Each month, we will feature an active member of the CBV community and share their thoughts on how acquiring the CBV designation advanced their career path in the ever-changing world of finance.
Partner
Valkrest Consulting Corp
Munish Mohendroo MBA, CMA, CBV
Partner –Valkrest Consulting Corp
As an immigrant, Munish is driven to help integrate skilled immigrants into the Canadian workplace. He actively volunteers with organizations that work with immigrant professionals, supports immigrant entrepreneurs, and has led diversity and inclusion councils in his past roles.
How has the CBV designation supported your career development?
In 2002, I immigrated to Canada as an experienced valuation professional from South Africa; where I worked in the valuations team of a large firm, but without a formal valuation qualification. Shortly after moving to Canada, I obtained my CBV designation; which provided me with additional technical skills and helped my career progression as a valuation practitioner – both in Canada and outside of Canada. Subsequently, after over 20 years in professional practice with large firms, I established my own practice focused on Valuations and Financial Modelling. The CBV provided a platform to launch my own practice and garnered a lot of respect from clients who see you as a Valuations expert and have the confidence to give you assignments.
Can you share a particularly challenging, yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
In my opinion, being a CBV involves more of an advisory or consulting role where you can help clients from a strategic perspective. While assurance also allows for strategy and big picture thinking, it’s still fundamentally tied to a compliance perspective. As a CBV, I find it intriguing to assist clients on a pre-deal basis, helping them consider pricing strategies for potential acquisitions, the types of intangibles they may be acquiring and identifying potential synergies for that sector. This incorporates more of a consulting role and, as a CBV, I can wear both hats, i.e. participating in broader strategic discussions but also helping clients understand any financial reporting considerations once the deal closes.
What differences do you see in your current role as compared to your previous roles?
In my previous roles as partner with the large firms, my work was primarily focused on larger listed clients; and included a lot of engagements for financial reporting purposes. My current practice is focused on the private mid-market and/ or closely-held private businesses. While building and managing can be stressful and requires juggling many roles, it provides me more flexibility and control over my time.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. Take the exam writing technique courses, I found these extremely helpful.
2. Do the practice exams – as many as you can.
3. Seek guidance from other CBVs and fellow students.
#FunFact: I enjoy running – for fitness and for fun. I recently completed the World Marathon Challenge – completing 7 Marathons on 7 Continents (incl. Antarctica) in 7 Days (consecutive days). Pretty confident that I am the only CBV to have ever done this. Well, there are only 190 people in the world that have completed this; and I am the 6th Canadian to complete this ever.
Partner
Ernst & Young LLP
Tiki CheungMAcc, CPA, CA, CBV
Partner – Valuation, Modelling & Economics and Entrepreneurial Winning Women Program Co-Leader
Ernst & Young LLP
How has the CBV designation supported your career development?
I started my CBV relatively early in my career while still in university. This was largely due to the influence of a motivating professor who holds the CBV designation. Though I previously worked in assurance, after completing my CFE (the UFE at that time), I immediately pursued a valuation role that intrigued me. While I learned a lot from my time in assurance, the CBV designation has been instrumental in shaping my career path. Especially in the earlier stages of my career, the CBV piqued people’s interest and gave me a great conversation starter with clients and new contacts who were interested in learning more about the profession and my day-to-day job responsibilities.
Can you share a particularly challenging, yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
This particular experience is deeply ingrained in my memory:
During the earlier stages of my career, I had the opportunity to work on a massive valuation project where I assisted in creating methodologies to value sports franchises. The assignment involved examining three sports franchises – an NHL, NBA, and MLS franchise – all within the same project. It was a fascinating experience that required the incorporation of all aspects of a CBV’s expertise.
We had to analyze the fundamental elements that drive the value of a specific asset, understand the uniqueness of the sports franchise sector, conduct extensive research and interviews, and learn how the market perceives the value of a sports team. The project was challenging, but I thoroughly enjoyed the learning process. It was a rare opportunity that enabled me to apply my core knowledge of valuation principles and sector knowledge while also incorporating accounting and tax implications. The complexity of the assignment made it an amazing learning experience that I will never forget.
What differences do you see in your current role as compared to your previous roles?
In my opinion, being a CBV involves more of an advisory or consulting role where you can help clients from a strategic perspective. While assurance also allows for strategy and big picture thinking, it’s still fundamentally tied to a compliance perspective. As a CBV, I find it intriguing to assist clients on a pre-deal basis, helping them consider pricing strategies for potential acquisitions, the types of intangibles they may be acquiring and identifying potential synergies for that sector. This incorporates more of a consulting role and, as a CBV, I can wear both hats, i.e. participating in broader strategic discussions but also helping clients understand any financial reporting considerations once the deal closes.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. I believe the first and most important step is to speak with other CBV professionals, especially those who are currently working as a CBV or are in the process of becoming one. By gaining insight from their experiences, you can obtain a more realistic and practical understanding of what the job entails, as opposed to simply reading about the requirements on a website.
