CalCPA ProtectPlus

It wouldn’t be quite fair to say that John Phillips was there in the beginning, but as the Group Insurance Trust’s longest-serving member and former Executive Director, he has been intimately involved in the evolution and growth of CalCPA’s insurance program for almost 40 years, including formation of the group health insurance program as a Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangement (MEWA).

Phillips joined CalCPA in 1968 shortly after receiving his CPA license. In 1972 he became a member of the Insurance Committee when Jim Kurtz, the long-time CEO of CalCPA, served as its Secretary. The Committee at that time was charged with overseeing all CalCPA-sponsored insurance plans and the Trust. This area of service also fit well with his professional responsibilities at Coopers & Lybrand in San Francisco where he  had become the first employee in what over many years would become a major human resource advisory group. One might say that Phillips was in the right place at the right time in respect to both his job and volunteer service, but that wouldn’t do justice to his enthusiasm for the work that engaged him over his long career. He has always found, he says, the precision of numbers to be “fun” and looked forward to his work every day—31 years with Coopers & Lybrand (now PricewaterhouseCoopers) and 10 years as executive director of the Trust.

After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley in 1962, serving in the military, and entering the workforce, Phillips soon saw, as he puts it, that “the language of business is accounting.” This insight inspired a return to Cal for an MBA with an accounting emphasis, which he earned in 1966, and then a stint at Golden Gate University at night for an MBA in taxation in 1972. (continue reading…)

“It may be a cliché,” says Stu Weinstein, chair of the Group Insurance Trust Claims and Plan Design Committee, “but I have gotten a lot out of my relationship with CalCPA as member, and so serving as a trustee, and finding products and services that benefit members, is a great way to give  back.” To this he adds, “Its enjoyable to be associated with something as successful as the Group Insurance Trust has been.”

In addition to his spirit of service, Weinstein also embodies a broad range of professional experience that helps him understand the circumstances of different members. Having graduated with a degree in accounting from the University of California, Berkeley in the late 1960s, Weinstein started his career with a large regional accounting firm where he served until receiving his license. From there he moved to a consulting firm and then to a job as controller in McKesson Corporation’s International Division.

He comments that this experience was a unique opportunity

“to observe the  inside of a business from the client’s perspective, something that many CPAs don’t get a chance to do.”

He was fascinated to see how an enterprise is built, how people are responsible for the bottom line, and how they report to others. He was also engaged by the process of building appropriate controls. At the end of the day, however, he found the work repetitive, and he turned back to public accounting with renewed interest.

He joined his father, who had been working as a solo CPA, in forming Weinstein & Company, where he stayed until 1999. At that point he found himself ready for a more corporate structure and moved to Rooney, Ida, Nolt and Ahern, which had just opened a San Francisco office. He liked the fact that they had separate departments with specialties and that clients were shared.

This structure also meant that his clients had a place to stay as he transitioned into retirement during the years from 2005 to 2007. Currently he still provides occasional services as a consultant and also continues as a director of CAMICO Mutual Insurance Company. (continue reading…)