Jessica R Sawyer

Hard work, determination and a willingness to never be told I can’t do something. Also having the support and love of my family. I could not do any of this without them.

The best career advice I've ever received is to not take things personally, because most of the time, it's not about you as a person. Constructive feedback is really important. I've also been told to always be yourself and bring yourself to the conversation, because even if people think that you are too emotional or perceive you as emotional a lot, which can happen as a female in this industry, empathy really lends yourself to being a better leader. So embracing who you are, embracing your belief system, and not sacrificing that for anyone are the two keys to being a great leader and to success.

The most advice that I give to people is that they need to find something that works for them. In accounting, I've tried both public and private industry. Public accounting offers a flexibility that private industry historically hasn't offered, so really take the time and make sure that you understand what you're getting out of being in public versus private, the benefits of both, and then figure out how that works into life goals. Re-evaluate that on a yearly basis, because when I was a senior, I wouldn't have thought that I would have been the New England tax practice leader for Citrin Cooperman. I said that I didn't even want my managers job at the time. So now, here I am at the partner level, and everything changes as your life changes and progresses. So really don't give up on something because it doesn't fit the mold that you're looking for. Always talk to someone and try to get the most out of it, because I'm extremely flexible, and if somebody comes to me and says, I really like this, but I don't like that, then I will try to get them more of the things that they like and less of the things that they don't like. It's never perfect, we all do things we don't like, but I do try to give everyone the experience they want.

Up until probably a few years ago, the challenges were trying to find people that come into our field. A lot of people don't find accounting to be an incredibly attractive option. We work a lot of hours, there's a lot of technical aspects, and the landscape has been changing pretty rapidly from a financial and a tax perspective. But now we have the major disruptor being AI, and not knowing where that's going to lead, honestly. We're being told anything from it could replace at least 30% of our workforce to it's going to support us enhance our ability to service our clients, so it's kind of a very big unknown out there right now that's a little bit of stress in the industry.

Family is obviously one of my key values, and helping people. I want to be a part of something that helps others. A lot of the times, especially in the tax situation, because I'm a tax partner, people really want to know how they can save money on taxes, how they can structure things to be more tax effective, and it helps them out financially, which also helps them grow and be a great part of society, especially for small businesses. My family is my passion and drives me to create a place where they would want to work and something that they would want to do with their lives. I believe in work-life integration rather than work-life balance. There are days I work 4 hours and I'm with my family 6 hours. There are days I work 15 hours and I sacrifice sleep. There are days that there's some kind of harmony between the two, but it's really finding what's most important in the moment and being present.