An innovative state society CEO and her view of accounting’s future

Sponsored by Blackbaud

Rebekah Olson, CPA, CEO of the Maryland Association of CPAs, returned to the Journal of Accountancy podcast for the first time since 2019 to discuss how community, collaboration, and relationships can strengthen the accounting profession.

She shared insights into efforts to address recruiting and retention challenges, the role of professional associations in creating value for members, and an update on CPA licensure.

Olson also explained the thinking behind the MACPA’s Beyond the Bottom Line YouTube series and why engagement remains critical for the profession’s future.

What you’ll learn from this episode:

• Olson’s “best part of the accounting profession” and how it led her state association to start a YouTube series.
• Why Olson believes relationships and community are among the profession’s greatest strengths.
• What she learned from Tom Hood.
• How Maryland’s CPA licensure changes fit into broader efforts across the profession.
• What associations can do to create more value and engagement for members.
• Why positive news about accounting enrollment, in Olson’s mind, doesn’t eliminate the need for continued workforce development efforts.

Play the episode below or read the edited transcript:

— To comment on this episode or to suggest an idea for another episode, contact Neil Amato at Neil.Amato@aicpa-cima.com.

Transcript

Neil Amato: Welcome back to the Journal of Accountancy podcast. This is Neil Amato with the JofA recording at the Future of Finance Summit, National Harbor, Md. I’m going to emphasize that state because we have the CEO of the Maryland Association of CPAs, Rebekah Olson, joining us on the podcast. You’ll hear that conversation right after this brief sponsor message.

[Sponsor message]

Amato: Welcome back. As I said, Rebekah Olson, CEO of the Maryland Association of CPAs, or MACPA. It’s your first time on the podcast since 2019.

Rebekah Olson: Wow.

Amato: Feels like forever ago.

Olson: We had a whole pandemic in between. Wow. It’s like, that’s crazy.

Amato: We’re so glad to have you back. Thanks for making time.

Olson: I’m glad we’re on the other side of that, too.

Amato: Exactly. Now, the last time you were a guest on this show was at ENGAGE. I recently had another state society CEO on the podcast from ENGAGE, the 2026 version of ENGAGE. His name, Calvin Harris. He’s the New York state society CEO and also a guy with Maryland roots.

Olson: Absolutely.

Amato: Also a guy who has his own state society interview series. It’s a podcast. You have a YouTube series. I want to ask you about that YouTube series. What made you decide to do that?

Olson: Yeah, it’s interesting. I get the privilege of talking to so many incredible people every day. I used to joke, my husband would say or people would ask what you do for a living. I just talk to people for a living, right? And I get to talk to amazing people that have amazing insights, stories, personalities, all these things. And it almost felt, like, selfish to just keep them to myself. And so that’s kind of what it started as.

The best part of this profession is the people. And I get naturally a platform as being the CEO, being the face of the Maryland Association of CPAs. And so I wanted to use that platform to bring our members, our partners, some of the amazing people that I get to talk to on a regular basis and kind of raise them up, share them with the world, not just keep these awesome conversations I’m having to myself.

Amato: So that’s one of the things you like about it, that you’re getting to share that knowledge, but you’re still getting to meet great people. Tell me what else you like about it and maybe what about it is tougher than you initially thought now that you’re into it.

Olson: One thing I like about it is we start every podcast, and this comes from what we do at MACPA with every meeting, is we start with good news. And on the podcast, I give the opportunity, or the YouTube series, I give the opportunity to say personal or professional good news. Some people like to keep those things separate. At our team meetings, you do both.

Amato: Ooh, you have to give one of each.

Olson: You have to give one of each. So you got to come to every MACPA meeting with two pieces of good news.

And I’ve started doing that as part of the YouTube series, the Beyond the Bottom Line series, because I get to hear all kinds of things. I did one a couple months ago where it was one of my guests’ birthdays. Fun fact I would not have known. And the other guest, we were interviewing two people at the same time. His birthday was the next day. So then they got to find out that they were birthday buddies. And, so fun things like that, the people behind the profession, that is my favorite part and what I love. And so being able to have that question and get to explore kind of that personal side of folks or what’s going right and just bring some of that positivity into the conversation, probably my favorite part of it.

What’s hard is maybe the timing, right? You have to have a structured, but not too structured conversation with someone, but you need to have it in this kind of frame of time. And it needs to make sense to someone listening. And I tend to be, I want to go on tangents. Somebody says something and I go off script, just, “Oh, tell me more about that.” So I think that’s the hardest part for me.

Amato: A host going on tangents? Who knew that was even a thing?

Olson: Yeah.

Amato: Funny that that’s coming out of my mouth. I love that. And you’re right. To have a structured conversation, but also an entertaining one, it takes some practice and some prep. It’s not always as easy as it seems.

Olson: It is not, no.

