Improving Your Company Culture: Key Strategies from Aprio, One of Atlanta’s Top Workplaces – Yelena Epova, Partner

Having a strong company culture is more important now than it has ever been before. In addition to salary, paid time off, and healthcare benefits, company culture is now considered a key component of attracting and retaining quality employees. That’s why during the month of September, the Atlanta Small Business Network will be speaking to several thought leaders and experts in this area to find out why company culture should be your top priority.

Our next guest, Yelena Epova, is Partner-in-Charge of International Services at Aprio, one of the AJC ‘s top Atlanta workplaces for three years running. Yelena will also be speaking at TiECON Atlanta’s Company Culture Breakout Session later this month. 

Yelena is a partner at Aprio, the largest independent CPA firm in Atlanta. In addition to being a full accounting advisory firm, Aprio employs over 500 hundred people with multiple offices on the east coast, and a virtual cloud-based platform. After moving from St. Petersberg, Russia in the early 1990s, Yelena received her accounting education from Georgia State University and began her first post-graduate job at Aprio as a staff accountant. She built Aprio’s international practice from the ground up and became a full-fledged partner. Now, 25 percent of Aprio’s workforce is comprised of foreign-born employees, with over 30 languages spoken among them.

Recently, Aprio was named one of Atlanta’s top workplaces by the AJC for the third year in a row. Yelena says, of course, they are very proud of that accomplishment considering that Aprio is an accounting firm that works incredibly hard, and frequently under stressful circumstances. The key to their positive culture comes from delivering great team member experiences. They focus on creating great work-life balance and have implemented many initiatives to achieve this. Yelena says that when she joined the firm years ago, it was completely different.

in addition to changes in the workforce, Yelena says management has changed as well over the years. They want to make sure that their clients are being serviced by happy people who like their jobs. Yelena also wants to make sure that they keep their greatest asset, their staff, with them at all times, so their turnover is very low.

To find out more about the innovative strategies Aprio uses to maintain great company culture, be sure to watch our full interview above. And don’t forget to catch Yelena at TiECON Atlanta where she will be speaking at the Company Culture Breakout Session. You can register for TiECON 2019: Built in Atlanta today, right here!

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