Marsha Leest is a nationally recognized expert in the field of accounting firm marketing. She has an extensive background in accounting and law firm marketing as well as in professional publishing. Her experience as an in-house marketing director for a top 25 accounting and business consulting firm coupled with the knowledge she gained as a consultant to the industry gives her a unique perspective of the industry, how it works and how it is evolving. Many leading experts in the industry look to her for advice and guidance.

Leest is the author of the Fourth and Fifth editions of How to Manage Your Accounting Practice, published by Wolters Kluwer, as well as various articles in industry publications. She is also the editor of CCH’s CPA Practice Management Forum, a monthly journal dedicated to covering all areas of managing a CPA firm in today’s complex business environment.

For several years, she served on the Executive Council of New York City's High School of Economics and Finance, and is a Board Member of the New York City Chapter of the Association for Accounting Marketing and a Member of the Communications Committee of the National Association of Accounting Marketing.

Gary Shamis became managing partner of SS & G Financial Services in 1985. Since then, the firm has changed dramatically. By taking an entrepreneurial approach to managing the accounting firm, he has developed SS&G Financial Services into one of the largest and fastest growing independently owned accounting/business service firms in the country.

Shamis' concepts for growth and expansion are respected and emulated by both professional peers and business organizations. The firm has won eleven Weatherhead 100 Awards (Cleveland), ten Cascade CDC Growth Awards (Akron), an Achievement in Client Service Award (Cincinnati), two Accounting Today Awards for Achievement in Client Service, and has been noted as one of Bowman's Accounting Report's top ten fastest growing firms in the United States. SS&G Financial Services has also been chosen a Best Places to Work in Ohio in 2008, 2007 and 2006, and is a recipient of the Better Business Bureau Torch Awards for Business Integrity.

In addition to his management duties, Shamis is a frequent speaker, all over the world, on the management of professional service organizations. In 2000, he teamed up with three of the industry's top advisors to form The Advisory Board, a think-tank focused on assisting and developing the accounting industry within the United States. As the only practicing CPA in the group, he brings a wealth of experience and qualifications. For example, Shamis has been recognized in the Wall Street Journal and the Journal of Accountancy for creating the nation's first Employee Stock Ownership Program for an accounting firm.

After completing his term as the Chairman of the AICPA Management of an Accounting Practice (MAP) committee, he was busy developing and chairing The Leading Edge Alliance, the a prominent association of CPA firms. With more than 150 member firms and collective revenues exceeding $1.7 billion, The Leading Edge Alliance has become one of the world's premier organizations for independent and entrepreneurial firms. Based upon these contributions to the industry, Shamis was named as one of Accounting Today's "Most Influential People" for the past nine years, and was chosen as the Institute of Management Accountants' 2001 Financial Executive of the Year. Shamis serves on the Advisory Board of CPA Practice Management Forum.

Jay N. Nisberg, Ph.D. is an internationally recognized management consultant to the CPA community. Well known for his work in practice management, partnership issues and business development, he is a frequent speaker at MAP conferences around the world.

His work encompasses consultation on the development of the firm by means of encouragement of growth in its individual members. He is also concerned with professional services marketing, communications, both verbal and written, including professional influencing skills and partner and staff attitudes as well as practice imaging.

Jay's areas of expertise include partner retreats, marketing the firm's services, partnership agreements, client satisfaction surveys as well as mergers and acquisitions among CPA firms.

His specialties are in performing as a consultant to partnerships and in designing partner-in-training programs for accounting professionals. His work has included acting as a discussion leader and professional development coordinator for the American Institute for Certified Public Accountants and as a lecturer in accounting and management at several state and local societies as well as universities and colleges.

Presently president of his own management consulting firm, Jay has been consulting to CPA firms for nearly 20 years and has worked for national, regional and local practices.

Jay has had extensive experience in strengthening partnership relations and firm management. He has been a consultant to numerous major corporations including General Motors Corp., RCA Corporation and the White House. He is frequently quoted as an expert on accounting issues in such newspapers as the Wall Street Journal, Accounting Today, and Public Accounting Report. He is the author of two nationally known business reference books published by Random House as well as being the contributing author of the Guide to Buying & Merging CPA Firms section of Practitioners Publishing Company's Strategic Practice Issues Resource Series.

Jay is the founder of the Accountants Financial Services Group which provides consultation to CPA firms on the financial services industry niche and is on the Editorial Advisory Boards of Accounting Today and CPA Practice Management Forum.