Episode 171: Little Acts Of Compassion Go A Long Way When Building Connection And Community With Alicia Gelinas
Sometimes it’s the smallest acts of compassion that create the strongest connections and shape entire communities. In this conversation, Alicia Gelinas, President and CEO of the Colorado Society of CPAs, shares her remarkable journey from a determined nine-year-old aspiring CPA to a respected leader guiding her profession today. Along the way, she reflects on the influence of her parents and mentors, the lessons of resilience from personal loss, and how fostering children with her husband deepened her commitment to empathy and patience in leadership. Alicia also offers valuable insights on money management, the role of professional organizations in personal and professional growth, and why embracing compassion can transform the way we connect and lead.
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Little Acts Of Compassion Go A Long Way When Building Connection And Community With Alicia Gelinas
Welcome to this episode of Breaking Beliefs, where I interview Alicia Gelinas. She first joined the Colorado CPA Society as a student member while attending the University of Denver in accounting. After years of volunteering at the society, she stepped into the role of chief financial officer and executive director of the Colorado CPA Educational Foundation for five years.
Alicia now serves as the society's third president and CEO, where she daily demonstrates her passion for the accounting profession and leads the organization as it carries out the Colorado CPA mission to help people thrive personally and professionally through service and connection. Alicia's professional background includes stints in public accounting, adjunct teaching, consulting, and coaching.
This Midwest native enjoys spending time camping, boating, and traveling with her husband and their dog, Ally. During this episode of the show, we discuss her career journey from childhood to becoming a CPA and later transitioning to leadership roles in various organizations. We also explore her personal experiences, family background, and her fostering of children while highlighting the influence of her parents and mentors throughout her life.
We discuss her insights on money management, community involvement, and the importance of professional organizations in personal and professional growth. You are in for a treat listening to Alicia's story. I am so excited to be able to share this with you, and I appreciate Alicia being so vulnerable and transparent during this story of just talking about her family background and how it's led to the lessons that she now has in leadership and family. Please share this with a colleague or someone who just needs to hear this. I think there are so many lessons for someone to hear that might just impact them, or just know that they're not alone.
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Welcome to this episode of Breaking Beliefs. I'm here with Alicia Gelinas. She is with the Colorado CPA Society. Alicia, do you want to give a little background on yourself before we get started?
From CPA to CEO: Alicia Gelinas' Journey
Yes. Thank you, Amy, for having me here. It’s really a pleasure. I am Alicia Gelinas, and I'm the CEO of the Colorado Society of CPAs. I am a CPA myself, and so that's a really big part of who I am, my identity, and one of the things I'm most proud of. I actually decided that this would be the path for me when I was nine years old. I'm one of those unique unicorns.
Choosing to come out to Colorado to go to the University of Denver, studied accounting, did multiple pathways, but chose the most common denominator, the Big Four. Jumped into that with a lot of my other peers and did that for nine years in the audit practice, loving every minute of that. I then decided to jump out of that big pond and try and find some smaller ponds that I could swim in.
I have then explored all kinds of other pathways, from coaching to consulting to financial advising and not-for-profit, and throughout the entire pathway was always connected to the Colorado Society of CPAs. It was a deep privilege when I had the opportunity to come and actually be an employee as the CFO and be the chief bean counter for the bean counters. It truly was an honor when I got the opportunity to step into the role of CEO and not just use numbers, but really use my voice to advocate for CPAs across our state.
Compassion: It was an honor to step into the CEO role and use my voice to advocate for CPAs across our state.
That's awesome. Glad to have you here, and cannot wait to learn a little bit more about this path. Maybe you can start off by telling us where you grew up and what your parents did for a living.
I was born in Iowa, mostly Midwest. Moved around a little bit in my early childhood, and it was some of the early childhood experiences that exposed me to just how important accounting is to making a thriving life. That's really what has been my compass ever since is how do you thrive in the life of change and volatility and things that happen outside of you.
