One of Minnesota’s Largest Accounting Firms Can Totally Get Behind the Alternative Pathway to CPA Licensure
In a LinkedIn post published March 3, CLA CEO Jen Leary — who graduated wayyyy back when only 120 units were required — threw her support behind Minnesota Society of CPAs’ initiative to add a second pathway that would allow CPA licensure at 120 units and two years of experience. It may not seem like […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Just Gained 200 People
Image via CliftonLarsonAllen CLA has merged with New Jersey’s SobelCo (a firm we’ve heard only good things about) and produced the obligatory press release about the union. Shout out to Allan Koltin, the prenuptial counselor of accounting firm marriages, who helped with the deal. News release: Today, CLA (CliftonLarsonAllen LLP), the eighth largest accounting firm […]
Guess How Much the End-of-Year Staff Bonus Was at CliftonLarsonAllen For 2022?
If you said $2,022, you’d be correct! A tipster from CliftonLarsonAllen told us on Monday, “$2,022 is how much the gift was to all employees. Very pleased with it. It was a complete surprise and appreciated by a lot of my colleagues. Especially with some other firms not giving out anything with a potential recession […]
CliftonLarsonAllen is Still the Constructioniest of All Accounting Firms
You may or may not be aware that there is such a thing as Construction Executive magazine, and you may or may not be aware that Construction Executive magazine has ranked accounting firms with construction practices for the past four years. You may or may not be aware that there is an accounting firm called […]
Oh Look, CliftonLarsonAllen Is Ranked No. 1 In a Couple Other Things Too
As we mentioned last August, CliftonLarsonAllen—the love child of Clifton Gunderson and LarsonAllen—has been the most dominant public accounting firm that no one really cares about the past three years when it comes to serving clients in the construction industry. But apparently construction isn’t the only client base that C to the L to the […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Is Ranked No. 1 In Something
And that something has to do with … construction. For the third consecutive year, CLA has been named the top construction accounting firm by Construction Executive. It’s an honor to be recognized, & it speaks to our ability to help owners & managers address industry challenges & plan for financial success https://t.co/rE1m1zVntL pic.twitter.com/D1RhjZzyPX — CLA […]
CliftonLarsonAllen’s Leadership Pays Up
We heard some good news late on Friday for those serving the capital markets at CliftonLarsonAllen. From the tipline: Lost wages are planned to be paid back to all employees therefore making all employees whole for 2020. This will happen as of Oct. 19, our tipster added. It’s been an interesting six months for CLA […]
Rumor of the Day: A Big 4 Firm Picked Up an Out-of-This-World Audit Client
From the tipline yesterday: EY just won the NASA audit. Well that’s a pretty nice get for the Black and Yellow. Our source didn’t have much more info to share other than (s)he found out during a Government and Public Sector call on Wednesday and that EY prevailed in the competitive bidding process. So which […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Is Finally Officially Done with Employee Pay Cuts
Thanks to the four denizens of CliftonLarsonAllen who were eager to tell us today and over the weekend that the firm restored employees’ full pay to pre-Rona levels on Aug. 1. CLA was one of the first top 10 firms to come out of the gate announcing employee pay cuts due to the uncertainty caused […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Is Giving Employees Shorter Duration of Pay Cuts, Consolation Bluetooth Speakers (UPDATE)
[Updated on June 9 with additional information.] We’ve got an update on what’s happening over at C to the L to the A. About a week or so ago a Redditor posted that CliftonLarsonAllen said it was cutting the duration of employee pay cuts by two months, ending now on Oct. 31 instead of Dec. […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Is Cutting Staff Pay By 10%, No Layoffs Planned
[Updated with additional information.] During the afternoon on Friday, someone posted on Reddit that CliftonLarsonAllen had announced earlier in the day 10% pay cuts to all employees. Checks out. Here’s what came through the tipline late Friday afternoon: CLA announced this morning in a firm-wide webcast that they will be reducing all compensation by 10% […]
In the Interest of Security and Penny-Pinching, CliftonLarsenAllen Will No Longer Accept Credit Cards
Wait a minute, why the hell were clients sending their credit card numbers via email in the first place?! Our tipster shares a recent email from the higher ups: Hello All, Gordy Viere, Denny Schleper, John Shutkin and Chas McElroy have made a decision that we will no longer accept credit cards as a method […]
CliftonLarsonAllen Settles with Dixon for $36 Million Over Crundwell Fraud
In addition to CLA coughing up their share, Fifth Third Bank will pay $3 million, and the city's auditor Sam Card will pay $1 million for a nice round sum of $40 million total, according to Saukvalley.com. CLA provided us with a statement from CEO Gordon Viere: The allegations of fraud committed by City of Dixon Comptroller […]
(UPDATE) If Krista McMasters, co-CEO of CliftonLarsonAllen, Is Retiring Then There Would Be No Major Public Accounting Firms Led By Women
UPDATE — A couple of reports out of the Milwaukee press have confirmed our tips from yesterday. We've also received the text of two emails, one from Ms. McMasters and one from CLA's other CEO, Gordy Viere that communicate the decision to the firm's employees. They appear on the following pages.
