Coleman D. Ross
Public Accounting Experience
… be free of conflicts of interest in discharging professional responsibilities…. be independent in fact and in appearance when providing auditing and other attestation services….
— American Institute of CPAs Code of Professional Conduct
PricewaterhouseCoopers
Price Waterhouse 1977 Class of New Partners
Norm Adams, Bill Bax, Jack Bernier, Paul Brou, Bernie Burke, Kevin Carton, Dick Connell, Glenn Corlett, George Drewry, Rod Felts, Peter Frank, John Gaffney, Jonathan Harris, Bill Hoffman, Tom Hoops, Dick Kaplan, Larry Kaplan, Pat Keller, Tony Komlyn, Tom Kuchta, Leon Leonhardt, Barry Lewis, Dean Markezin, Terry Martin, John McCabe, Jim McNally, Ed Miller, Frank Olazabel, John Pastor, Charles Ricks, Glenn Rose, Coleman Ross, Steve Scheiner, Dick Schreiber, Larry Shoultz, Roger Steinbecker, Bob Strickler, Bill Walker, Norm Walker, Ron Walton, Joe Warden, Bill Wheeler, Neal Zimmerman
photo courtesy of Price Waterhouse
Over the first 34 years of my business career, I served audit clients for Price Waterhouse (now PricewaterhouseCoopers), including six years when I was also the national leader of the firm's insurance practice. I joined Price Waterhouse on July 1, 1965 as an audit staff accountant in Tampa, Florida, participated in an international exchange program for six months in 1970, was admitted into the firm's partnership on July 1, 1977, and retired as a partner on June 30, 1999. I served in the following firm offices: Tampa (1965 – 1976), Toronto (1970), Hartford (1976 – 1993), and New York (1993 – 1999).
Throughout my 22 years as an audit partner, I principally served clients in insurance, banking, and other financial services. Six of these U.S. insurance and banking clients were included in Fortune magazine as Fortune 500 Services companies; a seventh client of comparable size was not included by Fortune due to its Bermuda domicile. These companies and my tenure serving as audit signing partner follow:
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Allmerica Financial (then State Mutual Life) Worcester, Massachusetts two years: 1991–92 |
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Equitable Holdings
(then Equitable Companies) New York four years: 1993–96 |
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Cigna (then Connecticut General) Hartford five years: 1977–81 |
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National Life Montpelier, Vermont five years: 1982–86 |
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Phoenix Companies Hartford eleven years: 1997–98; 1989–90; 1980–86 |
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Shawmut National (also Hartford National) Boston and Hartford nine years: 1987–88; 1978–84 |
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XL Group (then XL Capital) Hamilton Bermuda one year: 1998 |
In addition to my auditor role, I was Chairman and Managing Partner of Price Waterhouse’s national insurance practice from 1988 to 1994. This practice was the firm’s first non-geographical, industry-focused practice, bringing audit, tax, actuarial, and consulting professionals together from across the firm to serve our insurance clients. As Chairman and Managing Partner of the practice, I was also a member of the firm’s Financial Services Committee and the World Firm’s Insurance Committee.
Under my insurance practice leadership, we recognized the increasingly important role of the audit committee and began an annual audit committee forum for our insurance audit clients. We created the forum to give audit committee members the opportunity to learn best practices from recognized leaders and to keep abreast of industry and public company issues. I'm pleased to note that this forum, which we began in 1993, has been expanded by PricewaterhouseCoopers and continues today as the Financial Services Audit Committee Forum.
For a more complete list of audit clients that I served, click here.