Experience from both sides of the audit request list.
A certified public accountant who spent fifteen years examining nonprofit records, and has spent the years since helping nonprofit organizations build records worth examining. Versatile, organized, detail-oriented — and direct about what an engagement will and will not cover.
A large, authentic professional photograph of Marifran belongs here. The image linked on the current website is a Cape Cod harbor scene, not a portrait. No AI-generated likeness will be used in its place.
Professional summary
A certified public accountant with a background in nonprofit audits, compliance auditing, policy review, and research and analysis. Marifran establishes clear guidelines and defines the scope of each assignment from the start — a habit carried over from audit practice, where an undefined scope is the first thing that goes wrong.
She fosters open communication with colleagues and clients, works effectively under the time pressure that reporting deadlines create, and brings a comprehensive background in risk management, project supervision and quality assurance.
Her practice is deliberately narrow. Nonprofit accounting is not business accounting applied to a charitable organization, and the organizations she works with benefit from someone who treats it as its own discipline.
Education & credentials
- Certified Public Accountant
- Bachelor of Science, Accounting — Spring Arbor University, Spring Arbor, Michigan
- Member, American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)
- Member, Massachusetts Society of Certified Public Accountants
Skills & systems
- Review and monitoring of financial information
- Grant applications, monitoring and reporting
- Audit reporting and performance audits
- Corporate, partnership and individual tax preparation
- Project management programs
- QuickBooks; Microsoft Office; Thomson Reuters Creative Solutions accounting and tax products
- Virtual, cloud and LAN database environments
- Risk management, project supervision and quality assurance
Career timeline
- 2015 – PresentNonprofit consultant — Cotuit, MA
Complete reviews of financial records, reconciliation of complex accounting information, definition of financial, internal control and risk policies, compilation of financial information and preparation of tax returns, future-goal planning and strategic-plan implementation, and assistance with federal and state taxing authorities — using audit experience to benefit organizations that are themselves subject to audit.
- 2001 – 2015Senior auditor, contracted auditor — Osterville, MA
Directed audits for not-for-profit organizations (Yellow Book, single audit, HUD) and for-profit entities. Performed final review of all financial statements issued, created and oversaw the firm's quality-control systems, and implemented a paperless quality-control and workpaper system across a fifty-client audit practice. Handled online submissions to HUD REAC, MHFA, USDA and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts OSD, and reported internal control findings to management with recommendations to mitigate the associated risks.
- 1980 – 2000Controller & senior accountant
Controller roles at privately held companies and senior accountant positions at certified public accounting firms — the operational grounding behind everything that followed.
Confirm before publicationCareer history published on the current site reaches back to 1980. Confirm dates, current CPA license status, current memberships, and Marifran's preferred way to describe her total years of experience before publication.
On communication
Open communication with clients and colleagues is a working method, not a courtesy. Findings are explained as they emerge rather than delivered as a surprise at the end, and management and boards hear the same information in language each can act on.
On scope and expectations
Each assignment is defined at the start: what is included, what is not, what the organization will need to provide, and what it will have when the work is finished. Audit-readiness work is clearly distinguished from independent audit and attest services, which this firm does not perform.
On risk and quality
Having built and overseen quality-control systems for an audit practice, Marifran approaches an organization's records the way a reviewer will: looking for what is missing, what cannot be supported, and where responsibilities overlap in ways that create exposure.
Confirm before publicationA personal note about Cotuit and Cape Cod can be added here with Marifran's approval. No personal details have been invented.
Bring her the requirement you are least sure about.
A short, nonconfidential description of the situation is enough to determine whether the firm is the right fit.