In the episode, Wassia talks about her work with H.O.P.E - Helping Other People be Empowered: you can find the link here. This is an amazing organization doing work that matters and changing lives for the better.
Embark on a transformative journey through the dynamic world of finance with Wassia Kamon, Vice President of Finance and Corporate Controller from the Low Income Investment Fund, as she unpacks the essence of value beyond the numbers. Wassia telling her story coming from the Ivory Coast to become a senior finance leader is so inspirational. She not only underscores the significance of soft skills but also the power of a professional narrative in career progression. This episode is a treasure trove for middle managers looking to show their value so they can rise in their organizations, offering insights on how to strategically navigate the intricate path to senior positions.
Please connect with me on:
1. Instagram: stephen.mclain
2. Twitter: smclainiii
3. Facebook: stephenmclainconsultant
4. LinkedIn: stephenjmclainiii
For more resources, please visit Finance Leader Academy: financeleaderacademy.com.
In the episode, Wassia talks about her work with H.O.P.E - Helping Other People be Empowered: you can find the link here. This is an amazing organization doing work that matters and changing lives for the better.
Embark on a transformative journey through the dynamic world of finance with Wassia Kamon, Vice President of Finance and Corporate Controller from the Low Income Investment Fund, as she unpacks the essence of value beyond the numbers. Wassia telling her story coming from the Ivory Coast to become a senior finance leader is so inspirational. She not only underscores the significance of soft skills but also the power of a professional narrative in career progression. This episode is a treasure trove for middle managers looking to show their value so they can rise in their organizations, offering insights on how to strategically navigate the intricate path to senior positions.
Please connect with me on:
1. Instagram: stephen.mclain
2. Twitter: smclainiii
3. Facebook: stephenmclainconsultant
4. LinkedIn: stephenjmclainiii
For more resources, please visit Finance Leader Academy: financeleaderacademy.com.
This week I am sharing my interview with Wassia Kamon. Vice President of Finance and Corporate Controller of the low income investment fund you will see is an amazing leader in the finance and accounting community. And you can find her sharing realistic actionable advice on her LinkedIn profile. Please enjoy the episode. Welcome to the finance leader podcast where leadership is bigger than the numbers. I am your host, Stephen McLain. This is the podcast for developing leaders in finance and accounting. Please consider following me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. My usernames and the links are in this episode's show notes. Thank you. This is episode number 119. And let's get right to the interview with with Wassia, please enjoy. I am joined today by Wassia Kamon. The Vice President of Finance and Corporate Controller of the low income investment fund with Wassia was also recently recognized by practice advisor as a 40. Under 40 accounting professional, she is widely recognized as an innovative voice for finance and accounting professionals who want to grow in their career. And I'm honored to welcome her to the finance leader podcast. Please tell us more about you.
Wassia Kamon:Thank you so much for having me, Stephen. It's such a joy to be here. As you said, I'm Wassia and what Wassia means something you cannot burn in my native language. I'm originally from Ivory Coast, West Africa. And I came here when I was 17. And it's been a long journey. I started out in accounting at Georgia State University and went all the way up. Did public accounting didn't like it been in corporate finance and accounting since then, as you said, I'm the current VP of Finance and Corporate Controller at the low income investment fund. We help with mostly affordable housing and community development, something I'm very passionate about. As I'm also passionate about helping other professionals, I always look back and see. Okay, if I was talking to me 15-20 years ago, what would I say? And it's from that perspective that I post on LinkedIn that I write articles. And then I'm also have a community called strategic achievers, where we're able to help others in that journey.
Stephen McLain:That's amazing. I love your story. And I'm always looking forward to that next post on LinkedIn. Yeah, so I appreciate everything you're doing in this community to make mega all better. I appreciate you so much.
Wassia Kamon:Thank you so much. Thank you.
Stephen McLain:One of the things I wanted to talk to you today about is the future of accounting as a profession. The Wall Street Journal reported in October 2023, that we are seeing fewer students entering the accounting field. And they mentioned pay as a major reason. Accounting is often a prime gateway for understanding business fundamentals. And also for advancement into senior roles. It's easy to say, just raise pay. But why did accounting entry level roles fall so far behind and pay? And what can executive leaders do to reverse this? And what advice would you give young professionals who are passionate about studying accounting, even a starting pay has fallen behind?
