Carmela Haines, CPA, CA
Set Ambitious Goals While Allowing Yourself to Evolve
August 31, 2023
Recently named the first female CEO of Access Communications, Carmela did not arrive there by accident. From the beginning, she has had the drive to set ambitious goals, always knowing she wanted to land at the executive level, while allowing herself to evolve and change her mind along the way.
Starting her career in public practice, Carmela gained valuable experience and developed skills that she still uses today. Initially, her goal was to become a Partner but her time in public practice made her realize her love for the operations side of business. Carmela left public practice to move to industry with the goal of working towards a CFO position, where she would have the opportunity to be in a forward-looking position and influence the strategic direction of a company instead of looking back as an auditor.
“Twenty years ago, an opportunity presented itself to be the VP of Finance & Admin with Access Communications. I was at the table contributing to setting the future direction. I also had the opportunity to assume non-traditional departments to report to the CFO, such as sales, warehousing & purchasing, and more. I enjoyed this as it gave me a better understanding of the company and more influence on its future direction. This resulted in a new position being created at Access, and I moved to the COO position in 2019.”
With her recent promotion to CEO, Carmela is now responsible for overseeing Access Communications’ entire operation by providing leadership, setting direction, making strategic decisions, and executing strategic plans to ensure the organization’s overall success. She credits the CPA program with helping her develop her business acumen, critical thinking skills, and a broad understanding of business operations and how financial decisions impact an organization. In particular, the critical thinking skills enable Carmela to make informed decisions, identify potential risks and opportunities, and solve complex problems, all of which are essential for the long-term success of the organization.
“[Obtaining my designation] was worth it in more ways than I can [express], and I wouldn't be where I am today without it. Having your CPA designation opens up more opportunities to a wide range of career options, I think, than any other profession.”
Carmela encourages other CPAs who aspire to a CEO position to take personal risks and realize that there is never going to be a “right time” to try something new as some opportunities may only come once in a lifetime. She points out that it is important to believe in yourself, not allowing self-doubt to keep you from pursuing your goals as most often we are the only thing holding ourselves back. From her own experience, Carmela believes that you gain valuable skills and experience that can contribute to your success as a CEO by staying open to new experiences, opportunities, challenges, and being willing to step outside your comfort zone.
As the business environment continues to change, Carmela feels that it is important to continuously learn and improve by staying current on industry trends, best practices, and learning new skills and knowledge, particularly in your industry and chosen career path. For those who want to become a CEO, she suggests taking courses on topics like leadership and governance or gaining valuable experience and developing your skills by volunteering. As charities and not-for-profits are looking for people to serve on their boards, it is a win-win situation for both parties as you will also learn about governance from other leaders and gain insights about how a CEO reports to a board.
Over the past 20 years, Carmela has sat on several boards including the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Saskatchewan, Regina Food Bank, Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments, and Canadian Communications Systems Alliance which provided her with governance experience and advanced her leadership skills while having a positive impact on the community.
While she didn’t actively encourage her children to become CPAs, all three have decided to pursue their designations which Carmela attributes to them witnessing the diverse opportunities available for CPAs while growing up. Carmela’s husband is also a CPA who worked his way up to a CEO position and is now Executive Chairman of a mining construction company. She credits both of their career success to their equal partnership, shared values, and support of each other’s careers while sharing the workload of raising three children. When asked how they balanced it all, Carmela indicates they quickly learned that organization and effective time management were essential while also leaning on each other, parents, friends, and people they could trust. She notes they were also fortunate to both work for companies that supported flexible work arrangements and work-life balance while they were both VPs of Finance & Admin with three children between the ages of 3 and 8. Carmela believes it’s important to know what’s important to you and prioritize it - it was important to them that someone was always there for their kids, and they made it a priority to be involved in their lives and attend their activities.
When asked what advice she gave to her own children and what she would tell other future CPAs considering the program, Carmela regards public practice as a great starting point for those in the CPA program. Public practice enables you to learn about the various areas of accounting and different types of industries very quickly, providing broad exposure to assist in identifying your personal preferences. She advises that it’s okay not to know, so don’t be afraid to evolve and change your mind as you continue to learn more about yourself.
“A CPA designation is a stepping-stone and provides a strong foundation for career choices. There are more career opportunities with a CPA designation than any other profession. This is because it is a highly respected designation; it demonstrates you have met high education and professional standards and acquired the necessary skills and knowledge to excel in your career.
Because there are so many career opportunities, you can change your course [from public practice to industry, etc.] at any time, as I did. Early on, I thought I wanted to become a partner in a public accounting firm, then a CFO of a large publicly traded company. I ended up as a CEO of a telecommunications co-operative because of the opportunities that came my way. That was partly due to what I learned about myself, things I enjoyed doing in my work, and my decisions as I grew in my career.”