VSCPA 2030: The future is now

By Stephanie Peters, CAE

Eight years ago, VSCPA leaders, members and staff set out to craft a strategic plan to propel the Society into the next decade. VSCPA 2025, launched with four bold strategies, was our guiding light; its structure provided the outline we needed to double down on the most important issues to Virginia CPAs.

But then, we blinked. 2025 no longer seemed like a distant, aspirational year. As we now move into the 2024–2025 fiscal year, we knew it was time to reset and reimagine our strategic objectives. Last year’s Board of Directors, led by Board Chair Jennifer Lehman, CPA, spent the year collecting member feedback, reviewing key themes in small task forces, and diving deep into all the factors affecting the accounting profession of today and the future. The result is VSCPA 2030, an exciting new framework we’ll use over the coming years to guide our goals and ambitions.

A mission and vision for the future

We’re already proud of our mission: To empower our members to thrive. But through last year’s discussions, VSCPA leaders realized that we actually do more than just focus on our members. While the VSCPA membership is always our No. 1 focus, we’re also committed to future CPAs — who aren’t our members yet — as well as making a difference on the national stage to ensure the success of the entire profession. So we made a tweak to enhance our mission to reflect the full breadth of our influence:

Similarly, our vision was revised to reflect the evolving CPA profession and reality of working in a quickly changing business landscape.

We know the full range of CPAs’ skills, and as technology and things like artificial intelligence rapidly evolves how, where and when work gets done, CPAs will be asked more and more to be business’s trusted strategic advisors. CPAs of the future will lean into their strong relationships, ability to connect with people, and ability to effectively communicate and interpret information. This vision reflects the CPA profession of the future.

Our principles

As the Board task forces reviewed the bold strategies from VSCPA 2025 (see below), they made a key observation: Those strategies are no longer what we strive to do — they are what we do, ingrained in what the Society does every day, in every program.

VSCPA 2025 bold strategies

We’re not saying goodbye to our old strategies; they’re now part of what we stand for and what we do. They support our mission and vision and are core to who we are as an organization and a profession

Create a culture of learning: The VSCPA will foster a culture of learning that enhances leadership and technical skills of CPAs and elevates their strategic competencies to provide the highest value, influence and impact.
Drive innovation and vision: The VSCPA will provide a suite of information and resources to empower members to grow their innovative and visionary leadership.
Influence students to become CPAs: The VSCPA will ensure a strong pipeline of future CPAs by motivating the best and brightest students to make the profession their home.
Advocate for members’ interests: The VSCPA will advocate for Virginia CPAs in legislative and regulatory arenas and protect their long-standing reputation.
Increase diversity, equity and inclusion in the profession: The VSCPA will work to increase the number of unrepresented minorities in the profession by creating awareness and promoting an inclusive culture. (Note: This strategy was added in 2019 following the initial launch of the VSCPA 2025 plan.)

Now, those areas are embedded into our key VSCPA principles of what we stand for (innovation, learning, quality, service, diversity) and what we do (advocacy, education, community, and value). See below.

Innovation and agility: We drive innovative solutions, create new ideas and business models, take smart risks, and leverage technology that challenges the status quo.
Continuous growth and learning: We promote curiosity and a lifelong desire to build future-forward knowledge and skills.
Exceptional quality and service: We deliver high-value, high-quality services to ensure a professional, positive experience.
Diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging: We foster a collaborative, inclusive community that values, recognizes, reflects and connects a diversity of people, cultures and perspectives.

Advocate for CPAs: We advocate for the CPA profession, protect their professional interests and longstanding reputation, and promote accounting as a fulfilling career path.
Build knowledge: We build knowledge and expertise by providing content, ideas, learning experiences and resources for CPAs of today and tomorrow.
Create community: We connect people and foster long lasting relationships in a diverse, welcoming community.
Provide transformational value: We offer transformational solutions and value based on deep relationships and broad, strategic insights.

Our strategic priorities

Now that we agree on who we are, what we do, and what we stand for, what now? It turns out there’s a lot to be done to protect and promote the accounting profession to achieve our vision for the future, and the Board outlined three new and exciting strategic directives to meet these aspirations — while building on our recent successes.

1. Influence people to become and remain CPAs.

Yes, the pipeline challenges facing the profession aren’t going away any time soon, so we aren’t backing away from the challenge. Over the past few years, we’ve communicated with you about our many pipeline-related initiatives, from conversations on the 150-hour requirement to expanding the CPAs in the Classroom program.