Wassia Kamon:I think to me accounting as a profession, we have that stigma, right? We we don't have people don't always see the value of what we bring. And as we have not been able to raise our prices, as partners or companies are able to show that we can do more than number crunching and processing invoices. We still in that view of okay, you know, 50,000 is good. When I started back in 2009. I think as a staff accountant, the annual salary was 45,000. I was rejoicing, but then you look like how many years later and is the same starting salary. Other fields are starting at 75 by 200. And so for young professionals who know like people in accounting, they see that the cost of tuition is here. And so if my starting salary is here, okay, how do I bridge the gap? And it's very sad. I saw a statistic that said that there is a lot of accountants accounting students saying that accounting is their major when they enter college, but only about 50% actually graduate in accounting. So they get in and because we do accounting, you have to be good at a lot of things. And they see other options and they end up majoring in other fields.
Stephen McLain:Yeah, that's tough for our profession, because we want that continuing pipeline of, of young people coming into this profession. I think it's something that we all need to address as senior leaders in this profession, and work to figure out why that we fall so far behind and continue to grow that passion. So thank you so much for that. One of the things that you do is try to emphasize your value. As you move up in your career, you're a voice and advocate for middle managers who want to run senior roles. You're sharing a story of trial and error, seeing your value potential for more senior roles. And you'll highlight not to chase more credentials, you emphasize soft skills, especially, please share how you can highlight your value to others. So you get the opportunity for more senior roles. And let us know how you use LinkedIn as a channel to showcase your value.
Wassia Kamon:Yes, that's a very packed question. So I'll start with why do I talk about moving beyond certification. So right out of college, they were like go for the CPA, I went for the CPA. Then I wanted to do FPN A that I go for the CMA I went for it. So I went for everything. People told me to go for that. So I have so many letters behind my name. And then I realized I had all these letters, but I'm not where I want to be in my career. I'm reporting like I have yet to report to a boss, I had that many letters behind their name. And yet, these bosses are great. And I realized that it wasn't their certification, they were so good at other things. So while I was chasing their certifications, I ended up isolating myself and not developing all the other stuff that my bosses have been doing. They've been honing on the negotiation skills, knowing how to talk to different people in different department, they know how to articulate their impact, right now just talk about the tasks they did. But the impact they had. And I was just focused on, you know, tasks, tasks, tasks. But as you move up the ladder in an organization, or as you just have to start hiring, promoting, coaching, firing, having different difficult conversation, you know, having to do all these things, you realize, well, technical accounting, and those tasks are great, but they're not going to be able to get me to the levels where I want to be. So that's really how I started talking about beyond certification, my website is called Beyond certifications.com. Because I want to make sure that we understand that we should be focused more on just knowing the latest excels tricks. Like when you get to a VP level, you probably have people working for you to help you with Excel, or consultant, there's other things that your attention should be focused on. So that was the first thing about the alternative vacations, then how do you articulate your value? When we are in accounting, we think in terms of or close the month, okay, what does it mean for the business that you did that?
Stephen McLain:Right
Wassia Kamon:If the if you come to a one on one, for example, your managers, do you prepare before you go on your one on one, you just show up? And you're waiting for the manager to tell you what's going on? Or do you come prepared, ready to explain? These are the things I did? These are the problems I'm solving. This is how I'm making progress. Or by the way, you didn't ask about this. But I also thought we could do this. So I come with a problem and a proposed solution. Or when you join an organization, and they're like, hey, introduce yourself. Do you go Hi, I'm so so happy to be here. Or do you go hey, I'm so and so. I've been in this field for the past 15 years helping doing ABC. And I'm so excited to bring this onto this company and helping the department move forward? Do you have a power introduction? So beyond even getting on LinkedIn, it starts with how you articulate your value, and how you show up in whatever settings you are. And that's
Stephen McLain:amazing. I really liked it. I love what you're talking about. They're emphasizing that value. Thank you, you and you were talking about showing up to that one on one. Not just waiting for your boss to initiate the discussion. But you coming in was showing off the projects you're working on? And how how you made it made a difference on a particular project and how you solved a particular problem. Yes,
Wassia Kamon:you have to show up like a rock star. That's what I pushed everyone in my community to do. I'm like, we you have to show up like a rock star. You have to be your number one cheerleader, because we're elsewhere. Okay? Your managers have their own set of trub trials and priorities. If you show up as one more burden, you No is not going to work.
