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Lisa Featherngill

Director – Wealth Planning
Wells Fargo Family Wealth
Winston Salem, NC

 

You might consider Lisa Featherngill an overachiever. She graduated from high school at 16, went straight to college and scored a job at Arthur Anderson before she even graduated. Then two days finishing school, she took the CPA exam. And passed it on her first try.

Lisa spent the next 10 years at a large accounting firm, helping start a financial planning practice in their Washington, D.C. office. When she left the firm, she went to work for a national bank, which was also starting a financial planning group. “I loved the combination of marketing and technical skills that were required for the position,” Lisa says. “We grew the practice from one person to almost 100 people in nine years.”

After almost 20 years of working for a large company, Lisa left to start a wealth management firm with another woman. “I did not like being an entrepreneur,” Lisa says. “So I sold my shares to my business partner,” and went back to the bank. This turned out to be a pretty smart decision, considering she was recently featured on CNN.com for having one of the Top 50 jobs in the United States.

“I love helping people understand their financial picture, articulate their goals and execute a plan to achieve their goals,” Lisa says. “It is rewarding to take complex information and translate it into something that the client can easily understand.”

Of course just having an amazing career isn’t the only think that drives Lisa. She stays busy with her two sons who are very involved in sports. Plus she tries to “always be training for something, usually a triathlon or half marathon.”

So take some advice from an accomplished accounting professional, “A CPA can do many different things because the accounting background provides excellent business knowledge. A CPA is also one of the most trusted and respected professional designations,” Lisa says. “So, if you want a good business education, excellent career opportunities and a very nice salary, consider becoming a CPA.”

Got questions of your own? Ask a CPA.