As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be an accountant. The closest I ever got was helping accountants find jobs and working with CFOs on technology. So, the anticipation of hearing CFOs of Boston’s biggest sports teams at Fenway Park was too good to pass up. The day before the panel, I was sent a WSJ article: How can we make accounting cool? To quote Michael Scott, “How dare you, sir.”
Like most articles, it blamed millennial entitlement, but TBH it missed a pivotal reason the balance sheet of the world's oldest professions has shed over 300,000 accountants and auditors in the past two years. I came to the answer after taking a tour of America’s oldest ballpark, Fenway Park, which was how important old vs. new is.
Polished rocks, the abacus, adding machines, and computers came about from the accountants’ maxim: “If I had better technology, I could do my job better and make more money for the business.” In the 2000s, cloud applications like Sage Intacct, NetSuite, and Workday delivered technology to accountants. However, as other parts of the business also got their own system of records for marketing, sales, and HR - - - enter the CPA. Literally, accountants would have to enter data from one system to another or use their CPA to copy, paste, and attach data to an email, so someone else could enter it. Accountants are hard to find, and SaaS led to AaaS (Accounting-as-a-Service) “aka CAAS”, or CAS (Client Advisory/Accounting Service), or if you are familiar with Sage Intacct, SIAP. For the rest of this article, let’s call it CAS. CAS is an excellent choice for growing businesses and a huge growth engine for accounting firms. But getting all those SaaS systems to talk can be up to 25% of CAS engagement time. DataBlend can help with that, which was why we sponsored FEI’s Fenway event. But referring to the WSJ article - - - “was it cool?”
Determining the Cool Factor
Fred Bunker started as an intern at Madison Square Garden and then was a staff accountant with the NJ Devils. Now, he is the VP of Finance for the Boston Bruins/TD Garden and is the landlord of another panelist. Cool.
As far back as Bill Reissfelder could remember, he always wanted to be a CFO (of a Boston sports team). Knowing this was impractical, he joined EY after graduating from Babson College and became a controller at OEC. He was 12 years out of college when he got a call from an EY colleague who had joined the Celtics and needed to hire a controller. Bill is now the CFO of the Celtics (Fred is his landlord) and develops the new generation of Celtics leaders like the Director of FPA, Alice Zottoli, who became an executive after she started with the team answering phones. Cool.
Now, let’s talk about Tim Zue. He was also an intern and now is the CFO of the Boston Red Sox. In addition to counting beans, Tim also shared his involvement in re-signing Rafael Devers, creating dynamic ticket pricing, and helping ownership balance winning and the P/L. Cool.
Five Takeaways Plus a Bonus!
As impressive as their backstories were, I was also invested in hearing what advice they had to give. The question of “What advice would you give to future finance executives?” Here’s what they had to say:
- Network. Network. Network.
- Be in the business of saying yes (to new projects, new ideas, and having concerts at Fenway).
- There is no substitute for hard work.
- Have an unquenchable thirst for knowledge.
- Surround yourself with people that are smarter than you (i.e., people in your network, mentors, or people you hire).
Bonus: Career paths can be nonlinear. For example, Bill & Fred were accounting students and ended up as accountants and then CFOs. Tim however, was an engineering student and was a school teacher for four years before interning at the Red Sox and eventually becoming their CFO.
This is the Way we do Business
Yes, the incredible thought leadership and 300+ current and future finance leaders learning from each other while meeting some Boston sports legends was amazing. But for a moment, in the Fenway Park press box, I was Brad Pitt/Billy Beane. Now that is an experience like no other. In my humble failed auditor's opinion, accounting is cool now and forever.
About the Author
Andrew McDonnell is DataBlend's Senior Director, Revenue, North America. Andrew is a failed auditor and current sales leader. Learn more about Andrew >