John Geraci Makes Accounting Today’s 2020 MP Elite List

“Ask John Geraci about himself, and he often ends up talking about other people — whether it’s the leader at another Boston-based firm earlier in his career who taught him “the delicate balance between being a compassionate and caring human leader, while also being very entrepreneurial and innovative,” or the “strong and dedicated” leadership team he works with, or the firm’s “devoted team members.”

His passion for people is clear in the 22 separate retention initiatives the firm has put in place during his tenure, or the growth and succession plans that aim, in his words, ‘to ensure that we are in a position to provide everyone who wants it a seat at the table’ — but it may be clearest in a story from the current pandemic: LGA made a point of sending gifts and care packages to team members who were working from home to help them feel less isolated. ‘For one of these gifts,’ Geraci explains, ‘it was important to me to deliver it, in a contactless manner, to each of my team members’ homes. I wanted them to know that it was about more than spending money to make them smile; I wanted them to know that I cared enough about every one of them to spend over 20 hours in a car driving from house to house as a symbol of what our culture represents.”

The results of that devotion are clear as well: the 71-person firm’s revenue has grown over 100 percent since he took office — and its staff has grown over 200 percent. ‘Their success is my success, and their failure is my failure,’ he says, ‘so we must succeed together.'”

Accounting Today’s annual MP Elite list always represents the profession’s most outstanding firm leaders, but this year’s class of managing partners is notable for exemplary leadership amid the extraordinary events and challenges of 2020.