Growing up in the Midwest, moved to Nebraska, and that's where I did most of my high school years. I got to enjoy all of the Midwest activities, cheerleader. I still got that in me. I cheer on. I feel that's also been a part of creating my advocacy voice. I cheered for lots of sports, drama, and music. I love exploring new things and interests. I came out to Colorado for college. Ever since, I've been here ever since I came out here for college.
Roots Of Resilience: A Midwest Upbringing And Family's Influence
What did your parents do that led you to move around?
I had the experience of losing both my parents when I was young. My dad was a farmer, and he was also a PhD teaching economics. I got to see a really wide range of what it looks like to work with your hands, hands-on work, and then how you use your mind to activate things like a PhD in economics, and he would teach college night. My mom played in the world of floral arrangements and teaching, and spent some time with me at home before I had the experience of losing them. I went through a lot of change, but had the fortunate experience of being adopted by a family member who served as the CEO of a not-for-profit. I do think that also helped me understand what not-for-profits do for our community, but also what leadership looks like at a different level.
Your dad, being a farmer, did he grow up in farming?
Yes. Our family history was like deeply rooted in farm life in Iowa. The family farm was part of our family tradition. Uniquely, both my fathers were twins, and both of them became farmers and both had their PhDs, and took different pathways. We still enjoy going to the family farm that I grew up in Nebraska in the summer or holidays, and just enjoying farm life.
Why did he decide to get his PhD?
Learning has been something deeply rooted in our family. The extent to which you can learn more, do more, it's just one of our core values. Even though my father was challenged in the academic arena, it was always adjusted to your limits, but your limits are never put on you by anybody else. They went all the way and wanted to take the business aspect to farming. I think they did that really well in the academics. Once you learn something, give it back and teach. Those were some of the core values in our family, and then I think I have picked up on them.
Finding Family: Adoption And The Power Of Community
At what age did they pass away?
They were in their mid-40s. I was fairly young, and I was an only child. I went through the adoption process, ended up with other siblings. My family has grown large, and now I have a bigger set of family as a result of that. I consider that a blessing.
That's a big change. I mean, not only losing your parents, but going from being an only child to having siblings. What was the mindset shift for you to do that?
There was an age gap. Even though both of my fathers were twins, they were the same age, but they had different life paths. My biological father had me at an older age, and my adoptive father had me at had his kids at a younger age. It felt really natural for me because I've always had the mindset, even when I was young and as an only child, that family becomes who you choose to have. My parents always felt like they were family to me. My community activities always felt like family to me. Coming into a new family and having new siblings just felt like family, whether you call them a cousin or, sibling. The more people in my life, the better it felt. While it was an adjustment, it felt nearly as big of adjustment because I think even in my early years, community met family.
Were they in Nebraska? Is that why you moved to Nebraska?
We actually moved to Nebraska when my father got a new job. We all moved together. That became the place that truly formed my younger years.
How old were you when you moved?
I was entering seventh grade. I think that's about 12, or 13. Exactly the ages, but just in those years where you're starting to build your attachments with your friend groups and in your deep learning years.
What was he moving to do? What was the job?
That's when he became the CEO of the nonprofit in Colorado, which was actually he was the founding member of the organization established to introduce the use of information technology in the state of Nebraska. That was almost the years where I remember watching on the news that this brand new thing called the World Wide Web was coming out, and the state, and the legislators and economists and the chambers were wondering how are we going to have the state of Nebraska who is primarily a farming community or rural communities make sure that we don't fall behind in economic development with the use of information technology.
He had an uncharted path that he had to just create what this is going to look like in Colorado. I got to watch from the sidelines as he started an organization and a not-for-profit and brought educators, government officials, and the workforce together to make sure that Nebraska would stay competitive. I still look back at some of those things that he did and find parallels to the work that an association like the Colorado Society of CPAs does for CPAs when we're connecting between educators and employers and government officials and thinking, “I'm doing a lot of the same things in the world that he did for the information.”
My understanding of agriculture and farming is that they're pretty highly technological. How did that transformation happen? Do you remember them trying to learn these new tools, and how he go about that process?