To continue our pipeline focus, we aim to:

Implement talent initiatives to inspire students and other professionals to not just join the CPA profession but stay.
Encourage diverse students to consider careers in accounting.
Guide CPA leaders and managers to implement workplace culture, recruitment and retention best practices to attract and keep high-quality talent.

We plan to promote the CPA profession as a rewarding career path among pre-college students, including underserved communities, by building upon CPAs in the Classroom and expanding our virtual career exploration event for students.

For college-aged students, we aim to cultivate a culture on campus in which students are exposed to and understand the benefits of the CPA designation by increasing faculty outreach. We also want to encourage and support non-traditional students to enter the profession, and we’ll identify more opportunities for matches in the VSCPA Mentoring Program.

Finally, we’ll provide the resources, training and content CPAs need to ensure their workplaces are welcoming and inclusive — places where new graduates want to work and current professionals want to stay. We’re launching a new Workplace of the Future Summit, continuing our Virginia Compensation & Benefits Study, and offering new diversity webinars hosted by the VSCPA Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Council.

2. Foster connections and prepare the CPA of the future.

Post-pandemic, we’re hearing more and more that you want to feel connected and building and fostering relationships is a critical CPA competency. Newer professionals want networking and mentoring opportunities, seasoned professionals want to continue to upskill and enhance their people skills, and members at all levels want to volunteer and give back to the profession. To that end, we will:

Build a connected community of professionals to encourage relationship-building, mentoring, networking, and public service.
Prepare the profession to become leaders who are strong relationship builders and stellar communicators.

We will develop pathways for members to connect, both with each other but also with other stakeholders in the profession. What does that look like? We have lots of ideas, from expanding roundtables and peer learning to partnering with other organizations and associations to bringing back in-person networking events post-pandemic.

As mentioned earlier, we will have more volunteer opportunities available with CPAs in the Classroom, but we want to engage and grow our entire volunteer base, especially with new and young professionals. An engaged, happy volunteer foundation is essential for a thriving association.

Additionally, we must ensure CPAs have the leadership and people skills (like communication, negotiation and management) they’ll need to succeed in the transforming world of work. We’ll launch new leadership education and bring you timely, relevant content designed to evolve CPAs’ skillsets.

3. Pursue business model innovation to deliver member value.

The future of all businesses, no matter the industry, is changing. We’re all responding to the rapid rise of new technologies like AI, and the VSCPA is no exception. To ensure we have a solid, valuable future for our organization and for you, we must consistently innovate and explore ventures and initiatives that not only safeguard our stability but deliver exceptional member value. We plan to:

Reflect the evolving CPA profession by engaging in new ventures, implementing new business models, and showcasing operational excellence.
Support CPAs’ changing needs and model innovation by offering transformational member value.

Last fall, we acquired Don Farmer Tax Education so we could maintain this valuable educational program for our members and also expand our educational offerings to ensure our financial viability. In the next few years, we will ensure Don Farmer remains successful by onboarding new instructors and authors and also strengthen its national brand to better serve members and customers across the country.

With the changing association environment comes a variety of possible models for membership, such as firm and organizational memberships and other innovative ideas. We will make decisions on the best way to serve our members now and in the future while continuing to provide value.

Finally, we plan on leveraging new and emerging technologies to drive VSCPA and CPA relevancy. Whether it’s staying on the pulse of AI with guidance and learning for our members or onboarding new technology systems to enhance online learning, we plan to continue to focus on remaining technologically relevant.

The dream team

If this sounds like a lot, that’s because it is! But it’s nothing our team can’t handle. We have an incoming Board of Directors and slate of member volunteers dedicated to making VSCPA 2030 a success, and new Chair Christine Williamson, CPA, is focused on our strategic priorities, goals and measured outcomes.

“The VSCPA Board is committed to this new strategic framework, and we’re excited to hit the ground running,” Christine says. “With all of our member volunteers and the VSCPA staff, we are poised for great success on these initiatives starting this fiscal year. Stay tuned for our plans and how you can join in!”

We are also very lucky to have a knowledgeable and “seasoned” staff — several of whom have been here between 20 and 30 years! That means your association is in great hands, with leaders ready to take action on these objectives and pivot on a moment’s notice to meet your needs.

The final piece of the dream team is always … you. Your membership allows us to continue to do amazing things, from sending members to middle schools to introduce students to accounting for the first time to engaging with the AICPA and NASBA on real solutions to pipeline challenges. Your support, leadership, communication and volunteerism is always appreciated and honored.

VSCPA President & CEO Stephanie R. Peters, CAE, leads the organization on national and state professional issues, legislative and regulatory activities, and external relations. She joined the Society in 1997 and became CEO a decade later. She has received the Virginia Society of Association Executives’ CEO Award of Excellence.