CPA career roots.

• Position: Finalentry - Interview

David F. Veyna, CPA and partner at Veyna & Forschino has a career arc that grew out ol plant sciences and into accounting. We decided to talk to him more about this tit see what he learned, and why a CPA license was his ultimate choice.

Why plant sciences?

My father's owned a large wholesale tree nursery. Sitter the age of 5 I would work with him most weekends, holiday breaks and during the summer. When it became time start Ii tensing on what I would major in at college. it Was a no-brainer that it would be related to the nursery business. At the time. the premier researcher in plant tissue culture was Dr. Murashige at the University Califbrnia, Riverside. Nly lather would talk a lot about him and his work in ch >nal propagation, so I decided to go there and study plant science.

What did a bachelor's degree in plant sciences entail?

Plant science is basically the study of plain file. It entailed a lot of general science and plant biology. My hardest courses were organic chemistry and plant morphology. Anyone who has taken organic chemistry knows what I'm talking about. Plant morphology was just a lot of memorization that I was never good at.

How did you move into studying agricultural economics?

After I graduated from UC-Riverside, I started working hull-time for the family business with my father at the nursery's bareroot operations in Visalia. But then I decided to head back to school and work on a master's degree in agricultural economics at Oregon State University. My desire to know die business side of things started to emerge. Nly intention was to return to the nursery after I finished at Oregon State.

At what point did you decide to switch to accounting? Why?

After leaving Oregon State I did go back to work at the family business. This tittle I ended up with my uncle in Escondido, helping mintage one of our largest container tree yards. I loved working for my uncle and working with trees. But because of the unfortunate change in die economy. family politics and the fact that there were already a number of my older cousins holding key positions in the family business, my. potential for advancement within the company was limited. As I re-evaluated my situation, I decided it was time to leave the family business. I didn't want to work another larnik business, sit I decided to go in a different direction and start my career oven At 28. I had no qualms about getting back to school. And after evaluating my strengths and weaknesses, I...