I don't know a lot of the details about all the initiatives that they have, but I do know that building strong relationships and building technology jobs in the state of Nebraska was really critical, and figuring out how to bring people to the same table to solve common problems together. Honestly, that's what I saw the most. It's not always the outcomes that are the most part of how that happened.
The process of that happening, I remember very vividly, like, “Who's got the strength in this area? Who's willing to be connected? How can we bring two people together to solve some interesting challenges? What can we create together that doesn't exist today?” I remember my dad's methodology around doing that was the back of a napkin. He carried a napkin and a pen everywhere and out to lunch, and all the ideas came out on napkins. Napkins went home everywhere. Now imagine having that on an iPhone. The good old days.
Literally the back of the napkin.
I had all the ideas transformed into Technology in the state of Nebraska.
We're in that same state with AI. Trying to figure out how it all works with the workforce and government and all the tax regulations and so forth.
Sometimes what's old is new again, right?
Yeah. Need to take out some of those napkins.
Just get back face-to-face, have some lunches, pull out the napkin, and get some rolling. Solve.
Your adoptive mom, how did she take on that role for you, because that's a big shoes to fill, right?
Huge. Honestly, if I were to think back to the most influential person in my life, it's definitely her because to take a child that's not your own and then, at a stage in life when you thought you were kind of done raising children, and then get back into the thick of it. She dove in deep, and she was not one who had her own career, but she had her own interests.
She was pursuing all of those community engagement activities, being active in her church, and leading groups like mothers of preschoolers. At the same time, she was now trying to raise a preteen girl. The amount of patience and empathy and compassion, and consistency that she provided and showing acts of service and love before even the feelings of all of those things happened, and then to watch how those developed over time, taught me a lot.
I think just in the woman I want to be, that even if I have a career, like how do I lead from my heart? How do I act before I feel? You cannot always wait for the moment to come before you do an act. Sometimes you have to act, and then the feeling comes as a result of the action. Just witnessing that and the faith that she had in me before I had it in myself, and the faith she had in herself that she could do this again. It's really beautiful.
Can you think of an example when she had to show patience and empathy, where she demonstrated that for you of like where she turned something around for you, or where there was like this moment of like, “I get her and she's not a replacement for my mom, but she is my mom?”
In those very first years of being with her, as a child, you don't necessarily understand a transition like, “I have to let go of this thing, and I don't have the option of going back to it.” That comes out as that I'm just not going to like the thing that I have now. Whether it was name-calling or instigating fights, or like, “Why are you so strict?” or telling her that she's a bad mom.
I was a feisty little girl. Fire was in me then, the fire's in me now. I remember even just the way that she would speak to me, she would say, “I understand you're angry and you can be angry. I'm not going to yell at you,” and just really just showing and then still coming back. “Are you ready for some ice cream now?” “I just called you all these names and you're still going to give me ice cream?”
Even just like that, or going to pick out an outfit, and you're an adolescent girl going through changes, and just like, being there and being really compassionate about all the changes, and trying to help pick out an outfit that made me feel good. It's acts of compassion. I remember those moments or sitting down with the consistency of reading a book every night or doing things where I'm like, at the moment it didn't look like it, but now I just see those as truly deep acts of compassion, and empathy, and helping me identify my voice in that I can say things that are real for me, even if it isn't the real situation.
You have a right to your feelings, but it doesn't mean she has to engage in it.
I'm angry doesn't mean she has to be angry. I remember her telling me that once, like, “I know you're angry and you want me to get angry, but I'm not angry. I'm not going to act angry.”
I love that.
I'm pulling on that even now. With people who are feeling something, and I'm like, “You have the right to feel that way, I don't have to feel that way, therefore I don't have to act the same way that you were acting. That was a beautiful act that she did.
That really is teaching mindfulness. That is the definition of mindfulness, of being present with someone, accepting them as they are, and having compassion for how they see the world. Doesn't mean you have to see the world in the same way. Also, giving a space before a response, because when someone ignites that fire in you, it's sometimes hard to say, “Let me get back to you and respond later.” That's a huge lesson to get as you're young.
At that time, you do see them afterwards.
I love just you calling it little acts of compassion because I think if everyone were able to go around life that way, things would be a lot calmer between people.