Stephen McLain:Right? Exactly. Because the senior leaders, managers want people who are going to solve, take action and not wait for you to tell them what to do. Or you to step in when there's a problem. Yeah. So that kind of goes against, you know, some of the current trends of quiet quitting. And like, I'm just going to show up and do my minimum, I'm gonna, you know, separate my work life, from my after work life. And it still takes going that little extra mile, in order to show your value so that you can go ahead and get that next promotion and next upgrade opportunity. Yes.
Wassia Kamon:And I think people think that you have to work overtime to articulate your value, or to do what's needed and it doesn't, you actually able to do it by saying no, most of the time. So let's say you have, your boss comes in, and you have three projects, they want to give you two, okay? You have that ethic of wanting to be known as a personal brand of excellence, you have to be able to negotiate and say if I take these two, these other two have to be have to take the backstage, so I can focus on that. You have to be careful with the kind of tasks you take on, you're not just going to be showing up. You're trying to be a VP and all you do during the meetings taking notes. You're not an admin, like what are you doing? Are you doing the non promotable tasks are the promotable task. So even within 40 hours a week, you can show up like a rock star, and get it done?
Stephen McLain:Oh, my gosh, that's incredible. You said promotable tasks versus non promotable tasks. Are you a part of this process? Are you just taking notes? Are you part of the solution? Are you just waiting for somebody to tell you what the answer is? i That's amazing. To continue to communicate that, to the people out there, you know, what are you doing to show up to show your value? That's an incredible message that you could continue to carry, which is what every post that you do on LinkedIn, so I'm encouraging everybody out there, find, find you and watch the read your posts, and then back to yourself and what you're doing at work. I appreciate that. Thank you. There's another thing that I wanted to ask you today. And that's that transition to FPN. A, if you're an accounting professional, I believe that to be ready for senior leader roles in finance, we need well rounded professionals. But moving on from accounting roles to financial planning and analysis can be intimidating for some if the role of F PNA is very different. For example, financial analysts have to find root causes from metrics and KPIs that are not performing. And it often takes looking at not so obvious data. To do so in partnering to dig into extreme details. Please share your advice for making that transition. What skills do you need to develop? And how do you make that transition?
Wassia Kamon:So I'll share first how my transition went. So I was working as back then I was Accounting Manager. And we don't have a FP&A a department and as the company grew, and that became controller, it became okay, you're doing 25% FP&A, because you have to deal with a budget, and then you're doing 75% everything else. And so I started liking the FP&A part because you get to talk to people and I'm an extrovert, I talk a lot. So I was like, Oh, this is so cool. And from then I was like I want to do FP&A 100% And that's when I had I went on to have my first full 100% FP&A role. And I will tell you, the first struggle is letting go of the mindset of he has to be precise. See in accounting, everything has to tie you when you present and you have a framework revenues goes on this line expenses of that line, it goes in this GL so you very used to having structure and having precision, and then you get an F PNA and it's about hey, what do we think the numbers in the next few years are going to be and you're like what do I base it on? Right? I so you start feeling uncomfortable? Because you don't have that exact This is an invoice the accrual is 50% of it like you don't have that precision and so you can feel uncomfortable around. Okay, now I have to track this. Now I have to take non financial metrics. What is that? I'm used to just numbers, what do you mean turn? Like it's a lot of other things that you have to be comfortable with. And I think the first step is embracing the fact that you will be able to thrive in an certainty. Once you have that mindset, then the rest become easy. Because you realize, okay, now I have to connect with people. And that's where the communication skills come handy. Because in accounting, you typically work with people within your department, or when people come to you is really full, a saying the same type of conversation, I need this invoice old set of these vendors. So your communications are very structured, and they don't go into Oh, this is a strategic vision we have for this. How do I record this? Right? So you move from having the right mindset of dealing with uncertainty, to then getting into strategic thinking, and then your communication skill added to your negotiations, right? Because you have to push the business as well as and make decisions. As you partner with them, you also have to challenge them, right? Because we can't just buy things, we have a budget, like we can just do certain things, why are we doing this. So having those soft skills, and being able to also create report that makes sense, because again, we're coming from accounting, there's an ERP that spit out the same report, we have the same roll forward every month. Now that one dashboard, it has to be cute, and presentations. And so you have to start learning all these other tools like Power BI is great, what FPN a tool other using and how you going to present that information in a way that's easy to understand by non accounting people.
