PwC Tim RyanTim Ryan was named U.S. Chairman of PwC on April 12th of 2016. Pricewaterhouse appointed Tim as its new U.S. chairman for a four-year term beginning on July 1, 2016. Tim takes over for Bob Moritz, who is becoming global chairman.

Mr. Ryan is a CPA in Massachusetts and New York and a member of the American Institute of CPAs. He graduated from Babson College. A Boston native, he joined the firm after graduation. He is a father of six children.

Tim has been with Pricewaterhousecoopers for over 25 years. Before being appointed US chairman, Tim was Vice chairman and US Markets leader where he was responsible for essentially managing PwC US’ brand in the marketplace.

Tim has also been in charge of leading Pricewaterhousecooper LLP’s U.S. Assurance practice, where he oversaw all strategy and implementation of PwC U.S. Assurance practice in the marketplace.

Tim Ryan’s roles outside of PwC

Tim serves on the Board of Trustees for the Securities and Exchange Commission Historical Society and the Children’s Aid Society

Additionally, Tim Ryan will take over for Bob Moritz in PwC’s Chairmanship of the governing board of the Center for Audit Quality.

Tim Ryan’s Career

Tim Ryan is most well known in the industry for his role on AIG. AIG used to PwC’s largest audit and Tim was on the account when all the restatements were going on. This is where he likely put in the time necessary to get to the position he was in today.

Controversies faced During Tim Ryan’s Tenure

MF Global Lawsuit

IRS Caterpillar Raid

Taylor Bean Lawsuit

Oscars Controversy

Tim Ryan’s Involvement in the PwC Oscars Controversy

Tim Ryan had to personally apologize for the PwC Oscar Controversy. Unfortunately, the US chairman Brian Cullinan could not apologize to the Academy because he was at the center of the controversy.

Instead Tim Ryan had to personally head out to California and save the account. Tim Ryan understood the importance of retaining the account because of optics and marketing. It would have looked terrible if PwC lost an engagement that soley required them to count envelopes.

Millions of eyes are on PwC every year at the Oscars. It is a great branding opportunity. Unfortunately, PwC saw this as a branding opportunity as well, and they started huge branding campaigns. They got so caught up in the moment that they forgot to hand the right envelope to the presenters.

Now Tim Ryan’s reputation is on the line for the 2018 Oscars. We will have to see how they perform.

Tim Ryan is 4REAL about Diversity

As one of his first measures while in office, Tim Ryan took up the issue of diversity which we wrote about previously.

PwC has faced some problems in the past with diversity and age discrimination as well. Soon after his promotion to lead partner of the US, Tim Ryan took up the issue of diversity. He started the 4REAL campaign for diversity. The REAL part of the campaign stood for Recognize, Exploer, Act and Learn about diversity. The campaign was basically to raise awareness that diversity is something that requires awareness and action.

He did this in answer to racial tension across the United States after a series of race-based shootings.

The timing of this didn’t make sense to me because there were many shootings and tension before this July 2016 timeframe. It seemed like a campaign about driving safety. They put all of their staff through this 4REAL training program. I’m not sure why PwC couldn’t just use DIVERSITY or DIVERSE as an acronym and come up with training using those letters. I don’t know about you, but the acronym REAL would not be a good memory jogger that I need to be sensitive to diversity in the workplace.