Amato: But I did watch your YouTube series with a nontraditional accounting student. Her name was Sarah Stuart-Sikowitz. And I thought she was great. It was a great interview. I mean, were you somehow like a news anchor in a previous life? Because that was a natural, really good interview.

Olson: I was not. Maybe I missed a calling. Who knew? But yeah, I think it’s just setting other people up to look awesome. And I love that. I love being able to create a conversation that makes other people look awesome, because they are awesome. And sometimes they don’t get the opportunity, especially in our profession where we’re a little bit more hidden, sometimes on purpose. But there are such great insights and personalities and things that need to shine. And so to give someone that opportunity feels like kind of really purposeful in my career.

Amato: And you said “set up people to be awesome.” That’s kind of what you do in your meetings, apparently, with the MACPA. Was that something you started?

Olson: I did not start it. So I have the blessing of inheriting an amazing culture, an amazing organization. And then I have the very, very big shoes to try and fill to keep that going, which I tell you, it’s like this blessing and curse that I carry around every day. But that is part of our process.

So we run on something called EOS, the Entrepreneurial Operating System. There’s a book out there [about EOS] called Traction, and those meetings all start with good news. And so we’ve adopted that into everything we do. Even when I do town halls or our all-member updates, I like to start with good news and just do some polling. And you get to see, like, a whole different side, and there’s real brain science behind it as well. So it’s fantastic, and it’s one of my favorite things that we do.

Amato: You mentioned big shoes to fill. Those big shoes are walking around this conference venue as we speak. Tom Hood is the former MACPA CEO, now with us at the Association, a colleague of mine. I’m proud to say he is. What did you learn from Tom Hood?

Olson: Oh my gosh. Well, how much time do you have on the podcast, right? I just talked about the problem of trying to keep conversations short. Tom taught me confidence in things that I didn’t know I could be confident in.

I do a lot of public speaking, and that’s not something that I, as an accounting major, was trained for or I thought that I would be doing in my career as a CPA. And Tom showed me what that could look like and gave me permission to do things like that and always feel like I had a safety net. And that mentorship and that push to do things that were uncomfortable for me at the time really helped me get to where I am. And I’m eternally grateful for that.

Amato: That’s great. Back to Calvin Harris. I mentioned his podcast and me having him on the JofA podcast. For him, one of the reasons he started the New York state society podcast was to reach new audiences, new potential accounting candidates. Was that a motivation for you, or was it not exactly?

Olson: I don’t know that that was the motivation to start it. I think my motivation started from creating value for our current audience so that they help me reach the next audience, right? Calvin has an amazing podcast, and his T-shirts are phenomenal. Like, that collection needs to be in a museum one day or something.

But for me, it was about really connecting with our existing audience and giving them a platform to share their insights, their personalities. I think that will naturally, hopefully, create additional audiences reaching a wider net. But I think each one of our members has a huge network, right? And so if we can tap into those networks, if we can create such value within the community at MACPA and value where members are creating value for one another, that it’s not just me.

First of all, we have an amazing MACPA team, but it’s even not just our team. It’s the 8,000-plus members across the state of Maryland that really create value for one another in the community. And so that’s where we’re really trying to focus is to put our member at the center and make sure that is where value is created and replicated for each person.

Because in this super complex age, things are happening rapidly, and it’s hard to keep up. And I really don’t think we even really can. I think it’s in creating community and creating networks where you know who to go to or people that might know other people, not necessarily knowing the right answer right the first time.

Amato: That’s well said. I appreciate the thought behind that and kind of what you hope to leverage from your members, but also add for them by that series. When we were setting up time to talk, you mentioned an emphasis by the MACPA on community and collaboration. Tell me what that looks like in practice. And maybe it’s just, well, I’m here.

Olson: Absolutely. It is part of the reason I am here. We are really looking to rethink. So MACPA is celebrating our 125th anniversary in 2026. So yay, happy birthday to us. Founded in 1901. So half of the country’s age, you know, the U.S. celebrating 250, we’re celebrating 125.

And it really got me thinking about, OK, what is our defining feature? What do we want our next 125 years to look like? And I thought about when I talked to our leaders now, I talked to the giants of the MACPA, who have become giants of the AICPA in a lot of ways as well. How did they get involved? Why did they get involved? What do they see as the value? And it all came back to relationships and people.

As an association, we are in the people business. And how do we create sticky environments where people come and they’re in relationship with one another? It’s not just about either earning CPE or even getting a new resource or something like that, which is all important, but it’s ancillary to the relationship. And so that’s why we’re here.

One, it’s in Maryland. So of course I had to come represent Maryland because we are in Maryland. We’re not in D.C.

Amato: We’re not in D.C. and now it’s in National Harbor.

Olson: Yes, exactly, we are in National Harbor, MARYLAND. But it is also about how do we hear and know and talk about what our members are hearing and knowing and talking about so that we can better co-create with them.

I’ve been talking with my team about this new structure we’re looking at. So we’re adjusting our team. For 125 years, we’ve been organized around what we do for members. We have a communications team. We have membership. We have marketing. We have professional development. And that’s great. And we’re going to have all those things going forward. But we are reorienting ourselves instead around what we do, who we do it for.