Stephen McLain:Absolutely, completely agree what you're what you're saying what I always try to advocate for if you are working on the FPN a side, and you are responding to that particular metric, go find the expert who's actually working that particular metric. And yes, find out everything that he has with that metric, let's say you have to track what was spent for a transportation company will try to get all of the variables that affected fuel price and fuel usage. And then you go talk to that person. And then you go talk to the person who sits next to that person and try to dig and dig and dig and try to find all these root causes of why fuel. Maybe a fuel usage has gone high for the last few months and suddenly drops down to the lower. So the other thing that I that I want you to talk about is when you're going into present, like you said, it's not precise. And you're going to be challenged on your numbers. A senior leader is going to look at what you're presenting, and they're going to try to poke holes in everything you're doing. So how do you respond? How do you build up that resilience when someone's challenging you on your numbers? Oh,
Wassia Kamon:guys such a great question. So to me it start with how you preparing the presentation, okay, I like to have meetings before meetings to understand who will be in attendance and what matters to them. And I poke holes in my own presentation, I'm trying to do it from different viewpoints. I'm trying to get other viewpoints as well on how I'm going to present. And at the end of the day, somebody will always find something, right. And yeah, there will always be somebody that like, Oh, I didn't like this. Okay, I did my best. And I'm comfortable with what I did write, and I have the backup for and the assumptions for all the things that I did. So when I started, I always had like an appendix of other slides. So people could also understand, okay, if you if you want more info about this bar, you can go to appendix like, you know, number 25. Somewhere, that I try to not have too many slides in the presentations, right? But making sure that they understand, okay, this is where the assumptions came from. And really about confidence when you know your numbers and when they're coming from. It shows up. And he goes back to personal branding, right? Okay, this is my brand. I'm all about accidents, I did the work, I did my best.
Stephen McLain:Absolutely. You have to have that confidence, you have to know what methodology you use. You have that backup information, you know how you calculated the number, and you can explain it. And that's really what they're looking for. And most of the time is that how did you come up with this projection? How did you come up with, you know, the explanation of why your metric changed, you know, for the last three or four months and what happened? And that's what that building that confidence going and talking with everybody that has to do with your metric, getting all the background information and coming in with a fact or something that no one else knows that explains why that number may have moved in a certain direction. So I could talk FP and a all day long held people Yeah. And it's, it's quite a, it's quite a transition, I'm also have a background in accounting, and going from that precise to the imprecise and trying to explain how, how something is happening, how, how the business is being affected by this particular metric. It's absolutely amazing. And it's quite an opportunity for someone to like, like really get in and try to figure out and try to support those senior leaders in executing that strategy. So thank you so much for that, for that background. I appreciate you. Yeah. thing. Yeah. One of the other things we want to talk about is leadership. You posted recently on LinkedIn asking if managers were provided with leadership training, before moving on to their new role. Now, this is my biggest passion, growing our leadership skills. How do you see developing leadership skills as a way to advance your career to more senior roles?
Wassia Kamon:Yes, senior roles, it's all about leadership. Because when you are starting out, your performance is based on task. And your ability to work is the task you do as an individual contributor. As you move up, your work is done through relationships, it's not done by you is done by your team, because you cannot do it all. Absolutely. So you have to be able to move from okay, I comfortable because I did it to how do I get my people to be comfortable and do it the right way? How do I motivate them? How do I coach them? How do I make sure they have the tools to do what's needed, because now my work is no longer just my work is our work. And unfortunately, like many people like me, I went from being a senior accountant to be an accounting manager. And I went from being by myself to managing six people, and half of them were older than me. We don't always talk about diversity of age, we always think about color or gender, but different kinds of diversity as well. So I went from being able to do all my stuff. Now I have to lead month in and I have to get people who's more experienced than me, right to follow, like where I want us to go as a team, how do I take in their input? How do we push in push back? And I didn't have any training. So yes, it was hectic. And I find it sad that a lot of managers are thrown into leadership that way. So many times, so many people responded, it happened to me. And there was a study that said that usually people get promoted to their first management role. By the time they're 30. But they only start getting executive coaching and training when they're in the 50s. So you have 20 years of, we're gonna figure it out. And that's how you get micromanagers. That's how you get people being burned out. That's how you have people like me at some point, like, I don't want my boss job. Please all promote me, I don't want your job. Absolutely, because we're trying to figure out, and it shouldn't be that way.
