Trek and Travel - Moss Adams: The Next Chapter

This past Monday evening, I stayed at the Hotel Monaco in Seattle, Washington.  The king room of this four-star hotel booked for me was paid for by the regional accounting firm, Moss Adams, LLP.  It features a king-sized bed in a 300 square foot room with a 42-inch LG flat screen TV, a desk and chair, closet with cheetah-print robe and iron and ironing board, and a full bathroom.  And a very long hallway!  Very swanky room. My room at Hotel Monaco was on the 7th floor facing 4th Avenue.

A few blocks away is the Moss Adams firm in the Wells Fargo building on the 28th floor.  I went there for interviews starting at 8:30 am on Tuesday morning.  There were many candidates there, about 20-25 I want to say.  We each varied in the positions we were vying for: internships, tax staff, audit staff.  We ranged from college juniors going after internships as well as college seniors and graduate school students seeking out full-time positions in audit or tax.  I was personally seeking out a tax position, but was open to an audit position as well if the professionals felt it was better suiting.

The central structure is the Wells Fargo building in Seattle.  Moss Adams LLP is currently located on the 28th floor.

They paired up the candidates with a pair of professionals.  The professionals were one from audit and one from tax.  I was paired up with a candidate named Steven from Arizona, who was attending graduate school and was in Seattle for the week conducting various interviews for a position in audit.  We four walked over to a coffeeshop called Pegasus Coffee, which is apparently Seattle's oldest coffee bar.  Our interviews here were very casual.  We mostly learned about the two professionals' perspectives on the culture of the Seattle firm.  They did get to hear about mine and Steven's previous work experience though.  And the coffee was very good.

After we finished up our coffees, we walked back to the Moss Adams firm to have our formal interviews conducted.  Two professionals interviewed us.  They were different ones, and the interview was one-on-one.  The first professional interviewing me was hard for me to read.  He has a good poker face.  We talked at length about providing quality service and about my previous work experiences as a tax intern at Fruci and Associates, PS and as a front desk agent at a Holiday Inn Express and Suites.  The second professional was very friendly and smiley, and we talked at length about being busy-bodies and not liking to be idle.  We also talked a lot about volunteer service, especially about my past trip to Jamaica over my spring break.

After that, we candidates were all dismissed for our lunch breaks.  We reconvened at the Columbia Center tower on the 75th floor for schmoozing and for a last chance to impress more of the firm's professionals.  A tax partner found me (it almost seemed like he was looking for me) and spoke to me for about twenty-five minutes about how suitable the tax profession would be for me.  I was trying to stay humble and talk about how I know I already like doing tax work but that I am still open to audit should the firm hire me.  But the amount of time and effort he took for convincing me to tax made me feel really good about possibly being accepted for a full-time position.  He soon said he had to get going, and he gave me his business card before he left the building.  I'm not sure if he spoke to many other candidates while he was there!  Later on, the female professional from the formal interview found me and we chatted some more.  I told her about a serious cheer accident I had two years ago involving an uncaught back tuck basket right before mid-terms week.  She was fairly impressed I was alive!  Later on, I was in a circle of two professionals and two other candidates chatting about the possibility of Moss Adams expanding to the East Coast.  One was a SALT partner (a State And Local Tax partner) and the other professional was an audit partner.  I noticed that the SALT partner would hold longer eye contact with me over the other two candidates.  I barely got to input into the conversation (I was getting hungry and drowsy), but I was also trying to keep myself from over-analyzing.  Soon, the social was declared over.  The SALT partner was finishing up a conversation with one of the other candidates, shook the guy's hand, turned to me and shook my hand, and then offered me his business card.  He did not offer it to the other two candidates standing right there.

The tall black building in the center is the Columbia Center tower.  It is 76 stories high and is currently the largest structure in the Seattle cityscape.

After that, I hung out with my boyfriend at his house on Capitol Hill, changed out of my business suit, and watched Parks and Rec on Netflix.  Soon, it was time to depart to the Sea-Tac International Airport and take a 10:05 pm Alaska Airlines flight back to Spokane so I could resume my classes with the rest of the student body of Whitworth University.
Last night while I was working at the college cafeteria, I missed a call and received a voicemail from a different tax partner whom I have not yet met.  She stated that she wanted to touch bases with me about my candidacy for Moss Adams.  She also sent me an email restating her voicemail and also saying that she can take my return phone call until 7:30 pm that night.  I did not get off work until 8:16 pm, unfortunately for me!  I was so stressed out!  I could not tell from the tone of her voice if she was going to bring me good or bad news.  I tried to reason with myself - surely, she would have just emailed me if the firm decided to decline me.  They would not waste their time with phone calls and voicemails just to reject me, right?  But I also did not want to get my hopes up, just in case.  I took a shower when I got back to my room and played music on my phone.  And then I dropped my phone in the shower and the shower stream water got behind my screen, rendering my touch screen iPhone 5S completely useless.  I have listened to music in the shower nearly every night since I have been at Whitworth - WHY did it have fall over at this time!?
I was in a panic!  How could I call back the partner and hear back about my candidacy?  Luckily, I have been a lot better with my finances this year than in previous years.  I asked my suitemate if I could borrow her car to jet to Walmart to purchase a new prepaid phone.  I got the LG Lucky with StraightTalk for only $30.  It's a touch screen phone too.  But it definitely does not compare to the iPhone.

