Liam Collins

Bio

Liam has more than 18 years of assurance and consulting experience, including 10 years with Big Four firms. He leads the firm’s Risk Assurance and Advisory Services practice, which includes the firm’s Cybersecurity, Privacy, Service Organization Control (SOC) audit, HITRUST, ISO27001, Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX), Internal Audit and IT Compliance service lines. Before joining Armanino, Liam served as a Managing Director at KPMG, where he was engagement Partner on a number of large assurance and consulting projects. He has also held audit, assurance and IT leadership roles at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), ControlMetric, Clare Chapman and Prodapt.

Liam is a member of the American Institute of CPAs and the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA). He received a BSc. in Accounting from Golden Gate University, a JD from the University of San Francisco School of Law and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Experience

KPMG LLP
ControlMetric
PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC)
Clare, Chapman, Storey and Bowen LLP
Prodapt

Associations

American Institute of Certified Public Accountants
Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA)

Education

Golden Gate University
University of San Francisco - School of Law
University of Pennsylvania - Wharton School

Q&A

I was attracted by the firm’s entrepreneurial spirit and by the opportunity to build up a national SOC practice. I spent many great years working at the Big Four, and I’m excited that moving to Armanino will provide me with new opportunities. It also enables me to leverage what I’ve learned so far in my career to develop a new approach and more efficiently perform SOC engagements for my clients. The firm’s diverse range of clients, from small businesses to large public companies, was also appealing and is a great base from which to expand.

Nothing―I sleep very well. I’m not completely worry-free, but life is too short to be overly stressed.

I like to give my teams guidance and then give them the leeway to show what they can do and to be successful. I try to manage people the way I like to be managed, and demonstrate respect for their professional abilities. I also like to promote diversity in my teams, so we get multiple viewpoints on any given issue.

In my career, being admitted to the partnership at Armanino and to the partner group at KPMG were both very proud moments. Getting my MBA and my JD―both while working full-time―are also achievements I’m very proud of. Personally, I’m very proud and fortunate to have an amazing family and friends in my life.

Leaving KPMG to join Armanino was really tough, because I was happy at KPMG and worked with great people there. It was a difficult decision, but coming to an entrepreneurial, fast-growth firm like Armanino was too good an opportunity to pass up.

My eldest brother, because he showed me it was possible to be successful. We grew up in Ireland in a working-class family, and he was the first to branch out and succeed professionally. My first boss in public accounting, who showed me the value of building strong relationships, also had a big influence on my career.