Buy Me Some Peanuts and Cracker Jack

SPOTLIGHT

f the sun is shining outside, you’re likely to find Jack Oujo, CPA, on a baseball field. The former AAA minor league umpire just can’t get the game off his mind.

In addition to running Jack Oujo CPA Inc. of Wall, N.J., Oujo coached his son Christopher’s Junior League team of 14-year-olds to its first state championship last fall, then umpired 35 Division 1 college games in April and May (“I did get a little busy in April,” he acknowledges), then spent the summer coaching 10-year-old son Matthew’s Little League team.

“We have a sign in our kitchen that says, ‘We interrupt this family for baseball season,’” Oujo says. “I have a game every night—and tonight I’m taking 100 clients to watch the Lakewood Blue Claws play in the minor leagues.”

But don’t get the wrong idea. He’s hardly the kind of guy who plays around all day. When he was released from the minor leagues in 1988, Oujo immediately fell back on the accounting degree he had pursued in college. He took the CPA exam in 1989, passing all four parts in one session, and over the next four years added a CFP, a PFS, a master’s in taxation, a securities license and an insurance license to his resume.

Though he never made the Major Leagues, Oujo believes he has led a charmed life. “Most people would give anything to have a day in professional baseball—and I had eight years,” he says. “When I was single I had my baseball career and traveled all over the country, and now that I have a family I’m home with them.”

As for the combination of specialties, from tax to investments, Oujo says he’s “taken tax to the next level,” and encourages his fellow CPAs to do the same. “Adding financial planning to your practice is a great opportunity for yourself and for your clients,” he says. “The public loves having a CPA who also understands investments and discussing all their financial affairs in one place.”

—Cheryl Rosen