2. It’s essential to learn as much as possible, so take advantage of available resources, such as CBV Institute’s website and social media platforms.
3. Additionally, if you’re still in school, consider taking a business valuation course as an elective. This is how I was introduced to the profession, and I ended up loving it. My professor helped shape my career.
4. It’s crucial to have a sense of curiosity and to ask professionals about their day-to-day experiences.
#FunFact: I have a fear of heights, but on one of my birthdays, I went paragliding in Switzerland, which was both exhilarating and nerve-wracking.
Founder and Principal
Omnis Valuations & Advisory Ltd.
JT Dhoot
AACI, CBV, ICD.D
Founder and Principal
Omnis Valuations & Advisory Ltd.
With more than a decade of experience in industry and consultancy, he serves a diverse client base, including entrepreneurs, their professional advisors, and leaders across the public, private and not-for-profit sectors.
JT believes that understanding the “why” and the story behind the numbers is critical, stressing the importance of simplifying complex issues to make them accessible to the users of his reports.
We asked JT about his journey as a CBV, including his takeaways from the CBV Program of Studies. Here are some of the highlights from our conversation including a #FunFact.
How has the CBV designation supported your career development?
The CBV designation has been extremely beneficial. It enabled me to establish my practice, and without it, I would not have been able to achieve the level of success I have today. My knowledge of business valuation has helped me not only professionally, but also personally, as I have the skills to evaluate investment opportunities for myself and my family.
Can you share a particularly challenging and interesting valuation analysis that made you realize that you had chosen the right career path?
I began my career as a CBV in a non-traditional way, as a real estate appraiser. This experience sparked my curiosity about the similarities and differences between tangible and intangible asset valuations, ultimately leading me to the CBV Program of Studies. Not long after, I recall working on a challenging assignment involving a family-owned business with significant real estate holdings and a complex capital structure comprising multiple share classes. My work helped resolve a longstanding dispute between the parties, which was a rewarding experience that motivated me to continue learning and exploring opportunities in areas such as alternative dispute resolution and corporate governance. Unlike publicly-traded companies, many privately-held companies have a unique dynamic in that the officer(s), director(s) and shareholder(s) are often the same people. I find this type of work particularly interesting, and the CBV Program of Studies was foundational in preparing me to excel in this space.
What differences do you see in your current role as compared to your previous roles?
In my previous roles, my work was primarily focused on financial analyses and valuations involving commercial real estate and/or closely-held businesses. My responsibilities are much broader now, as running a practice requires you to wear many hats, some of which I find more enjoyable than others. My current role also gives me more autonomy, flexibility and control over allocating my time and resources.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. Reach out to other CBVs; this is what I did when I started. Students and prospective CBVs contact me frequently to ask questions about the profession, and I always help them out as best I can.
2. CBV Institute has done a great job in providing a variety of resources. Combining the information on the Institute’s website, social media, and CBV Matters can provide valuable perspective and a well-rounded understanding of the industry.
3. Maximize your study time by understanding and optimizing your schedule and learning environment. Some people are more productive in the morning, while others are night owls. It is important to find what works best for you regarding the time of day, location, and environment and then focus on putting in solid study hours. Find a quiet place, such as a library, or a more stimulating environment, like a coffee shop – whatever works best for you and gets you in the zone.
#FunFact: I find it amusing that I now live just a block away from my elementary school, despite not originally living in this neighbourhood. I remember taking the bus from the suburbs and looking at the older houses surrounding my school, lifting my nose and thinking, “my neighbourhood is way newer/better,” and here I am now, 30-plus years later, living a block from there. It’s funny how things change.
Associate, Corporate Development & Investor Relations
Big Rock Brewery
Spencer Gunning, CBVAssociate Corporate Development & Investor Relations
Big Rock Brewery
In his previous role as Portfolio Manager – Diversified Industries, ATB Financial, Spencer managed and assisted in building a leveraged finance portfolio valued at over $500M across a multitude of industries including emerging technologies, aviation, and manufacturing.
We asked Spencer about his journey as a CBV, including his takeaways from the CBV Program of Studies. Here are some of the highlights from our conversation, including a #FunFact.
How has the CBV Designation supported your career development?
The CBV obviously gave me a good deal of tangible skills, but the one thing it gave me right away was the intangible of knowing you have the confidence as a subject matter expert to skillfully approach problems and challenges. I’ve greatly benefitted from this.