Today, I called the partner back at 10:59 am.  She was just exiting a conference.  She told me that the Moss Adams CPAs I interviewed with were extremely impressed with me and that Moss Adams would like to offer me a full-time position in tax.


I am one of Moss Adams LLP's newest tax staff hires in their Seattle office!  My start date will be in January 2017.  This is my dream job.  I have been vying for Moss Adams ever since an acquaintance of mine told me about his recruitment process for an internship with them during my freshman year.  Now, I am among their ranks and I could not be more excited to begin work!

NW Summer Stunt Fest 2014

So on July 27, I travelled to West Seattle for a cheer festival!  It's basically an event for people in the area to get together and stunt.  I met a guy fron Gonzaga University and I did a toss to hands!  Here's a mini photo dump:

Peter Sullivan LLP Summer Leadership Cruise 2014

I didn't take too many photos, as this cruise on Argosy's Lady Mary was a networking event with accounting professionals.  I didn't want to come off as that girl.

So on Wednesday, July 30, I drove two hours from my house to Bainbridge Island to park the car, got on the ferry as a walk-on passenger (it's free fare this way), and then walked to Pier 55 from the Seattle terminal on Alaskan Way.  There were already many people there - professionals and hopeful potentials who were undergraduate and graduate college students.  They had a table set up where they were handing out free sunglasses (I'm wearing them in the photo) and name tags with your first and last name above your college logo.  I was the only one from Whitworth University, so I knew no one and didn't have much of an idea of how to approach anyone.  I didn't bother with the other students as I didn't want to waste my time socializing when I came all this way to network.

So while we, sixty hopefuls, cruised on the Lady Mary with forty professionals, I made a new friend named Becky, who came to the States from Rwanda in Agrica to get her college education, is a graduate from a Georgia college, and is going to be studying for her Masters in Auditing this year at the University of Washington. One of the campus recruiters, Mr. Togami, saw me as I climbed the stairs to the upper deck and sought me out.  He is the campus recruiter for Spokane!  Mr. Togami explained this when he saw my confusion at his knowing my name - he's been speaking with Whitworth's Outside Internship Director about the university's annual accounting internship recruiting event.  He introduced himself, then Becky and I introduced myself, and then we all talked about travel.  Then he gave us his business card, requested for our resumes, and then he suggested I crash Gonzaga University's accounting recruiting event if he is unable to make it to the Whitworth campus.

Then we all took a seat in the lower deck to listen to Seattle University's head women's basketball coach, Joan Bonvicini, give a speech on leadership.  During her speech, she asked for volunteers to come up and give an example of leadership.  I was the last one to go up, and I shared an example involving my work in the hotel and how I sometimes have to take charge when there is no supervisor or manager on site, and how I take the time to chat with people from other departments and listen to their concerns.  I didn't stutter when I spoke, I had good posture, my voice didn't waver or fade, I didn't use any crutch words such as "like" or "um," and I even got the 100-ish people to laugh.  After Coach B ended her speech, several professionals came up to me to introduce themselves and asked me to tell more about my working at the hotel.  One of the professionals who approached me is a senior partner with Peter Sullivan LLP.  He has CPA, CHIA, and CM+AA certifications (Certified Public Accountant, Certification in Hotel Industry Analytics, and Certified Merger and Acquisition Advisor).  So his CHIA certification is a major part of what made him perk up when I spoke up with my example.  He gave me his business card, requested for my resume, and then we talked about the hospitality industry.  He and I also spoke about ethics and hospitality in general.  Then I met up with Becky again, and we got some ice cream that was being served on the upper deck.  When the Lady Mary docked back in to Pier 55, Becky and I went to a nearby Starbucks and talked for a good while until it was for us to go home.

It was definitely a wonderful day and this cruise went better than I imagined for myself, I made new contacts, and I made a new friend.