CEO's Message: Always Moving Forward—Fourth Quarter 2024

I wish I had time to share with our membership everything that is in the works at Headquarters (HQ), because I do not think you would believe it. Sometimes, even I struggle to fathom it all and track it. It all has one fundamental purpose and that is improving support for our members. If it is not a new product or service, it is upgrading our infrastructure to streamline operations so as to enhance our service and responsiveness to members. I have said this before and will say it again, NACVA is not like other associations because we cover (or strive to) every need a member could conceive of. On the scale of association size (AICPA, ACFE, CFAI, etc.), we might be considered small, though we operate at a scale of size like no other. Our team at HQ can attest to this. The purpose of this message is to alert you to a few happenings of which you will be interested:

First Announcement—Over the last year, NACVA’s Valuation Credentialing Board (VCB) (click here for a list of members) has been working on an update to our CVA Core Body of Knowledge for Business Valuations (BOK). It started with a meeting of 11 Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) (Sarah von Helfenstein, Timothy Murray, Ashok Abbott, C. Zachary Meyers, Walter Blijleven, Stephen Kirkland, Yan Gindin, Alan Gorlick, Marty Abo, Richard Reynolds, and Wolfgang Kniest) in Ft. Lauderdale last December who carefully dissected our BOK and made some very astute modifications and a few additions. This new document was then extensively reviewed by our VCB before they sent their refinements back to the SMEs for further consideration, after which it went back to the VCB. The final stage of updating required a survey of our members (2,000 were solicited) to get their input, feedback, and buy-in. In the final stage, the VCB reviewed the survey feedback, made some additional minor changes to the BOK, and unanimously voted to approve. It should be noted, in the survey of our 2,000 members, that over 90% of the respondents approved of the BOK as was written, and the minor changes made pursuant to the survey were based on respondents’ comments. I would like to express my deep appreciation to all our members who supported this process and am proud to share with you NACVA’s new BOK (click here).

Second Announcement—In 2018, in response to a devastating hurricane in the south-east portion of the country, NACVA created a new policy allowing members who were affected by this disaster whose recertification was due that year to request (in writing) from HQ a deferral in their December 31 calendar year-end recertification filing/compliance for up to six months, giving them until June 30 of the following year. Most certainly, the most recent hurricanes (Helene and Milton) to hit the south-east this year qualify as major disasters, and we want all members affected to know that they can extend their recertification filing to June 30, 2025. It is important to note two things:

1. We at HQ are not qualified to determine whether you were affected, meaning even if you were not in the path of the hurricanes or saw any damage to your property, that does not mean you were not affected. You may have relatives, friends, or clients that needed your help/support. You may have volunteered your support. You may have been without electricity for an extended time. Essentially, the decision on whether you were affected is for you to determine, not us.
2. There are all kinds of disasters/devastations around the country and the world (for our international members) that affect and upset our members’ lives and work that we do not know about because they did not draw the attention that Helene and Milton did. As such, this policy extends to any member up for recertification in the current year, who has experienced some form of disaster, natural and otherwise, anywhere they reside, to request (in writing) an extension of time to complete their required recertification. The policy regarding this can be found here. 

Third Announcement—I am proud to announce NACVA has a new Executive Director, Melissa Cardwell, Executive Director and Director of Project Management. Many of you know Melissa, but what few know is Melissa has been with NACVA almost since the beginning (27 years), having started here in 1997 as our receptionist. From the beginning, Melissa set the standard for good to excellent work performance excelling as a receptionist and establishing the standard from which all others have been compared. A few years into her career at NACVA, she asked to be transferred into our research arm now known as KeyValueData (KVD). There she excelled as a research assistant, taking on dozens of tasks and doing such an excellent job that we kept giving her more and more work to do. Eventually, I selfishly decided I wanted Melissa closer to me and working on NACVA matters instead of KVD because she had proven herself to be just too valuable.

Once again, an employee of NACVA, we gave her more and more responsibilities where she continued to excel and set high bars for our team to aspire to. I should mention, though Melissa has continually, to this day, taken on increasing levels of responsibility, she has never once complained. Plus, she is always calm and always professional in all her dealings. I have been and continue to be amazed by how much she can handle but know in great part it is because she is one of the most organized people I know, and she finds ways to creatively streamline and automate processes that make her increasingly efficient. 12 years ago, I came to realize that Melissa’s fingers were in just about every NACVA pie. This was because of her diversity and the broad range of projects we had her working on, and as such, I had been involving her in just about every meeting I had with our departments/teams, i.e., sales, marketing, exam/recertification, accounting, publications, you name it. Consequently, it seemed the appropriate thing to do was to promote Melissa to Director level at HQ, where she continued her trajectory to even higher levels. We have been without an Executive Director for a few years, and it makes perfect sense to give that role to Melissa; she has earned it. She is my go-to person on so many things, I cannot count them all. Melissa knows more about NACVA, inside and out, than pretty much anyone. Please join me in congratulating Melissa in her new role as NACVA’s Executive Director, her e-mail is MelissaC1@NACVA.com.

Thank you for your continued support and as always, I am available to all members for your input, advice, and questions at Parnell1@NACVA.com.