Councilor, Buchanan & Mitchell (CBM) was recognized by the Accounting and Financial Women’s Alliance (AFWA) and the Accounting MOVE Project for the third consecutive year as a top accounting firm for leadership equity. Recognition acknowledges the achievements of firms nationwide that successfully passed the threshold of having at least 30% of its partner and principal group composed of women, a statistic research suggests allows for meaningful contributions from a particular group.
“We could not be prouder of the CBM team,” said Daniel L. Weaver, CPA, president and managing partner of CBM. “Not only does the composition of our leadership team reflect shared equity between men and women, but our entire team—more than half of whom are women—reflects an international population from nations as diverse as China, Bulgaria, South Korea, Bolivia, Romania and Peru.”
To participate in the 2021 Accounting MOVE Project, CBM responded to a survey detailing the extent to which women professionals are represented throughout the team, and how often they participate in professional development and networking activities and receive ongoing training to support their ongoing career advancement.
Earlier in 2021, CBM reported 63% of its team and 41% of its partner group were represented by women. During the firm’s most recent set of promotions on July 1, 2021, 50% of the firm’s new partner group were women.
CBM Partner and director of the firm’s wealth management and financial planning practice Judith P. Barnhard, CPA, CFP®, CDFA® responded to questions from AFWA’s project partner, Wilson-Taylor Associates, about how CBM’s approach to advancing the role of women changed during the COVID-19 pandemic. “Because of the abrupt shift to digital communications,” Barnhard said, “CBM began serving clients with ongoing web-based professional education. Our financial planning webinars pushed our pre-pandemic average attendance of around 20 people at in-person events to closer to 80 attendees, with some high-demand webinars attracting 120 or more attendees. These sessions always include a woman presenter,” Barnhard continued, signaling to attendees that women professionals are as likely to serve clients as men.
The theme of 2021’s Accounting MOVE Project, “Permanent Progress from Pandemic Pivots”, reflects accounting firms’ journey through the pandemic, including how a challenging year of civil rights activism and increased expectations of corporate accountability often led to fresh operating dynamics and perspectives in the business community.
In June 2021, CBM Manager Reema Patel, CPA presented to an audience of several hundred at the Accounting MOVE summit on re-imagining the path to partnership for women in a remote environment.
The Accounting MOVE Project is an annually project collaboratively administered by AFWA and Wilson-Taylor Associates President Joanne Cleaver to recognize and promote the extent of women’s contributions to the future of the accounting industry.
Click here to access a copy of the 2021 Accounting MOVE project report.
For more information about CBM’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, click here.
Councilor, Buchanan & Mitchell (CBM) is a professional services firm delivering tax, accounting and business advisory expertise throughout the Mid-Atlantic region from offices in Bethesda, MD and Washington, DC.