Stephen McLain:Right. So the point is to try to get that leadership training earlier on in the career. So they're equipped with tools and exactly what you're talking about. You're probably leading a team that's diverse, completely different backgrounds from you. And you're trying to motivate and inspire your team to produce excellent work and how do you do that? So that so that comes to my next question is please share some of those leadership tools that you use that a new FPN a or accounting manager can adopt to help lead their team when they face so many requirements, and lots of distractions each day.
Wassia Kamon:For me, the first thing is having support. I can't say that enough, because especially the way things are now and that's how I started my community. People need support, even as you go through because let's say you have the leadership training, right, most of those youth training is what a two day off site. Okay, life is going on. 365 days. So, right. It was great. I learned great concept in the two days. But unfortunately, companies are not always keeping the consultant on to you know, keep that relationship throughout the year. Oh, great, man. You have the two days and the consultant is gone. Okay, what do you do the rest of the time? So finding support is like to me the number one thing, I have a personal board of directors, people that I lean on and I can call it go What should I do? You know, having that support, whether it's a personal board of directors having a coach, in addition to the traditional forms of leadership training is important. You're going to have to read books to accelerate your learning. I'm reading a great one right now called the new kind of diversity by Tim Elmore, all talking about, oh, it's great, great book, it's talking about how we have four or five generations in the workforce on teams, how do you bring them together? Right? So you have to keep educating yourself because things change, like how we talk about di today or not Di? Like there are topics that were not in couple years ago, now they're a thing, how do you adapt to it? To me, you really need to have that support, being able to make lifelong learning a priority. And understanding that you will all you will not always have the the answer. Like it's that's not what leadership is about. It's not like I know it all. I have to know it all. But I have to do my best to support the people I have. So part of it is developing those soft skills saying no is my favorite one negotiation, people are always like you like you like this, too. I'm like, of course, because you come out of school, you know how to pass an audit, you don't know how to negotiate your fees. You don't know how to negotiate your salaries, it's all numbers. But if you don't have that extra extra, how is it? How are you going to make it?
Stephen McLain:Right, right? Absolutely. So you talk about saying no, and you said no, a few minutes ago, too. So when it comes down to working as a finance and accounting professional, you're gonna get requirements thrown at you every day. And one of the things I like to do is ask the priority, how important it may be important to you, you're asking me for these numbers, or this analysis, but I have to then fit it into the bigger picture priority. And then I know I have a certain number of tasks there to do over the next couple of days. Where does your requirement fit into the big picture priority?
Wassia Kamon:Yes. And how do I negotiate for extra help? That's my The thing is, is how do I negotiate not just for me, but to have extra resources to have a better system implemented to have a consultant helping me on this? So a coach helped me go through this. So that's why I love negotiation. Absolutely,
Stephen McLain:no, that's a great, that's a great point, that negotiating for help. Yes, we could talk about that probably the rest of the day to try to figure out how to develop that skill. I think this is something that we all need to really come back and look at is how to negotiate for help the additional tools. Like you said, it could be a consultant, it could be another software analytical tool, or it could be somebody on the team could be a number of number of reasons. Some because because it takes more than us sometimes to answer the big picture question. And I love collaboration. Sometimes people like to get in the office and just kind of like, just sit at their cubicle, and just work all day in an isolated position. And you know, what the person who might have the answer that you're looking for might be sitting right next to you. And until you ask, you're probably not going to get the answer, you're gonna be frustrated all day trying to find an answer. So no, I think that I think you make a great point, that's a great skill, that we all need to continue to grow and develop, you know, the know, especially when it fits into all the other things we're trying to do. And then negotiating for help means when to ask for another tool, or maybe a piece of data, you may be missing in your analysis. So thank you so much, in that, there's another tough topic that I wanted to bring up before we run out of time. Everybody's talking about artificial intelligence, particularly artificial intelligence, when it comes to the Accounting and Finance functions. There's so much talking about it, and it's really shaping, you know, our profession right now. What are your thoughts on AI? And what can accounting and finance professionals to do to prepare for it? Is there going to take jobs away? Or is it going to expand the profession
Wassia Kamon:I think is going to change how we do accounting because AI is truly fascinating. And all the if I can call the derivatives right the things that come out of it the fact that you can just type in a chat and say give me the give me a trend of my last three months like it's already in the it's already happening in some of the SDN a tool, because AI will go through get your actual data and come in. There's two main concerns for me when it comes to AI is one intellectual property and security of the data and or the fact that people may be feeding confidential information into it? How are we going to, you know, monitor that. The second thing is replicating the things we're trying to solve. So if you looking at how people think, because AI is just bringing past, the way we were doing something in the past, and you still need the person to think, Okay, what do I want it to be moving forward? So if you ask AI, for example, to give you a picture of a CFO, and we'll give you an old white male, for example, right, we're trying to get more women to be CFOs. Okay, so we are keep we It looks like we can we will be again, without the right intervention, repeating some of the things that I want my daughter to be like, Hey, you can be all this, if you pay. So these are my main two concern about it. But as far as we'll replace our job, I think it's going to change how we do things. And when you think about it, with less people entering the profession, we need to be more efficient. So if air is going to help, I'm like, please come on. Because if there's not a lot of people to do the work, right, let technology elevate the work that we are currently doing with the resources that we have. So I think there is value in AI, we just have to be mindful of all the other things that we should consider as we implement it. Right?