It gives you a little bit more compassion.
The Squeaky Clarinet: A Life Lesson In Disguise
Everyone's got their own set of circumstances, and she understood your set of circumstances, but maybe other people wouldn't because they didn't all know your background. It was like demonstrating for you how to handle it without telling you. That's huge. You were a cheerleader then. That was something you spent time and you said you also did music. What music?
I loved music. I started with piano, and then I joined the band. I tried all the instruments. You've got to try the instruments at night. I'm like, “The trumpet.” Like, “No, I don't like this.” I really thought I wanted to be a flute player, and I really could not get any sound out of a flute. Finally, the clarinet just fit.
I became a clarinet player and my favorite story about music and another life lesson I learned through music was for the first year that I did clarinet lessons and in the band, in the band you go first chair is the best clarinet player, second chair, and then you start to sit in the order of like how good you and I was last chair clarinet for like a whole year.
I'm like, “I am trying to get good at this instrument. I am trying so hard. I want to be good. I like the music. I would just always squeak. They were like, “Don't play all the notes. Maybe I'll put it in this note.” Finally, it was my second year. Had a private lesson. I was sitting with my band teacher, and he went to show me, like, “Let me take your clarinet and let me play and so that you can see me doing it.”
He did it, and the clarinet squeaked, and he's like, “What's wrong with your clarinet?” No joking, I had gotten a broken clarinet, and for a whole year, I was practicing over and over again, not hearing good sounds. I got a new clarinet, and I moved to the second chair because I actually knew how to play the clarinet.
That is horrible.
I often like will think of that sometimes when I'm like, “I can be good at something and it still doesn't look like it just because the tool is broken. Sometimes you just have to change out the tool.
Compassion: You can be good at something, and it still doesn't look like it just because the tool is broken. Sometimes, you just have to change out the tool.
I'm just going to relate it to delegation. He actually was trying to demonstrate for you, but in the demonstration saw the problem. No one else had even tested the instrument all that time. They just assumed it was exactly that beautiful.
Like, “How to help an employee or somebody who's encountering the same problem over and over again?
I just literally got off a call like that, where it's like people just are quick to judge, say they don't have enough staff, but they didn't take the time to actually see that they have the tools that they needed or the resources they needed to be successful in their job. I think that's why it was top of mind. Given the opportunity, and that practice still helps even when things aren't working, the practice still does help build your skills even when you're not experiencing the benefit of it. After I got a new clarinet, I loved my band experience in playing clarinet and doing competitions, and also doing cheerleading. That was the way I did my athletic activities, and then music was my creative outlet.
The Nine-Year-Old CPA: A Childhood Dream And Advocacy
You said you wanted to be a CPA when you were nine. Where did that come from?
A lot of that really came from all of that transition that I went through in my childhood. I think my dad was a farmer in the ‘80s, and those were some of the hardest years of farming. I watched what it was like in a community when there was a struggle with money. What happens through the transition in my own life? I could see from the outside that money can either create additional stress or it can bring you freedom through stress.
Compassion: Money can either create additional stress or it can bring you freedom.
I wasn't quite sure how I would be involved with the management of money, but I started exploring careers, and actually, my adopted sister was at the time looking for jobs, and that's when jobs were in the classified ads and the actual newspaper that you got on the steps, not just online job boards. She was looking for some accounts payable jobs or jobs that were accounting-related. When you open up to classified ads, accounting is always at the top because it starts with A.
I started reading, and she was having me circle things. I read the job descriptions of what accountants do, and what this accountant does. I just could see that it relates to money, it relates to business, it relates to having some sense of control and influence, and making decisions. I was like, “I think this is a really good avenue to explore.” I went to my high school teacher. We didn't have an accounting class.
We had a business class, and I said, “I really want to understand what accounting is. Would you create a class for me?” She said, “Yes.” She found an independent study program for me that I could do during my elective, so that I could study accounting in high school because it wasn't an option as a full-on class. I think even those little experiences, like learning to advocate for my needs and what I want, are carried on to like trying to advocate for the profession and what the profession needs and wants.
