Over the course of 75 years, the team at Froehling Anderson has had the absolute honor of providing business consulting, tax, audit and accounting services to individuals and businesses. Many of the relationships that we've made with these clients have had a lasting impact, cultivated by our staff and our dedicated partners. Even the partners that are no longer with Froehling Anderson have had an influence in shaping our trusted reputation.
For the past few months on our blog, we have been celebrating all of the elements of Froehling Anderson that have made our 75 years in business so successful. We have discussed how our firm has grown, what we value as a brand, and who the people of Froehling Anderson are. For this installment in our "Cheers to 75 Years" blog series, we are focusing on some of our past partners and their biggest takeaways from working at our firm.
We spoke with Gary Dosdall, Dave Wasmuth, CPA, CGMA, and Joe Froehling about our firm's greatest achievements, where these past partners see Froehling Anderson going in the future, and anything else they wanted to share about their time with us. Keep reading to discover what they each chose to highlight.
"From the beginning to the end of my career, I got to work with some of the best and brightest people in the industry," Gary Dosdall reflected when asked about his work. "I think that Froehling’s greatest achievement was, and continues to be, the high-quality professionals attracted by the firm regardless of whether they serve clients or the internal needs of the firm. I got to learn from the best and got to coach some rising stars."
"I would like to see Froehling continue its commitment to privately held businesses," Dosdall continued. "When we get to play a part in helping a closely held business succeed it benefits not just the enterprise, but the entire community. That can get lost in the day-to-day grind but looking back, that is pretty cool."
"At Froehling, we look beyond the compliance aspect of accounting (preparing financial statements, audits, and tax returns). Our understanding of business puts us in the unique position of being consultants," Dave Wasmuth noted when looking into the future. "Beyond being number crunchers, we are helping our clients to understand the financial aspects of their business decisions to enable them to reach their goals. I would like to see the firm continue to grow, keeping up with new and exciting thought leaders and technologies as we develop leaders who can continue our tradition."
"One of our greatest firm achievements is in developing a culture that is supportive of work-life balance. The CPA profession has a reputation of a brutal culture with high- stress and long hours (particularly during audit and tax season)," Wasmuth continued. "Frequently – children of accountants in no way want the work intensive life-style of mom and dad. Although this is talked a lot about now days, as far back as the mid-90’s, as a partner group we strove to achieve the type of culture that our children would look upon favorably. This has resulted in low employee turnover with the benefit of a mature and experienced staff. In addition, the children of many of us have gone on to become successful CPAs and continue to grow the profession."
"It was my only job and I’m still very happy to have worked there and stayed there," Joe Froehling shared. "The advice I would give to the firm now is to continue to take good care of staff and clients and continued growth." Some of his favorite memories at the firm include the great relationships that he was able to maintain over the years, and the opportunity to help a wide variety of clients. "I still run into clients every now and then," he said. "They still have good things to say [about Froehling Anderson]."
We are endlessly appreciative of the time, effort, and pure dedication that these leaders put in to Froehling Anderson. We couldn't have said what they shared with us any better. Our partners make us strong, and the payoff can be seen through what these past partners said: we are able to establish a welcoming work environment that serves both our clients and our staff. We take time to create relationships instead of treating interactions as transactions. Truly living the motto of Putting the People Before the Numbers. We implement solutions that last.
Thank you to the past and present partners of Froehling Anderson for being a huge part of our commitment to put people before the numbers. It really does make a difference!