My background is in investment and corporate banking so to transfer from a very finance-focused world over to business valuation and corporate development taught me to obviously appreciate key accounting principles, but I then learned how to apply those principles from a finance and company-specific perspective. Clearly, valuation can be used in so many contexts, but from a corporate development perspective – whether the focus is on organic or inorganic growth– my CBV designation has given me a great deal of insight and rigor around how to build out and template information to support truly well-informed business decisions. This input is viewed as highly valuable by the company I work for.
Can you share a particularly challenging, yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
Last year, we went through a period of exclusivity with a company we were looking to acquire – a reputable vodka soda brand in Canada – and the deal ultimately fell through. Brands such as this will oftentimes come to companies like ours for our production capabilities. (Many of these companies are just brands with no production assets of their own – they develop the recipes and then turn to companies like us to oversee production and in some cases, distribution.) For this transaction, we were down to the eleventh hour and there was still a sizeable discrepancy in the purchase price between the respective parties. What the CBV designation really helped me with was analyzing key risks in the transaction and communicating to stakeholders, including our bankers and their bankers. When we took a step back and sensitized certain key risks we saw in the potential acquisition, we gained a lot of confidence in the number and structure we were comfortable with.
Ultimately, the deal fell through and in part thanks to my CBV designation, we were able to make a well-informed and – in hindsight, what we still feel was – the correct decision.
What differences do you see in your current role as compared to your previous roles?
I see myself somewhat as an in-house banker. The key difference from my previous roles in finance is that I now leverage my understanding and experience in capital markets and banking and I now apply it from a company-first perspective. So, corporate development for me is that sweet spot where it has allowed me to do the work I like to do, which is rooted in banking and valuation and, at the same time, it’s with this greater understanding of the company I’m working for, including their strategic objectives, that I look to create value however possible. How do our planned initiatives tie back into our one-year, three-year and five-year plan and then ultimately how do all of these moving pieces tie back to our positioning as a public company from a “maximizing shareholder value” perspective? From that, I put my investor relations hat on and determine how we best communicate this to the market.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
Know what your muscle is, make sure you flex it, but at the same time, focus on increasing your understanding of what you don’t know. The best growth comes from times of discomfort.
Also, do the practice exams and show up to the webinars. They’re helpful.
#FunFact
I’m 6’8” tall and after high school and before beginning university, I was a hockey goaltender for two years playing for several junior hockey teams spanning Alberta and British Columbia. The last team I played on was the Calgary Royals.
Partner
Ernst & Young LLP
Neal Mizrahi CPA, CA, CBV
Partner
Ernst & Young LLP
Neal has worked as an expert in various industries, including resource and extractive industries (i.e. oil and gas, and mining and minerals), construction, manufacturing, financial services, cannabis, software, and other sectors.
We asked Neal about his journey as a CBV, including his takeaways from the CBV Program of Studies. Here are some of the highlights from our conversation:
How has the CBV Designation supported your career development?
I was always interested in business valuation, and after obtaining my accounting designation, I researched additional designations that would enhance my valuation knowledge. I landed on the CBV, as it seemed to have the most practical and comprehensive curriculum, with the least amount of overlap with the CPA and business school.
The CBV opened so many doors and has enabled me to do what I do today. While I value businesses for a variety of purposes, much of what I do is act as an expert in the context of disputes. Put plainly, if one party alleges that another party conducted some wrongful act (for instance a breach of contract), I would be retained as an expert to provide my opinion of the monetary damages, which in many cases is a function of the value of a business. Typically, each party in the dispute would retain an expert, so the ability to conduct a credible and objective analysis, consider other viewpoints, and communicate clearly is paramount.
Overall, the CBV designation played a key role in my career progression; it provided me with the technical skills to be able to analyze and opine on complex valuation issues, and it enabled me to be qualified and recognized by courts and arbitral tribunals as an expert witness.
Can you share a particularly challenging, yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
One case emerges as particularly challenging and rewarding. It involves a dispute in the oil and gas industry in Alberta. I was retained by the buyer in a transaction who had acquired assets relating to a number of oil fields in Alberta, with the objective of developing them further (i.e. finding more oil and increasing the acquired company’s value), and selling it within approximately three years. Once the transaction closed, the buyer realized that the company it acquired had significant compliance issues, which delayed its plans by two years. Ultimately, they did find more oil, but by that point, oil prices declined significantly, and the value of their company was lower than what it would have been when they initially intended to sell (i.e. three years post-acquisition), which also happened to be during a period of peak oil prices.
So, the buyers commenced litigation against the seller, suing for millions of dollars, and I was brought in as a valuation expert to quantify the damages. I quantified the values at different points in time and the resulting “Loss of Opportunity” suffered by the buyers. I testified twice in the Provincial Court of Alberta, where I was cross-examined at length. Ultimately the court accepted my valuation evidence which led to an award of damages of almost $200 million dollars.