And so I’ve seen over the last, gosh, probably 20 years, CPA firms, they still have audit teams, tax teams, things like that, but they are organizing around industries, right? You have your GovCon (government contracting) practice, you have your not-for-profit practice.

And so I’m borrowing from that a little bit and creating a public accounting team and a management accounting team. And that’s honestly why we’re here, to help get some of those insights so that we can better serve that management accounting member, who I think sometimes gets left behind in some ways and doesn’t feel like they belong in the association.

Amato: Let’s shift gears to licensure. In Maryland, what’s the latest on licensure, and also what’s the impact of licensure changes that you’re seeing in the talent pipeline?

Olson: Yeah. So really exciting. One, I just have to give a shoutout to the entire profession because I think we’ve done a phenomenal thing over the last 18 months in changing licensure pathways in so many jurisdictions. I mean, we’re really close to having a majority — well, we do have the majority. I want to say we’re at, like, 90%.

Amato: Yeah, it’s like 40-something [states].

Olson: Yeah, it’s amazing. And that is a feat. And that took collaboration and community, right? It took people coming together across the country. So, another emphasis on that. In Maryland, what that has looked like is it was a two-step process, just the way our legislature meets and the timing and our board of accountancy and their appetite and readiness to change.

So we did individual mobility last year, the 2025 session. And then this past session, we did pass the new pathway. And so that’s going to be effective real soon, Oct. 1. Excited for that. But yeah, just a phenomenal thing that the profession together came together to make tremendous change.

And I hope we remember that as we tackle more challenges in the future, because the power of collaboration really does [work]. And it took a couple states kind of coming out there first and saying we need to do this. And that’s a hard thing to be that first mover. But I’m really proud of what we’ve been able to do.

Amato: Another issue that is kind of professionwide and does probably need some collaboration is retention. What’s changed about retention in the profession and what, to you remains a challenge?

Olson: I do worry about this. And you asked the question about the results, like we have these new pathways, yay, but is it making a dent? Is it really making a difference? I think it’s going to take a little bit of time to see that, one, because the implementation and stuff. It got people talking, which is fantastic.

I do think, and I worry, that we could become complacent in change because I think recruiting-wise, we’re definitely seeing upticks. I think education enrollments are certainly seeing upticks. So I don’t want to kind of rest on our laurels. I do think we need a robust, continuous workforce development program and aspect to our profession more so than we have in the past.

The Profession Ready Initiative is really exciting, what they’re doing on that side. I think we have pieces of a lot of really great things, and I just want to make sure that we don’t go, “OK, we did that, yay.” It’s got to continue. But on the retention side, I think we are doing a better job at culture. I do think we are doing a better job at that. I think it got enough noise and the talent got enough power that it kind of forced it a little bit.

I think during the pandemic, we learned that flexible and remote work can work, which is good. Now we’re seeing kind of how we make it work better because I think there’s some challenges in it, especially from a management or leadership-type aspect of how do you mentor and grow someone in a remote environment, and it has to be really intentional. So, still growing pains there.

I think there’s always room for improvement, but I do think forcing the conversation over the last couple years because of the crisis point has made a difference. And I just hope that we continue that even if the numbers tell us things are OK. I don’t want that, like, the economy obviously plays a part, too, and I don’t want to still kind of hide behind that and really not continue to push.

Amato: A lot of the things you said about the workforce maybe getting more power. It reminds me of conversations I’ve had with another Maryland rock star in the accounting profession, Kimberly Ellison-Taylor. We’ve talked about these topics several times. She’s here on site as well.

So again, Beyond the Bottom Line is the YouTube series. I said it earlier, you mentioned the show earlier. You’re an excellent host. Keep doing what you’re doing.

Olson: Thank you.

Amato: Anything you’d like to add in closing? This has been a fantastic conversation.

Olson: I would just encourage everyone to get involved, be engaged. I think there is so much opportunity in our profession. And I think there are so many organizations doing such great things. I was with the Beta Alpha Psi national meeting just last week, and I did a session on why state societies matter.

And I got to show the collaboration between state societies, the AICPA, NASBA, [the American Accounting Association], probably leaving out a thousand other different organizations. But the opportunity to come together as a profession and to level up — the rising tide, raising all boats. That takes engagement from our CPAs and engagement from our members. And I will tell you, you won’t regret it.

The amount of relationships that move from, a professional [one] to a personal friend and a contact and a confidant. There’s something to be said for having someone that understands your world, your profession, and then being able to give back to the next generation too. Like, there’s just such blessing in that. So that would be my parting words is, if I have a platform, it’s to get in a relationship, get engaged with the AICPA, with your state society, with an association to give back to the profession and to continue to make an impact that we have.

Amato: Rebekah Olson, thank you very much.

Olson: Thank you so much, Neil.