A couple of tips came in earlier today that CliftonLarsonAllen's co-CEO Krista McMasters is retiring. If she were to step down then it stands to reason that Gordy Viere, the CEO of CLA Holdings would be the head of the firm. We're still trying to confirm that this is in fact the case but if true, that would mean all of the CEOs (managing partners, or whatever else they might be called) of the 25 largest firms would be led by men.
According to This Dude Who May Have Helped Screw It Up, CliftonLarsonAllen Totally Screwed Up on the Dixon Audit
Meanwhile, back at the horse ranch: Sam Card says that CliftonLarsonAllen continued to do an audit for the city, despite guidelines that said they should not. In an October deposition statement, Card said that he and his mother’s small Sterling accounting office, which became Dixon’s contracted auditor after 2005, did not do its own audit […]
It Looks Like Clifton Gunderson Knew About Rita Crundwell’s Secret Bank Account
Everyone remember Rita Crundwell? She's the horse lady that gave Dixon, Illinois a long face when it was discovered that she had been helping herself to the city's money. About $53 million or so over a couple of decades. That's not Madoff, Stanford, or Petters money, but it's not exactly a small sum. Last summer Dixon […]
Recruiting Season: Looking for a Firm with “Longevity”; The Big 4 Toss-up; Opportunities Missed
Welcome to Rock the Recruitment Season. We'll be winding up the 2012 series very soon so if you still have a question about recruiting season, email us at [email protected] with "Recruiting Season Questions" in the subject line. The recruitment season questions have slowed to a trickle, so you best get them in while you can, […]
City of Dixon Sues Auditors Over…Ya Know
That money isn't going to find itself now, is it? An attorney for the city of Dixon filed a civil complaint this morning against the accounting firms that conducted the city's audit for the past 5 years. The complaint says that Samuel S. Card, CPA, P.C., and Janis Card Company, LLC, both located at 501 E. […]
Future Associate Wants to Know What to Expect From His Firm (That We Can’t Say, Definitively, Is CliftonLarsonAllen) That Is Merging
Ed. note: Are you in the throes of holiday cheer but deep in the belly of career jeer? Email us at [email protected], we’ll lend you an ear.
Hey GC,
I’ll try to keep this short and to the point.
I’ll be starting my career soon with a firm that will be merging with another. Should I be wary of anything that could change on my end?
Thanks!
The first question to cross my mind was “what firms are merging?” Caleb suggested that our contributor could be from CliftonLarsonAllen, covered on Going Concern last month. Poor Gunderson. But yes, mergers (MERGERS!) can be fun/daunting/HR headaches/swag gold mines. Below are a few things to expect.
Client Coddling: Priority #1 in any merger is for the partners to assure their clients’ confidence in the new, stronger firm. Employee cross-over from one firm to the other’s engagements can be expected on the lower levels, but expect partners to remain active on their respective clients.
Crash Courses in Firm Lingo: Here come the HR tutorials. Acronyms – the lifeblood to any public accounting firm – will have to be efficiently combined. More so, understanding what “the other guys” do is very important from a sales perspective. Understanding the merger’s strengths will not only be beneficial in making current employees confident and comfortable with the merger, but they will be prepared to answer the inevitable client question of, “why did you merge with THEM?”
IT/HR headaches: “Who do I call for computer questions?” “Who is my HR contact?” “Are we UPS or FedEx now?” “How do we submit T&E?” There are bound to be efficiencies in the day-to-day operations of the newly merged. But, inefficiencies in the short term will hopefully lead to long-term improvements.
SWAG: Let’s end this dance on a good note. HR should be ordering up all kinds of stylish pens, travel sized 10 keys, and XXL hoodless sweatshirts. Most of the goodies will be slated to hit cover the desks of clients to keep them in the loop of Gunderson’s departure from the picture. However, look out for your office’s HR professional at the holiday party (i.e. – get them wasted) and see if they’ll hook you up with some of the leftovers.