The Biggest Issues Facing the Profession—Third Quarter 2025
The Biggest Issues Facing the Profession
Brien K. Jones
Chief Operations Officer and Executive Vice President of Business Development
Client trust.
Disruptive technology.
Data integrity.
The commoditization of professional services.
As a practicing business valuation or financial forensic analyst, you are dealing with big and complex issues.
Overlay performance expectations in a multi-generational workforce, keeping up with regulatory updates, and developments to professional standards and ethics ... where do you go for solid guidance?
Expert practitioners, judges, trial attorneys, academicians, economists, and professional service marketing consultants will address the biggest issues and opportunities facing the profession.
You do not have to register for the entire conference to access individual sessions. View the agenda and register today for individual sessions.
Seize the opportunity to sharpen your skills. You will be equipped with actionable insights and competitive advantages to employ in your practice.
Here are the Top 10 Biggest Issues and Opportunities being explored at the conference next week.
Whether you plan to attend or not, you must get a handle on these critical matters.
#10 Reducing Your Client's Exposure to the IRS
Bruce Wood will uncover frequent triggers and discuss measures to reduce your client’s exposure and protect them against appraisal challenges, whether audit, appeal, or U.S. Tax Court.
#9 Connecting with the Workforce
Attracting, developing, and retaining staff are no easy feats. Robert Carter and Samantha Fisher will analyze the challenges employers face to provide insights towards building a stable workforce.
#8 Going Solo
Sarah Greifenberger, a PTA mom-turned-valuation professional, and Greg Clark, an active dad and business valuation and financial consulting expert, will share personal stories about what it takes to build a successful firm from the ground up and what it takes to maintain it.
#7 Combatting Elder Fraud
The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center reported Americans over 60 lost $3.4 billion to scams—an increase of 11% from 2022. Losses surged by 43% in 2024, with older Americans losing nearly $5 billion. Tatevik Torossian will uncover forensic accounting techniques to protect our seniors' financial future.
#6 Economic and Industry Analysis, Approaches, and Discounts
In this interactive session and through a semi-case study approach, Jeff Harwell will challenge attendees to think and question valuation best practices, offering new perspectives, tools, and resources.
#5 Cryptocurrency
Two conference sessions will address this topic.
Brad Sargent and James Spencer will lay the foundation of popular cryptocurrencies and exchanges, and as cryptocurrencies become a more common asset found in marital estates, they will provide guidance on how to approach asset tracing and valuation within these estates.
Dorothy Haraminac will discuss blockchain forensics and cryptocurrency valuation, with tips, practice tools, and alerts to mitigate common pitfalls.
#4 Artificial Intelligence
Several sessions will delve into the rapidly evolving technology.
Offering perspectives from the bench, a panel of judges from the American College of Business Court Judges—Judge Timothy Driscoll, Judge Steven Platt, and Judge Christopher Yates, with Michael Kaplan moderating—will examine how the triers of fact respond to the application and reliance upon AI.
Further exploring AI's implications for valuation and forensic practice, Karen Lascelle will address professional standards and ethics.
Colin Brown will lead a dynamic live demonstration showing exactly how you can harness the power of AI to grow your practice.
Enrique Brito will uncover how emerging technologies are revolutionizing middle-market M&A.
#3 Client Representations in Expert Work
Client-provided information is essential in every expert engagement, but how much reliance is appropriate? How should that reliance be disclosed, tested, or limited? How do you frame these based on the nature of the engagement? Michael Pakter will explore practical and ethical considerations and how to tailor your approach to varying types of engagements.
#2 Marketing Professional Services
Your customers are using search, social, and emerging artificial intelligence platforms to find the very services you offer.
Are you prepared to reframe your understanding of business development success? Greg Chambers will illuminate what separates successful business developers from the rest.
Larry Balin will dive into critical thinking on how businesses must become conditioned to win even when it seems like the sky is falling, providing insights into developing engaging and intriguing marketing messages that convert, and platforms that will work for your business objectives.
#1 The Global Economy and Markets
Economic growth. Downgraded.
Capital spending plans. Delayed.
M&A and IPO. Stalling.
Tariffs. Deregulation. Immigration.
Heightened uncertainty creates challenges in planning for the future and makes the estimation of future cash flow difficult.
Carla Nunes and Jim Harrington, from Kroll, will explain how the Trump administration's global economic and policy insights are shaping markets, the drivers of company value, and cost of capital assumptions and valuation analyses.
These sessions and more will be covered at the upcoming conference.
Register now to attend the full conference in-person in Salt Lake City, or virtually, or view the conference agenda to register for and attend individual sessions.
- View the agenda. Register for individual sessions.
- Register to attend the full conference in person.
- Register to attend the full conference virtually.
- Learn more about Tri-Annual Recertification.
