Career moves

The Securities and Exchange Commission's Office of the Chief Accountant has selected eight professional accounting fellows for two-year terms beginning in 2010:

Greg Schwartz has joined LarsonAllen as a principal with the firm’s credit union practice, an industry the firm has been serving since the late 1970s.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has appointed Deloitte partner Howard A. Scheck chief accountant in the Division of Enforcement.

KPMG LLP CEO John B. Veihmeyer has been named U.S. chairman and CEO of the firm, succeeding Timothy P. Flynn, who will focus on his role as chairman of KPMG International.

Houston CPA firm McConnell & Jones has appointed Edward Hlousek as leader of its SEC Audit Practice and Oil & Gas Industry Group.

Broker-dealer 1st Global said that it has engaged Nobel Prize winner Dr. Harry Markowitz as an advisor to the company’s Investment Management Solutions committee and as a consultant to 1st Global’s Investment Management Research Group.

ALABAMA

Elliott Davis LLC, one of the largest accounting, tax and consulting services firms in the Southeast, has named R. Jason Caskey as office managing shareholder of the firm’s Columbia, S.C., location.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., has temporarily stepped aside as chairman of the powerful tax-writing committee amid mounting calls for his resignation.

Thomson Reuters has elevated long-time executive Jon Baron to oversee the newly formed Americas Business Unit of Thomson Tax & Accounting.

Lyndon Group has appointed John Gantenbein as the firm’s loss prevention practice leader.

Influential accounting industry leader Stuart Kessler has joined J.H. Cohn as a director.

Freed Maxick & Battaglia has hired PR strategist and communications professional Emily Alexandria Burns as the firm’s e-marketing and communications specialist.

ConvergenceCoaching has brought on Jack G. Lee III as a new partner in the CPA firm leadership and marketing coaching group.

The Financial Accounting Foundation has selected Michael Granof, a professor at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin, to serve as a member of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board.

United Nations climate chief Yvo De Boer plans to join KPMG in July as governments around the world face uncertainty over the prospects of establishing a global market for carbon credit trading.

IMGCAP(1)]Ten years ago, I was sitting in a training session at a Big Four accounting firm, thinking about my answer to a question on a self-evaluation form: “Where do you see yourself in 10 years?” I remember exactly what I wrote: to be a professional triathlete winning the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon.

John Geraci has joined LitmanGerson Associates as a principal, expanding the firm’s assurance services and employee benefit plan services.

ARIZONA

Sage Software developer and partner SWK Technologies recently added Andrew Nunez and Paul Frydman to its executive team as part of a strategy to increase its presence throughout the Northeast, as well as resell and consult on Sage X3 software.