Karen Lanz, our Senior Accountant based in our Glen Innes office, has recently attained the highest score in an Advanced Tax Course. Congratulations, Karen, on this outstanding accomplishment! We had the opportunity to interview her to gain insight into her success and reflect on her achievement….
What did you learn in the subject that has been most valuable?
The most valuable sections for me were on the personal services income rules, the taxation of trusts, and small business CGT concessions. Although I already had a fair bit of exposure to small business CGT concessions through my day-to-day work, it was really helpful to get into some of the more “fringe” cases in terms of who could qualify or be disqualified from the concessions.
In general, the Advanced Tax course covered a little bit of a huge variety of topics, so it was good to get a bit of exposure to all of these different areas to get a better understanding of all the various issues that can impact our clients.
What do you attribute your success in the subject to?
I spread out my study week to week – I get too stressed out if I leave it to the end. I have also really evolved my presentation style since undertaking the CA courses. For this course I had to do my fifth recorded presentation as part of the CA program. While I started out doing really formal presentations, I have evolved my style to be a lot more personal, friendly, and casual. This seems to be paying off in my subject marks.
What advice do you have for other professionals considering taking this course?
It was certainly not an “easy” elective to take, but I am not sure any of them really are. While parts may seem not as relevant to our day-to-day work (say, international tax), it was still interesting to get some exposure to these areas and you never know when that knowledge might come in handy. The sections that were relevant were really interesting and easy to focus on since I could see the direct link between the topic and the work that we do. I am glad I took it!
Karen Lanz (pictured on the left) + Jane Newsome (pictured on the right).