If only now more teachers would do that, so people can be exposed to what accounting is and is not, because I think not. I think a lot of people have assumptions about it that aren't necessarily true.
It was basic bookkeeping in high school. It was definitely learning the debits, the credits, you're learning to understand a balance, business transactions, and learning about invoices. I really value what that teacher did for me in creating something that had an interest for me early on, which helped me build the foundation for the career path I would choose.
You went into college to do accounting.
Yes. I specifically looked for colleges that had good accounting programs, and so I was seeking out only accounting programs, and that led me to the University of Denver. I learned probably in mid-high school what a CPA was. I didn't exactly know what a certified public accountant was. Once I learned that, I'm like, “What school produces the most CPAs? What's the highest pass rate? I want to put myself in the best position I can.”
That's amazing. You worked in what part of public accounting? Were you an auditor?
I did an audit. I'm doing an audit. I loved my tax class too, but the audit world just sounded more fun to me. Variety, being on a client site, working with a whole team of people, has always been very social. I wanted that exposure.
You met your husband in college or later on?
I met him later on.
Where did you meet him?
Mid-30s, through one of my career transitions after I had left public accounting. I was actually helping a friend of mine who needed some help in her business that she had inherited. I was helping them. It was a construction company. Got in there, I was trying to do the books, and through that organization or through that company, they knew people, and so I met my husband actually at a trivia night at the bar through those, just trying to bond with those people in that company, and didn't think that we would hit it off right away.
I was like, “You’re not quite sure about this,” but he showed definite persistence and character, and I'm like, “I think this is good.” We started dating and got married two years later. If I think back to what the biggest thing that a career transition did for me, it was to introduce me to my husband and change my life.
Unconventional Paths: Building A Family Through Foster Care
You're starting a family and having this big career, what were you going back to in your childhood, or maybe what you were setting out to do with it yourself, having gone through two different families growing up?
I think the beautiful thing that connected my husband and me is that his family doesn't look traditional either in a very different way. We connected on that, in that if we were going to be partners in life and try and create a family that knowing that we were trying to start a family later, and that we were also more established in what we wanted in our careers and what we wanted out of life. Family might not look like it does for everybody else.
We were going to do so many more ideas because of what we both experienced. I really loved that about my husband and still do. I think I knew that whatever I'm doing, whether it's family or work, I am going to try and be as fully present and fully exceptional as I can, and understand that at some point my career may have to lessen in order for my family to become bigger. You cannot control the timing of the family. I was going to continue to pursue excellence in my job for as long as this was an opportunity for me.
Compassion: Whatever I'm doing, whether it's family or work, I aim to be fully present and exceptional.
Once we got married, it took us a long time. We went through a lot of struggles, and so we realized that our path was going to look different. We have just opened our home to foster care and that has been a whole new experience but really one that is bringing back a lot of the lessons that I experienced as a child and I feel like a reflection of preparation that maybe others may not have that compassion for what it's like to have your life completely flipped upside down for you to not have a sense of control. Now I am bringing that and my husband to a real-life experience as a parent through the foster care system.
How do you prepare yourself for foster care, because with the bonding process of bringing children in, knowing that they may go back to their original family, or that's the goal, right? How do you prepare yourself emotionally for that?
There is no preparation, to be honest. I think there's just vulnerability. They have to understand that to be successful and to make the impact that you're really hoping to make in a child's life, you have to let go of what you want out of the relationship. You have to be responsible for your own emotional needs.
Compassion: To make the impact you're hoping to make in a child's life, you have to let go of what you're wanting out of the relationship.
It is not going to be dependent on the situation, or it's not going to be dependent on the behaviors, or it's not going to be dependent on the outcome of whether these children get to stay with you longer term, short term, or go back to their biological parents. The outcome you have to own your own meeting your needs, emotions. I think the preparation for that is really life experience, but then it's learning that when you're in it. I the preparation has not been being prepared to handle what's about to come.
It's about setting up the systems of support to handle me when it does come. Having a strong team at work, having people who understand my story and what I'm going through, having a good friend network, having resources in the community, and having my professional network of people that I know. Having family understand and be ready. It's about creating the systems of support because you cannot fully prepare yourself or your heart for what will come.
