The players are in place. Now, what's topping the agenda?

• Author: DiFabio, Christine
• Position: Securities and Exchange Commission appointed Conrad Hewitt - Public Company Accounting Oversight Board appointed Mark Olson - Column

In this column last April, I pondered on what I called the "revolving door" of leadership at key Washington agencies, specifically the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB). At that time, the question on many people's minds was whom SEC Chairman Christopher Cox would select as the next PCAOB chairman and SEC chief accountant.

Well, the results are in: Mark Olson was named PCAOB chairman in June and Conrad Hewitt was named SEC chief accountant in July. While these appointments, as well as several others in recent months, have answered the question of "who," we're now waiting to see how the actions of these individuals will impact the finance community.

Recent Appointments

In the past six months, it would appear that much of Chairman Cox's time has been dedicated to personnel issues. Olson, a former Federal Reserve Board governor, has a varied work history: with the Fed since 2001; a former staff director of the Securities Subcommittee of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee; a partner with Ernst & Young LLP, and President and CEO of Security State Bank in Minnesota.

Upon Olson's appointment, Acting PCAOB Chairman Bill Gradison stepped back to his position as board member. On the same day, Kayla Gillan was reappointed to a second term with PCAOB. It already appears that, similar to the legacy left by former PCAOB Chairman William McDonough, much of Olson's focus will be on Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act dealing with internal control reporting--specifically, PCAOB's efforts in amending Auditing Standard No. 2 (AS2) on Audits of Internal Controls.

At the SEC, Kathleen Casey was sworn in as the 88th commissioner in July, replacing outgoing Commissioner Cynthia Glassman, who had served since 2002. Casey's background includes 13 years on Capitol Hill, most recently as staff director and counsel for the Senate Banking Committee.

Hewitt, the new SEC chief accountant, is a former California Superintendent of Banking, Commissioner of the California Department of Financial Institutions and partner with Ernst & Young. He started working for the commission on August 18. Deputy Chief Accountant Scott Taub had been Acting Chief Accountant since the departure of former Chief Accountant Donald Nicolaisen in October 2005.

There was much speculation about whether the next chief accountant would be someone with public accounting experience or an individual from the...