Tax Senior Manager, Private Client & Family Office Services

About the role

The Tax Senior Manager, Private Client & Family Office Services (PCS-FOS) leads the PCS-FOS group. This role involves building a robust PCS-FOS practice, providing exceptional client service, supervising the work products of other professionals, developing new business, mentoring and developing interpersonal and technical skills, and managing the financial performance of the client portfolio.

Responsibilities

• Manages the full-life cycle of all assigned engagements by providing technical expertise in all areas within the finance and accounting function.
• Understands the technology packages clients are using to support their accounting/finance functions.
• Describes the major functions each system performs, and knows how the system performs those functions.
• Explains the purpose and value of system functions that a client may not be using.
• Identifies when a client is not using a technology package in a proper or efficient manner; learns new technology quickly, understands the essence of technologies, how they can be used, how they interact with other technologies and business functions, what the best methods/benefits are for using them, and applies these technologies to an engagement.
• Facilitates effective discovery meetings with clients; uses open ended questions to identify what their objectives are, what financial information they value for management/decision making and why, as well creating a map of their current internal finance and accounting structure; looks for root causes and does not take information at face value; understands the complexity that can lie behind data.
• Designs integrated solutions that respond to the specific situation; open to new ideas and solutions, and avoids “locking-in” to a single solution; knows BDO well enough internally to identify when services outside of PCS-FOS should be included and describes what these services achieve and how they operate.
• Outlines the solution in a concise document and vets it internally with their leaders and other BDO stakeholders.
• Accurately determines the cost of building a client solution.
• Calculates the benefit to a client in dollar terms of the solution, using the pricing process.
• Compares the differences between the perspectives, and if there is sufficient margin in between (given our confidence in our calculations) to have a profitable engagement, proposes a fixed fee based on current scope for review by leadership.
• Formulates recommendations to client leadership on technical accounting issues, financial accounting policies and procedures and financial management issues; Educates clients on how their finance and accounting needs will evolve as their business grows.
• Assists clients in identify next steps and persuades the client to value those unperceived needs; Identifies what needs are critical versus what are not; looks at the business of the client holistically.
• Periodically reviews solutions with their clients to determine if it is still the right solution for the current state of the business; Develops a compelling future vision for a client; communicates in such a way as to inspire clients to take the journey towards that positive future.
• Assertively manages conflict; uses negotiation techniques to drive difficult agreements between opposing parties/ideas and generally leaves parties satisfied with the result.
• Supports the client through business changes and helps to facilitate the change management process; is comfortable with ambiguity, knows when to create clarity (or when clarity is possible) versus when to make progress without full definition.
• Acts as a partner to clients, as part of their team.
• Diagnoses the relationships and political structure of clients and appropriately navigates these complexities; Quickly and accurately assesses people’s perspectives; gathers and/or reviews information necessary from the client to execute on engagements; creates, develops and maintains strong business relationships with clients, both internal and external.
• Comprehends the information presented on different tax return forms, analyzes this information to draw conclusions and have an intelligent conversation with clients – helping clients navigate business decisions and their potential financial and tax implications.
• Appropriately refers tax related matters to Core Tax and Specialty Tax Services.
• Supports PCS-FOS Leadership with business development strategies and service offerings targeted for various industries;
• Initiates building sales pipeline and closes new business;
• Ensures prospect and sales information is entered into CRM as appropriate;
• Rifines designed solutions and work plans into a compelling proposal document that speaks the language of the client and identifies the value clients will be receiving;
• Develops a strong understanding of the various industry groups and builds relationships with business development resources;
• Has a deep awareness of the impact that different industries and service offerings have on the technical work and final deliverable;
• Actively participates in industry trade groups and networking events;
• Identifies new opportunities to cross sell to existing clients;
• Explains the Advisory service offerings, as well as the broader firm to a client, prospect, or contact;
• Gains an understanding of the BDO Alliance and BRN Network firms;
• Develops others: Fosters a culture that embraces change and accountability;
• Ensures PCS-FOS Managers and Staff are trained to understand and perform analytics and forecasting at a level where they are capable of interpreting financial results, recognizing trends and gaining insights into business performance improvements;
• Acts as Career Advisor to PCS-FOS Managers and Staff, as appropriate;
• Evaluates the performance of PCS-FOS Managers and Staff, and assists in developing goals and objectives to enhance professional development that aligns with the firm’s and PCS-FOS’s objectives;
• Drives recruiting efforts at all levels and assists with the on-boarding process;
• Serves as a resource for the team.

Qualifications

• One of the following is required: Bachelor’s degree, focus in Accounting or Finance, preferred AND eight (8) or more years of experience performing general accounting transactions and functions, required; OR High School Diploma and ten (10) or more years performing general accounting transactions and functions with some supervisory and consultative or business advisory experience without a degree, required.
• MBA or other relevant advanced degree (Masters in Accountancy), preferred.
• Four (4) or more years of supervisory experience, required.
• Consultative or business advisory experience, required.
• Prior experience utilizing industry recognized accounting research tools, preferred.
• SEI Archway and Qvinchi, preferred.

Skills and Abilities

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• An in-depth knowledge and understanding of finance and accounting functions, technology for supporting these functions and how tax planning can differ by industry and business structure; knows what is required from a compliance perspective and what is considered a standard or best practice for the industry or business structure.
• Takes personal accountability for work products and accepts constructive feedback to guide future actions.
• Fully understands the finance and accounting functions generally performed by a business (e.g. sales, purchasing, A/R, etc.) and common best practices/processes for how they operate, as well as how they interact; understands other business imperatives/functions (e.g. data security).