Compassion: It's about creating systems of support, because you cannot fully prepare yourself or your heart for what will come.
It's so true that any relationship is like you can do work on yourself, but you learn so much within a relationship or within different experiences. That takes you to another level of understanding yourself and where you get support and therapy or whatever you need to do that. I think it's such a tribute to your adopted parents that you are doing something like this and giving back. It's huge.
It is, and also the entire family, just not parents, but everybody in that family unit took on a role of showing me something about what it means to be family and how you're connected. It was the church family that was connected, or whether that's the community support. It is definitely the caregivers who are with you every day that do a lot of the work, but they cannot do it without all those other things. It is an attribute to them and the communities they felt they had built.
It takes a village.
It takes a village everywhere. Whether they are your natural-born children, adopted children, family, or they're under your supervision in a work environment, it takes a village.
Passion To Paycheck: Transitioning To Association Leadership
How did you end up wanting to move over to association work from being in public accounting and corporate accounting?
Honestly, it's not a path that I built out in advance. It really came just by being an active member of the community and the pure passion that I have for accounting and what it does for people's lives, for relationships, for businesses. The Colorado Society of CPAs, its members it and the staff serving it were always there for me throughout my entire career.
Whether I was in my highs and I'm experiencing my peaks of like, “I just made manager and this is really awesome. It was my low, and I had like a really bad performance review, and I had no idea how to deal with it, or when I thought maybe I needed to change, and had no idea what to do, or when I had an idea I wanted to explore, or I just needed exposure to other referrals.” This community has been there throughout so many professional moments.
The opportunity, I didn't actually seek it out. It really was like a door opening because the position of CFO had opened, and I have always looked for ways to turn passion into paychecks in every role that I have had, whether that was working for another nonprofit or helping a friend's business. It always came from a place of the heart, whatever path I explored. When the opportunity came, I just walked through the door. It wasn't that something I was seeking. Because I was connected to the community, I knew about them.
How did the transition to CEO happen?
Many people who have been a part of the Colorado Society of CPAs community know that Mary Medley, who had been the CEO for over 35 years, was getting close to retirement. Mary was actually one of my dear mentors throughout my career. She taught my very first business writing class. She was my teacher long ago.
I had the conversation with her before, when I knew that she was retiring, “Do you think this would be a role that I could do well in, not for myself, but for the greater community? I wanted to know, do you think this is something I should explore?” She was a cheerleader for me, but she was also a very good mirror to reflect back where she thought I needed to grow or areas I would thrive in right away, and has been a continued support for me, even though she's no longer there to help me process different things, new experiences as the CEO.
When she retired and the opportunity opened, it was just a decision. Is this something I want to risk what I have now in order to lean into something new with the same purpose in mind? I think that my exposures to community, being a CPA, and having that voice of advocacy and relationships, and community building are something that led me to the board, saying that this was the right position for me.
Lessons From Leadership: Advocacy, Communication, And Discernment
What have you learned since being in that position?
Just like parenthood, there's nothing that can truly prepare you for certain roles until you're in them. I have learned so much. I really didn't understand the word advocacy like I do now, and what that means to have an advocate, to be an advocate. I have learned the importance and power of different types of communication that I think, as a CPA, typically like just showing facts does just show you the answer, but there's so much more to the psychology of people and the change that is required in a position like this, in a community like this.
I have been challenged in so many different ways. To be the navigator of when there is always more that can be done, and what to distill down to what really can be done or should be done right now. Really, having to be discerning. I think that some of those skills, between communication, really the power of advocacy and what it means in our community, and the discernment of priorities, have been something that, like I have continued to grow in this role.
Quite a story you have. Thank you so much for sharing so much of it and being transparent and vulnerable for the audience, because I think it is always helpful and understanding how that's brought through in your leadership now.
It really is a joy, a privilege. I do love when other people's stories can be relatable and shine through to how leadership shows up.
I just have some rapid-fire questions. Pick a category. Family and friends, money, spiritual, or health.
