Employee Spotlight: Mark Ma

Before putting down roots in California, Financial Analyst Mark Ma spent much of his life residing in various parts of the world. Reflecting on his experiences from China to Dublin to Kansas City to Los Angeles, one thing remained the same: Mark’s love for numbers and his ability to adapt. This has shaped his versatile, well-rounded approach to tasks and projects at Gelfand, Rennert and Feldman (GRF).

Mark’s journey began in China, where he was born and raised. As a child, Mark already knew he had an affinity for numbers.

“When I was tiddle, one of my favorite toys was my granddad’s abacus. I used to watch him do some calculation on it by moving beads and self-mumbling (the formulars),” he says. “That was pretty much about how I started to find mathematic so attractive.“

After scoring high marks in his math classes, Mark’s parents opted to send him to college in an English-speaking country: Ireland. This provided the first of several “culture shocks” that Mark underwent in life, and the first of several that he successfully overcame. He went on to meet his wife in college, and the two married several years later.?

Mark fondly recalls how a summer job as a bartender on the north side of Dublin city provided some valuable workplace experience.

“That was my real ‘social’ practice and where I learned how to communicate, read people and serve different customers,” Mark recalls. “At summertime every Saturday night, I got to pour a perfect pint of English Ale called ‘Bass’ with a special Guinness Head on the top and brought it to one of my regular customers, whose daytime job was Irish Prime Minister. Yes, the Taoiseach!”

Mark noticed that multinational entities were flocking to Ireland to set up their headquarters, seemingly drawn by the 1/8 corporate tax rate at the time, which afforded him ample job opportunities. Once he graduated with his Master’s degree in Accounting and Finance, Mark landed a role with a Top 10 accounting firm in Dublin as a Junior Audit Associate.?

“The professional job training I received was great. I learned well-standardized audit and financial reporting procedures, documentation skills and other professional knowledge.”

Mark’s wife later had an opportunity to relocate to Kansas City for work, which brought the pair to the States. Mark soon snagged a role at a local PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) office as a Financial Auditor. Looking back, Mark describes the move as the second major shift in his life.

“Moving from Dublin to Kansas City began my second culture shock,” he says. “I still remember the first day we arrived in Kansas City… I walked into Panera Bread for lunch. After I placed my order, the cashier asked me, ‘Do you want chips with it?’ I replied, ‘Yes.’ When she dropped me a bag of potato chips, I was still standing there and waiting for my fries until I realized that the terms ‘chips’ and ‘fries’ in Ireland have a different meaning than here.”

After a few years in the Midwest, in mid-2014, Mark’s family relocated to Los Angeles. They originally settled in Downtown Los Angeles, but ventured around town and felt drawn to the region of Century City. They decided to purchase a home in Century City a short time later.

Thus, when GRF called Mark to offer him a position in its Century City office, Mark felt the ‘chips’ were falling into place once again.

“I was so excited that my workplace would be just two blocks away from where I live and I no longer needed to drive 33 miles each way, every day, in LA.”

Joining the firm marked another pivot for Mark. He had years of work experience from multiple accounting practices, but was switching gears from external financial auditing to internal financial reporting. Ultimately, this proved to be a smooth transition. Mark took time to study the firm’s internal resources on its ERP system, including various manuals, and his team familiarized him on industry specifics and reporting capabilities.?

His work expanded to preparing financial information for management meetings, given the firm’s shift toward more comprehensive financial analysis and planning for its many clients in the entertainment field. Mark notes that tailoring data per stakeholders’ needs and expectations is key in providing meaningful and impactful data.

“When I need to perform analysis or forecast with sensitive information, I keep my mind on the ‘end user-focused’ approach, enhancing proper communication and ensuring the data accuracy and privacy are in place.”

Mark has witnessed advanced data processing tools (SQL, Python, R) and business intelligence tools (Power BI, Tableau) being broadly introduced to the modern accounting world over the past decade - mainly in Big 4 CPA firms but also at Gelfand, Rennert and Feldman.?

“The traditional accounting, financial reporting, tax and business management services procedures are experiencing a reforming in this new world with big data,” Mark shares. “GRF is also a pioneer in this market. We launched Tableau server and online access, which help the internal management team and external clients to timely visualize the interactive financial and/or operational information. We also launched R programming that will help us on service/procedure automation, performance measurement and marketing development by analyzing our system data.”

Though the introduction of AI has caused some in the accounting world to fear the longevity of their practice, Mark is doubtful that Accountants will cease to be. Rather, he predicts more shifts to come to the industry, and he welcomes whatever changes will follow.

“I believe being an Accountant is not all about crunching numbers. In the end, Accountants are human beings with real-life stories behind them. They provide tailored services to clients - real people. Like Coldplay’s lyric, ‘We live in a beautiful world.’ Don’t panic about the globalization, culture shocks, visualization, big data… just keep learning, keep thinking, keep exploring and communicating with people who share your passion.”

When asked how he weighs professional designations (i.e., certifications) in the field of financial analysis, Mark offers a balanced response.

“I personally feel that having a certification in Data Analysis is not a must, but there are benefits by systematically studying these computer science-related skills and combining my current business, accounting and statistics knowledge into a good structure. I was certified by Google this year; it brings me extra confidence when I develop or enhance data models and structures for internal purposes and/or external services.”

In his personal time, Mark spends some mornings running and even participated on the firm’s LA Half-Marathon running team in 2019. Due to the pandemic, he has adopted a newer hobby of biking on Santa Monica Boulevard’s extended bike lanes.

“I really enjoy the 9-mile route from Century City to Venice Beach every weekend,” he says.

The “Employee Spotlight” series introduces our firm’s diverse, talented professionals and highlights their notable extracurriculars. We hope their stories provide a more personal perspective of life at Gelfand, Rennert & Feldman.?