Stephen McLain:And I think it can, it also emphasizes that continued partnership with it. Because your IT professionals are going to be implementing the technology, the algorithms, the software, and then the hardware, but also how are you building out those sets those datasets? How's it? How's it evaluating the information that's coming in? How's that? How's How's those tables arranged and organized? And I think, I think those are skills, we're going to continue to need to develop and partnering with the, with the IT people what one of the things that I continue to advocate, of course, is partnership with it. Yeah, even in even trying to you know, this isn't necessarily an AI related issue, but continuing to partnering with a with the IT folks to build out your routine solutions. Stuff that you can continue to need to do. I want, you know, analysts and accountants to move beyond your routine reporting, you can probably, probably AI can probably help in this in this situation, where you automate the routine. Yes, you spend more time in analysis and problem solving than pulling data and developing a routine reporting.
Wassia Kamon:Yes, cleaning data, reformatting, reshaping, instead of doing the strategic thinking and all these other great things we could do so yeah,
Stephen McLain:right, right. Absolutely. Again, AI is going to continue to shape, you know, how we view and how we grow in this profession. And it probably needs to be if it's not already put in the university right now. And how you start to adopt and sheep are, and how do you implement AI and start working in that kind of direction? So another thing I wanted to ask you today, you work with the nonprofit organization hope helping other people be empowered. Please share with us what hope does, what's your role? Why does this organization matter? And where can we get more information?
Wassia Kamon:Oh, thank you. So hope is helping single parents complete their education degrees. So a lot of our parents come in and they have to do two three jobs to provide for their families. What we do is allowing them to only have a full time job while completing an education degree so they can able to they can provide and have and really boost the whole community because it's kind of a vicious cycle, right? You live in a certain environment. You cannot afford a home or a car and then you don't have time to spend with your kids and then you not have and then we keep repeating the same cycle and the government cannot do it all. I agree. I'm currently on the board. I'm the treasurer and making sure that we are able to help people because a lot of a lot of them just need a push. We have single we have mom that were stay at home mom recently divorced, didn't do didn't work for like 10 years. And now they in this situation then they go from I was living in a suburban house to not fight in custody for my kids, right. I'm having to reinvent my my you know, my skills have to work two jobs and so We have lawyers that work with us for on the pro bono basis. So we able to at least have dual custody of the kids in those time. While they're able to work. It's not that they don't want to work, right. But they just need help for that season, it could be a year, it could be two years, until they become nurses are able to, you know, go go do something else. But it's really about empowering them and be that person that will stand in the gap for them for this difficult season of their lives. And he has been such a rewarding experience. For me personally, my parents divorced when I was 15. And I saw how my mom wanted to be a PhD, but she had to switch she had to take care of us. And so I understand the struggle. It is to be a single parent trying to provide and having people to come in and just help for that season makes such a big difference. Oh, it
Stephen McLain:absolutely does. Now is hope, particularly in your region where you're at, or is it national, international. So
Wassia Kamon:we bring to other states but we mostly in Georgia, but we starting helping people in different states.
Stephen McLain:Yeah, I mean, I think it's such an incredible organization, I took a look on the website, I think you're doing incredible work. I'm going to put a link to the in the show notes to hope. Thank you. And I just want to encourage everyone who's listening to go look at the website, go take a look. And how can we take this same mission, what hope is doing into every place to where we're, we're living and working. I think it's an incredible work to help people give you a chance to grow and build stand on their own two feet. And I think you're right, the government can't help everywhere. And hope is filling a gap that the government can't be everywhere. And so I appreciate the hard work that hope is doing. It's quite a quite an amazing organization. So thank you for doing that.