I will go with money since that was the impetus for me wanting to control the world.
There you go. Things or actions I don't have that I want to have with money.
I think unlimited money would definitely be the goal to be able to do anything that I really wanted.
Things or actions that I have that I want to keep.
I think my budget mindset, my planning ability that helps me be able to do the things that I really love, which is like travel and true experiences, be able to pay for them.
Isn't that just such a gift of being an accountant? Many people just don't understand the language at all. When you do, it really makes a difference. Things or actions I don't have that I don't want.
I think the weight of a lot of consumer debt, the feeling of not owing someone else, and feeling a little bit more freedom and flexibility. I think I don't have a lot of debt, and I don't want it.
Last one, things or actions that I do have that I don't want.
I would say a little bit of my conservative, saver mentality sometimes keeps me from fully enjoying the fruits of my own labor. A little bit of my conservatism holds me back from fully enjoying the benefits of money.
I had a background where we lost things, but I think you saw your father struggle with money, your biological father. When you see that, when you feel that, it makes it hard to turn around. Like, “No, I've actually gotten past that point.”
There's always this little piece in you that I lose. I want to make sure to keep it. The true enjoyment of enjoying what you've done.
Is there anything that we haven't talked about that you want to make sure to get across, or something you want to emphasize from our conversation?
I would definitely say my encouragement. Community is a really big part. That's why I lead an organization like the Colorado Society of CPAs. Not being afraid to just step into a community, explore something. I know you're coming to speak at our peak conference, which is so exciting, and those kinds of conferences are a wonderful way to just step into community, and every community is built by just sometimes one step forward. We're excited to have you, and I encourage everyone to make sure that you're well supported so that you can truly thrive.
I love it. I do think it's so important because these professional organizations. I've volunteered my whole career, and it's where you make not only connections but friends. I think too many times it's thought about as if this is CPE. Instead of like how you can advocate, how you can give back to future generations doing this work and the important work going forward, or like your adoptive father, how do we bring together all of these different areas to now deal with AI and offshoring and recruitment and pipeline and training, and all of those things? Get involved and be a part of it.
It really is the table of innovation for not just our jobs, but the profession and the greater circle that we live in.
That's awesome. Thank you so much for being a part of this.
Thank you, Amy. My pleasure.
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Now for my mindful moments with this episode with Alicia Gelinas. I so appreciate it when guests feel open enough to share their personal story because I think we all have a backstory to learn from. Those backstories actually craft and create who we are today. We talked about her shift in her life when her parents both died when she was very young, and moving to not only another state, another home with her uncle and her aunt, who took her on and adopted her into their family.
The lessons that she learned from them just from such a young age of really watching her adopted father be able to show taking leadership at a time that technology was a disruptor in the state of Nebraska, starting out as a CEO of a not-for-profit and really bringing together all of these different areas of the workforce and government and education so that they could solve together how technology was going to affect not only the farming community, but also other jobs that were dependent in that area.
I think we're going through a similar time with AI. There's just a new tool developed, it feels like every five seconds, and so much creativity and innovation happening where it can get overwhelming as well to anyone looking at all the opportunities available to them to maybe innovate the things that they do and what they work on. When someone actually leads the charge going into unknown areas and tries to bring together all of these different opinions, it's really important to understand how to navigate that.
You may not agree with everyone, but what is the give and take so that you can come to a solution that everyone feels like they're a part of? That is the power of persuasion, and not everybody comes naturally to that power, but it is important that it's always something that can be learned. When we learn the skills of really trying to understand what different people's viewpoints are without putting our own viewpoint on what they're saying and just purely listening to what they have to say, it really does give a new perspective and helps to brainstorm ideas.
It's very hard to come up with ideas by yourself. When you have a community to help you with that, and ideas always get better because they encompass things that you couldn't even think of, because you're not in those shoes. You're not thinking of it from that vantage point. That's why it becomes so important to build community, which was a big theme in this conversation about how do you bring diverse opinions together and facilitate that as a leader. One of the things we talked about was that very early on in her learning the skill to do that was from her adopted mom.
