Scott Miller joined Tax Forum in 2024 after 17 years with a national CPA and consulting firm. A longtime Forum attendee, Scott welcomed the opportunity to share his knowledge and expertise with faculty members Chuck Levun and Michael Cohen. We sat down with Scott to learn more about his experience and what he has in store for the future.

You received your JD and LLM, tell us more about your background.
I grew up in Nebraska, and my dad was a CPA. I took accounting classes in high school, and I did well in them, but when I went to college, I thought I wanted to study computer science. I found out quickly it wasn’t for me so I majored in accounting. After graduation, I moved to Denver and worked as a staff accountant for a large publicly traded company. I completed my JD and LLM concurrently at the University of Denver law school. I eventually started working for Kennedy and Coe (now Pinion) and ended up staying there for 17 years. I became the director of their national tax team.

How has Tax Forum made an impact on your career?
I attended Tax Forum seminars for about 10 years. I thought I knew a lot before I went to the Fundamentals of Flow-Through® course, but I soon realized there was still so much to learn. Michael and Chuck are the experts, end of story. After I attended the Fundamentals of Flow-Through, I started going to the Forum® [or regularly [I had a few gap years when the firm sent me to international tax seminars] and gained knowledge every single time. I would study the materials that were relevant to what I was doing and I kept a copy on my tablet. More than once, I was on an airplane and I started reading those materials to see if there were any ideas for a client I was about to visit. I almost always found a way to share new thinking and solve problems my clients were facing.

How did you come to work at Tax Forum?
As I was trying to build my national tax team at Pinion I sent Michael an email and asked about American Bar Association meetings. He connected me with Chuck, who met me at an ABA meeting and introduced me to literally everyone there. Chuck became a mentor to me, and when he asked me to join their team, I knew it was a unique opportunity to work with two of the best in the country.

You joined the team in 2024. How has the transition been?
Joining Tax Forum has been really interesting. When people call us with problems, we don’t get many softballs, we get the really tough questions. That has been challenging and fun. I’ve done presenting, writing of our email blasts as well as Exhibits, and when you’re working with this team, you can’t just be in the general ballpark. You’ve got to throw a strike right down the middle of the plate each time. It’s been a great career move and I’m looking forward to continued success.

What have you been working on at the Tax Forum? What’s new this year?
We just updated the Fundamentals course for this year’s programming, and we’ve also developed a new self-study option for the Fundamentals, which has been great. It adds a lot of flexibility for Learning and Development directors and we think it’s going to be a hit, especially with our younger attendees and global teams located in Asia. We’re always evolving and innovating to better meet the needs of our attendees.

What does the future hold for you and Tax Forum?
My goal is to continue to learn and grow with Tax Forum. Chuck and Michael are fantastic teachers, not only for our attendees but for me as well! So, over the next few years I want to learn as much as I can from Chuck and Michael and help bring our programs into the future. With their guidance, eventually I plan to design and carry on the program.

Chuck and Michael have built a great reputation for Tax Forum. People know that this is the place where they can come to learn new ideas, take the ideas back to their firms, and solve the problems their clients face. There’s no other place where you’re going to get flow-through taxation strategy and planning at this level. Tax law and consulting is a career where we are always learning and evolving, so there’s always going to be an important role for Tax Forum.