Know When To Hold, Know When To Fold:
Year-End Financial Planning for Entrepreneurs and Consultants
Speakers/Panelists: Len Cohen, Financial Advisor, CF Services Group, Inc.; Jina Etienne, CPA; Paul Van Akkeren, Computer Consultant 

Meeting Agenda:
2:15    Welcome 
2:25    Panelist Presentations and Discussion 
3:55    Q&A 
4:10    Closing announcements 
4:15    Informal queries, conversation, networking 

Now is the best time of year to examine your financial picture, both business and personal. Can small changes, or a major overhaul, save you or your business money now and/or protect your future? Is the structure of your business appropriate to your current situation? Which expenses should you pay before the end of the year? 

What about investments--are the ones you have now appropriate for this time in your life? How long since you've really examined your insurance coverage--are there new options that would be better for you? Finally, if you plan to retire someday, how do you best ensure you will have the money you need to have the retirement lifestyle you want?

Speaker/Panelist: Lenard S. Cohen is a Rockville-based financial advisor with 20 years of experience advising owners and senior level staff of startup and small businesses having 250 or fewer employees. He is well versed in the topics of employee benefits (including group insurance and retirement plans) and executive benefits (including financial planning, deferred compensation, and strategies for gaining tax-advantaged benefits). Other areas of expertise include estate planning and business succession. 

Len Cohen is an executive board member of the Suburban Maryland Estate Planning Council. He is also a member of the Society of Financial Service Professionals, the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors, the High Technology Council of Maryland, the Rockville Chamber of Commerce, and other business and industry associations.

Mr. Cohen has earned masters degrees from the University of Illinois and the University of Hawaii. He earned his designation as a Certified Financial Planner in 1988 and was awarded the Chartered Life Underwriter designation in 1995. Prior to entering financial services, Len Cohen worked at the U.S. Public Health Service. 

Mr. Cohen considers his business entrepreneurial because he needs to continually change with the market and differentiate his professional knowledge and services from the competition. He is president of CF Services Group, Inc., an independent financial services firm. Len may be reached at len@cfservicesgroup.com.

Speaker/Panelist: Jina-Michele M. Etienne, CPA, and CPCUG member and speaker, has more than 11 years of public accounting experience. She began her career with Deloitte & Touche, one of the "Big Eight" accounting firms, where her focus was tax planning and compliance for corporations, partnerships, and S corporations ranging from government contractors and vending companies to hospitality and retail firms. When she left Deloitte and Touche after several years, her focus shifted to the needs of small- and medium-sized businesses. 

Now with her own practice, Jina Etienne provides a wide range of accounting services for businesses and individuals, including tax planning and preparation, and business consulting. Her client base is diverse, including retail and service-based businesses as well as consultants and contractors. She also has been involved in a variety of special projects ranging from budget estimating for government proposals and bids, to providing stock versus asset comparisons for a corporate reorganization. 

For individuals, her services are tax preparation and planning, including tax research projects and taxpayer representation cases. She has researched the tax consequences of incentive versus nonqualified stock options, the timing of capital stock sales, the applicability of the home-office deduction, and more. In one of her taxpayer representation cases, Ms. Etienne successfully defended a taxpayer's position, reducing an IRS assessment for more than $40,000 to a tax bill just under $3,000. 

Ms. Etienne earned an M.S. in taxation in 1993 and a B.S.B.A. in accounting in 1989 from American University. Jina has also taught accounting as an adjunct professor at American University and teaches QuickBooks at local seminars and conferences. She may be reached at jina@jmecpa.com, and her Web site is at http://www.jmecpa.com.

Speaker/Panelist: Paul Van Akkeren, a computer consultant doing business as Akorn Komputing, has been providing support to customers in a variety of industries for more than 12 years. His consultancy follows a career of more than 19 years in full-time permanent positions in aerospace and biomedical industries.

Mr. Van Akkeren specializes in the programming of database management systems, technical writing of proposals and technical documents, and systems analysis. He has also provided computer training and expert advice.

Mr. Van Akkeren is a member of CPCUG, the Institute of Electrical and
Electronic Engineers (IEEE), and the Association of Proposal Management
Professionals (APMP). He was a charter member of the Association of Home Based Businesses (AHBB). 

Paul Van Akkeren is an individual investor and personally manages all his finances, personal and business. He may be reached by e-mail at paulvana@ieee.org.

Saturday, November 4, 2:15 pm 
National Institutes of Health (NIH) 
Masur Auditorium 
Clinical Center (Building 10) 
9000 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, Maryland 
(area map; NIH campus map; Floorplan of first floor of Clinical Center) 

NOTE: This E&C SIG meeting follows CPCUG's free "Before You Buy a Computer" Seminar, which starts at 8:30 am for registration and runs as late as 2:00 pm. 

Free Parking: There's construction underway at NIH, so try to arrive a little early. (There are traffic police on the NIH campus--observe the signs--speeding or rolling through stop signs, for example, can result in tickets.)  You may park in the inside parking garage of Building 10. Enter from Memorial Drive and park on the P3 level. Watch for and observe the signs, including those about types of cars permitted in
certain spaces (such as "handicapped" driver and "small compact" only.) Tell any parking attendant you are attending a CPCUG event (there will be no charge). You may also park in the many outdoor parking lots.

Metro--Medical Center Stop on the Red Line (about 3 blocks across the NIH campus) 

Free (any door prizes are usually for CPCUG members only) 

RSVP: Not required to attend, but if possible, please RSVP via e-mail to bconn@cpcug.org. (Sometimes we have handouts, giveaways, or both, and try to have enough for everyone.)