It makes sense that a teenage girl, a preteen girl coming to live with a new family after losing both of her parents, would be angry or upset and maybe take it out on the people around them because they have no one else to take it out on. One of the things that she really learned from her mom was the patience and empathy, and compassion that she would treat Alicia with as a young girl. She was very clear that even when Alicia was angry that she had a right to be angry. She had a right to her own feelings.
It doesn't mean that she had to agree with her, but she wasn't going to engage in the argument. I think a lot of people are good at engaging other people in an argument or figuring out the things that's going to drive someone else crazy, so that you engage and then you didn't even intend to engage. Really learning that skill of taking a step back like her mom taught her, that she gave Alicia space to work through her feelings, to be angry, to cry, whatever she needed to do, but then she would always come back.
I think that's really important, whether you're in a family or in a leadership position, that people want to feel that consistency and that compassion. The way she talked about it was these little acts of compassion that, when we're being an example for somebody else, sometimes it's not the big things. It can be the little things. It can be just giving someone that space to breathe, which eventually they're going to so appreciate. They just cannot appreciate it in the moment because they're not thinking as clearly, and that you gave them space so that they didn't make it worse is a good thing.
Understanding that each person has a right to their feelings is a mindfulness practice. We talked about that with her father as well, bringing all those different perspectives together, and her mom teaching her on a personal basis about the way that she felt and what she was going through. How we make sure that these lessons carry through is that we do one little shift at a time until it becomes where we can embody. Whenever we want to shift something, and especially if it doesn't come naturally to us, it's one of those things where it just doesn't feel right, so we give up on it.
Instead of having in our mind, this is how we want to feel. This is what we want to think. We might not feel or think that right now. If we make little shifts over time and we start embodying it, it starts becoming more natural because we're repeating the behavior. As we look back, we're like, “I cannot believe I've come so far.” You don't even notice it in the moment because the work is hard. To change ourselves is hard. When we talk about changing organizations, onboarding technology, doing all of these new things that we're talking about in business, all of those things take little steps at a time.
People are going to get upset. People are going to get frustrated, and you have to give them space to feel that way, but not in a condescending way, utilizing your empathy and compassion for them, but not pitting them. Once we utilize those skills, then we can show up better as a leader, as a partner in our personal life as well. I just love that she's taken this all the way through to the current day, where she is now fostering children, because that was something that was so important to her, having been in their shoes.
She better understands how it feels to be them, to have compassion for them, but also to realize that any emotions that she has, she needs to be supported by a community, too. That led us into the importance of communities and how many communities we have, whether that be in family, that be in business, that be in the associations that we're a part of, and that we network with. Those people become our friends.
It's not always about CPE or something we're going to gain. It's about the relationships that we create and the giving back. When we truly give back and are able to appreciate the successes and all that we have been able to overcome in our lives, and actually show people that it is possible and they don't have to hold themselves back, and they can overcome. That is when we really feel in our bodies that energy of purpose. I hope all of you enjoyed this interview. I know I did.
I so appreciate Alicia sharing her story, and I'm very excited to go out to Colorado and be their keynote speaker for their peak conference. If you want information on that, definitely look that up under the Colorado CPA Society. It's a very exciting new conference that they're offering, and I'm so honored that they're having me a part of it. Please share, like, and give this to someone who this could be helpful to them too. Give them the hope that they need and the purpose that they're looking for. Make sure to just remember that our energy is contagious. Being intentional about how we show up is contagious with the people around us.
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About Alicia Gelinas
Alicia first joined the COCPA as a student member while attending the University of Denver. After years of volunteering at the Society, she stepped into the role of Chief Financial Officer and Executive Director of the COCPA Educational Foundation for five years. Alicia now serves as the Society's third President and CEO, where she daily demonstrates her passion for the accounting profession and leads the organization as it carries out the COCPA mission to help people thrive personally and professionally through service and connection.
Alicia’s professional background includes stints in public accounting, adjunct teaching, consulting, and coaching. This Midwest native enjoys spending time camping, boating, and traveling with her husband and their dog, Ally.