A link to the decision is available here.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. Experience helps: Try to work in the valuation field while you acquire the designation. The day-to-day work experience really enhances your learning in the CBV Program of Studies. I found that I’d read about a concept in the course materials and apply that knowledge in the same week or month – that really enhanced my learning.
2. Have a mentor and be a mentor: There are immense benefits to both. First, having a mentor that is experienced can help you through the process and your career. Second, being a mentor to others is not only rewarding, but it allows you to pause and reflect on your own experience. I’m grateful to those that have mentored me throughout my career and still have people I look to for guidance.
3. Enjoy the process: Getting into a new field is an exciting time in your career. Sure, it’s challenging, but there’s a ton of development that occurs over that period and a great opportunity to meet new people.
Vice President Valuation
Fiera Comox Partners
Anne DavidCPA, CA, CBV
Vice President Valuation
Fiera Comox Partners
She has also been an active member of the CBV Institute’s Education Committee and has also served as a teacher in the CBV Program of Studies. Anne very recently joined Fiera Comox as Vice President, Valuations.
We asked Anne about her journey as a CBV, including her takeaways from the CBV Program of Studies. Here are some of the highlights from our conversation.
How has the CBV designation supported your career development?
My CBV journey started in 2013 when I was working in M&A and looking for some clarity and guidelines to move forward in my career. M&A has a lot to do with negotiations, but before that, you must get involved in business valuation and that’s when I realized the CBV designation could help elevate my career. So began my journey into the world of business valuation. I then joined the KPMG valuation group to make the most of it.
I shared my passion for valuation by coaching students who were enrolled in CBV Institute’s Program of Studies after passing the MQE. I started to quickly undertake more responsibilities with CBV Institute, such as marking exams and becoming an active member of the Education Committee and as a course instructor in 2018.
In the same year, I started working as Head of Valuation at Investissement Quebec and laid the foundation of its valuation department that would oversee a $15 billion portfolio and built a team of valuation professionals to strengthen valuation for financial reporting procedures.
Can you share a particularly challenging yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
The unprecedented market volatility in the initial days of the COVID-19 pandemic posed many challenges for CBVs. I had to report on the value of Investissement Quebec on March 31, 2020. I had plenty of questions on my mind and we had to redo all the valuations that we had prepared in advance.
The CBV community came together to share ideas and methodologies and in a time of great uncertainty, I felt the power of our network. At that exact moment, I knew I had chosen the right career path.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. Don’t hesitate to ask for help, get a mentor or a tutor to help you practice because the MQE is quite challenging. Having someone re-read your answers is a must before trying to attempt the MQE.
2. My advice to young CBVs is this: the answer is not always in the books, but going back to basics will always help you find the answers.
Partner
Sequeira Partners
Kira GregsonCPA, CA, CBV
Partner
Sequeira Partners
We asked Kira about her journey as a CBV, including her takeaways from the CBV Program of Studies. Here is some of what she had to say:
How has the CBV designation supported your career development?
As a guest lecturer at the University of Alberta, I get this question a lot and I say that the more tools you have in your toolkit, the better. Especially when you are a business advisor. What is unique about the CBV designation is, that when applying valuation fundamentals, you are really forced to understand a company’s inner workings from a very complete and well-rounded perspective. You cannot just focus on one aspect of the business. You need to understand the business from a financial perspective, but also operationally and from a human capital perspective to understand what drives value. Then you can apply the basics of valuation theory learned through the Program of Studies to develop valuation conclusions. This is what makes you a trusted advisor and resource for your clients – which I love.
Can you share a particularly challenging, yet interesting valuation analysis that made you realize you had chosen the right career path?
I have been solely practicing valuations for 10 years, and every year there is a marquee file that is challenging. One particular file that made me realize I had chosen the right career path was when I had to value a company that was invested in multiple companies. It wasn’t just one valuation, it was multiple valuations, and these companies were in various stages of development, some with limited history and all were operating in new and emerging sectors within technology and software. It was particularly challenging because there was limited precedent for this space. The first sentence that comes to my mind is “this is hard and maybe I cannot do it”. However, then you take a step back and you work through it. The CBV Program of Studies teaches you valuation fundamentals that you can apply to companies of any size and industry. In the end, it was a very positive outcome for the client and for my professional experience.
Do you have any tips for people looking to become a CBV?
1. If you put the time in, and work through the modules and accompanying content, I am confident you can pass every single module. What you put in is what you are going to get out of it.
2. There is flexibility in the program. There is a course pack, there are online resources, and you can work at your own pace. I found that I could accommodate the course work into my personal and work life. I think the program is approachable from any stage you are at in your career in terms of time commitment.
3. To get the most out of the program, you need practical experience whether it be directly through work or in collaborating with peers or a mentor.