individuals, had sitting, and they could roll it over into these funds that could then be invested in these opportunity zones. And there were a lot of tax breaks that came with that.”
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A ‘place-based’ strategy
The shifts that Lalla is calling for in the policy “could either be narrowing criteria for what qualifies as an opportunity zone or creating force multipliers that further incentivize investments in more places,” he said. In other words, investors may consider ideas for, say, semiconductor plants, workforce training facilities or data centers across the Midwest and in rural areas throughout the country rather than trying to build more luxury residential properties in New York and Los Angeles.
While President Donald Trump has certainly favored that type of economic development over his career in real estate, entertainment and politics, those properties could tap into other tax incentives. And a refreshed approach to opportunity zones could speak to the “real innovation and talent potential in midsized cities throughout the Heartland,” enabling a policy that experts like Lalla describe as “place-based,” he said. With any policies that mention the words “
“We can’t have cities across the country isolated from tech and innovation,” he said. “When you take a geographic lens to economic inclusion, to economic mobility, to economic prosperity, you are including communities like Tulsa, Oklahoma. You’re including communities throughout Appalachia, throughout the Midwest that have been isolated over the past 20 years.”
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Hope for the future?
In the book, Lalla compares the similar goals of opportunity zones to those of earlier policies under President Joe Biden’s administration like the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, the American Rescue Plan and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
“Together, these bills provided hundreds of millions of dollars in grant money for a more diverse group of cities and regions to invest in innovation infrastructure and ecosystems,” Lalla writes. “Although it will take years for these investments to bear fruit, they mark an encouraging change in federal economic development policy. I am cautiously optimistic that the incoming Trump administration will continue this trend, which has disproportionately helped the Heartland. For example, Trump’s opportunity zone program in his first term, which offered tax incentives to invest in distressed parts of the country, should be adapted and scaled to support innovation ecosystems in the Heartland. For the first time in generations, the government is taking a place-based approach to economic development, intentionally seeking to fund projects in communities historically disconnected from the nation’s innovation system and in essential industries. They’re doing so through a decidedly regional approach.”
Advisors and
“This really is a bipartisan issue. Opportunity zones won wide bipartisan approval,” he said. “Heartland cities can flourish and can do so in a complicated political environment.”

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