compensation and M&A
Career Highlights: President, Aquila Global Advisors LLC, 1995-present ... CEO, Chantrey Capital Advisors, 2007-present ... Director of practice management consulting, The Growth Partnership, 2003-2005
... Vice president of mergers and acquisitions, American Express Tax & Business Services, 1996-2003; vice
president of field management, 1994-1996 ... Senior
vice president, Practice Development Institute,
1987-1994 ... Partner, Friedman, Eisenstein, Raemer
& Schwartz CPAs, 1983-1994 ... Adjunct professor of
marketing, DePaul University Graduate School of
Business, 1980-1994 ... Group director of marketing,
Coopers & Lybrand (Chicago Group), 1979-1983.
Other Affiliations: Founding board member, Association for Accounting Marketing ... Founder and
editor, Partner Advantage, 2003-2006 ... Author, CPA
Firm Merger Strategies That Work; CPAs That Sell;
Breaking the Paradigm: New Approaches to Pricing
Accounting Services; Client at the Core: Marketing and
Managing Today’s Professional Services Firm;
Compensation as a Strategic Asset ... Contributing author,
The Marketing Advantage; How to Hire a Marketing
Director and Make it Work; The Power of Optimism;
Bull’s-Eye! The Ultimate How-To Marketing & Sales
Guide for CPAs ... Board, Engineered Tax Services ...
Past board member, Minnesota Chapter, AAM.
Education: Indiana University, Ph.D ... DePaul University, MBA, BA.
Personal: Born 1946, Chicago ... Married to Emily
Haliziw ... One daughter.
Twitter: @aquilaadvisors
Andy
Armanino
CEO and managing
partner, Armanino
McKenna
Even among the top firms
in the country, Armanino’s
stands out as a true firm of the future. Its
growth, tech savvy and innovative services
have been well documented, and it shows no
sign of stopping, continuing to climb the Top
Firm and VAR ranks.
Career Highlights: CEO and managing partner, Armanino McKenna, 2004-present; partner-in-charge
of audit, 1994-2004; senior staff professional, audit,
1989-1994 ... Senior staff professional, Arthur Young,
1987-1989.
Other Affiliations: Chairman, Moore Stephens
North America ... Director, Moore Stephens International ... AICPA ... California Society of CPAs.
Education: Santa Clara University, 1987, Bachelors.
Personal: Born 1965, Oakland, Calif. ... Married to
Denise ... Three children.
Erik
Asgeirsson
CEO, CPA2Biz
Now approaching a decade
at the helm of the market-
ing and services portal of
the AICPA, Asgeirsson has
forged a number of powerful vendor alli-
ances and put the institute in the lead in the
move to the cloud with a stable of affiliated
SaaS products, in addition to recently luring
aboard profession veterans Greg LaFollette
and David Pollack to oversee marketing and
sales, respectively.
Robert
Attmore
Chairman, GASB
With standard-setting for
companies hogging all the
headlines, it’s easy to for-
get the enormous realm of
reporting that falls under Attmore’s purview
— to say nothing of the steady stream of stan-
dards, proposals and long-term plans GASB
produces to render government accounting
more transparent and useful to citizens.
Career Highlights: Chairman, Governmental Ac-
counting Standards Board, 2004-present ... Deputy
state comptroller, New York State, 1986-2003 ... Di-
rector of internal audit, New York State Office of
Mental Health, 1979-1984 ... Audit manager, Deloitte
Haskins & Sells, 1971-1979.
Other Affiliations: Board of Advisors, Masters in
Government Accounting Program, Rutgers Business
School ... Past president, National State Auditors Association ... Past board member, NASACT; AGA; Intergovernmental Audit Forum ... Past chair, N. Y./N.J.
Audit Forum ... Past president, N. Y. Capital Chapter,
AGA ... Past trustee, Academy for Government Accountability ... Advisory Council, U.S. Government
Auditing Standards ... U.S. Comptroller General’s
Domestic Work Group ... AICPA.
Education: Villanova University, 1971, BS.
Personal: Born 1945, Kearny, N.J. ... Married ... One
child.
Paul Bahnson
Professor of
accountancy, Boise
State University
Along with his fellow Ac-
counting Today columnist
Paul Miller, Bahnson has
been one of the leading voices in the fight
against the apparent juggernaut of IFRS
adoption in the U.S.
Career Highlights: Professor of accountancy, Boise
State University College of Business and Economics
... Assistant/associate professor, University of Montana, 1990-1999 ... Postgraduate intern, FASB, 1984-
1985 ... Staff accountant, Deloitte Haskins & Sells,
1979-1980.
Other Affiliations: Board of directors, Idaho Society
of CPAs ... Columnist, Accounting Today.
Education: University of Utah, 1987, Ph.D ... Indiana
University, 1982, MBA ... Augustana College, 1979,
BA.
Personal: 1956, Sioux Falls, S. D. ... Married to Kathie
... Two adult children.
Ron Baker
Founder,
VeraSage Institute
The widely acclaimed
“dean” of value pricing
for professional services,
Baker has spent over a
decade lecturing and writing what he hopes
will be the epitaph of the billable hour and
timesheets — and his efforts look like they
are beginning to bear fruit, with more and
more firms exploring different ways of charg-
ing clients.
Career Highlights: Founder, VeraSage Institute,
1998-present ... Instructor, California CPA Education
Foundation, 1995-present ... Partner, Baker & Barnett
CPAs, 1987-2003 ... Senior accountant, KPMG, 1984-
1987.
Other Affiliations: California Society of CPAs ...
Group of 100, AICPA ... Professional Pricing Society
... Author, Implementing Value Pricing: A Radical
Business Model for Professional Firms; Mind Over
Matter; Pricing on Purpose; Measure What Matters
to Customers; Professional’s Guide to Value Pricing;
The Firm of the Future; Burying the Billable Hour;
Trashing the Timesheet; You Are Your Customer List
... Faculty, Professional Pricing Society ... Cato Institute ... Heritage Foundation ... American Enterprise
Institute ... Foundation for Economic Education ...
Competitive Enterprise Institute.
Education: Professional Pricing Society, Atlanta,
2002, postgraduate ... University of Chicago GSB,
2001, postgraduate ... San Francisco State University,
1984, BS Accounting ... Santa Rosa Junior College,
1982, AA.
Personal: Born 1962, Santa Rosa, Calif. ... Single.
Blog/Twitter: www.verasage.com / @ronaldbaker
Jon Baron
President,
Professional,
Thomson Reuters
Tax & Accounting
Through all the recent re-
organizations going on at
his employer, one thing has remained con-
stant: Baron’s dedication to providing tools
that make tax and accounting professionals
more productive — as most recently evi-
denced by the mobile technologies they’re