Wassia Kamon:Thank you for sharing too.
Stephen McLain:Absolutely. Hey, you mentioned the book earlier, I wanted to ask you, what is a book that you recommend right now for finance and accounting professionals? Oh,
Wassia Kamon:none of them have to do with Excel. And, yeah, there is a great book called data story by Nancy Duarte, about storytelling with numbers. One I love is multipliers by Liz Wiseman. So especially for new leaders how you can grow your team. And then the one I'm reading right now that I can't put down the new kind of diversity. And it's Tim Elmore, fascinating to hear like how management is going to change as Gen Z millennial coming to the coming to place coming to power, quote unquote, and how we can tap into the different strength of different generations rather than fighting. You asked me for one book I'm giving like three I have taught. There is one I always recommend when you're transitioning into a new role the first 90 days. And then if you are moving into your first executive role, I recommend the leadership accelerator by Ajit Campbell, he worked at Deloitte and they were training new executives. And it's so fascinating to go through that book. Because it shows you okay, how do you deal with a person that was passed over for promotion? But that C suite? Like it goes into the issues? And you're like, Oh, I didn't think about that. Um, so great, great, great book to read.
Stephen McLain:Oh, incredible. Love all those recommendations. Thank you for those. I'm gonna go look and see if I have those books. I don't think I've read. I think I've read some of those. But I'm gonna go back and find my copies. If not, I'm getting those copies. Yeah, thank you so much. Thanks. So even so other than work, and your passion with hope, do you have any hobbies? What kind of what do you do for fun?
Wassia Kamon:I eat. Okay, I love cooking. I love cooking and I love cooking different foods. So, um, at some point, I was learning almost all Jamaican recipes. And then he was Indian recipes. And I'll call any friends I have because I love when I talk about diversity, like diversity in my own life as well. And I love trying different foods, different spices and yeah, I just have to pair it with working out. That's my struggle right now. But the thing I do for fun is cooking. And, and my husband does the dishes, do the dishes, so it works well.
Stephen McLain:That's good. Yes. Love that.
Wassia Kamon:Have you do some coaching? Uh huh.
Stephen McLain:Where can we find your resources, your website, coaching opportunities.
Wassia Kamon:So The website is beyond certifications that calm. I currently do like peer to peer mentoring with a community because I had so many requests and my schedule can only accommodate for so much. So we actually had a our monthly live yesterday was awesome. And then I have office hours. So I'll come in. And if you want to join me for a one on one, you feel free to join. But that's how I'm able to share, you know, and helping others in that field. So you can learn more about it on beyond certification.com. I'm also a guest contributor. And I've been a ghostwriter for people's LinkedIn post, which is, yeah, so writing is one of my New Years, I need to get better at writing. So I'm getting all these requests to write articles or to write posts for people that like, he can write four posts for me a month, I'll pay, you just do the full post. I'm like, sure, I like to talk, I'll use your voice. And so I've been able to do that as well, which is critical. And also sharpening my communication skills, right. Because as accountant, we think a certain way, but to be able to do creative writing. And an accountant is actually tough. So I'm, I'm stretching myself that way, and I'm really enjoying it.
Stephen McLain:Oh, that sounds amazing. You have such a heart for people. And I appreciate that. I wish more people would adopt that same philosophy that you're doing, trying to help grow this profession, help people out there who need, you know, a little bit of encouragement, and then also matching up resources to people who needed to get a little help to get a little Yes, starter out there. So thank you so much for being such a beacon of hope and help out there for all of us that are out here. So I appreciate you so much. Thank you so much for joining the podcast. It was an incredible discussion. I wish you the absolute best. And thank you for everything you're doing. And I'm looking for the next LinkedIn post that you're putting us up.
Wassia Kamon:Stephen, thank you so much for having me.
Stephen McLain:All right. Take care. Wow, what incredible insights I really enjoyed this discussion with SIA shared some amazing advice, and she has a real heart for people. Now that is leadership. We all need to apply the insights that we heard today. I can't wait to get her back on a future episode. I hope you enjoyed the finance leader podcast. I am focused on helping this community to become more confident finance leaders capable of transforming organizations. You can find this episode wherever you listen to podcasts. If this episode helped you today, please share with a colleague and leave a quick review. Until next time, you can check out more resources at finance ninja academy.com and sign up for my weekly updates so you don't miss an episode of the podcast. And now go lead your team. And I'll see you next time. Thank you