Pinnacle point in her career as a CA
FOR Meliki Tuinamuana becoming a partner at KPMG has been a pinnacle point in her career as a chartered accountant.
She started her work as a CA in PwC and then delved out into the commercial world.
“I worked for Wakaya for about nine years, and then British American Tobacco.
“Got different sorts of experience and then I wanted to come back into the CA world and my aim, when I came back was to get to partnership level.”
Ms Tuinamuana said this was the highest point an individual could get in their career as a CA.
“So that was my aim when I came back into chartered accounting. I think it means a lot to be a female indigenous partner in the firm.
“There are not many indigenous Fijians in the field.”
The newly appointed partner was happy to be pushing this agenda not only for itaukei but for women as well.
“I mean, we have many more females in the profession but to get the females up to the top level partnership, to put their hands up to sit on directors on boards.
“That’s the next level that I’m hoping to maybe mentor young women to be able to help them get to that point.
“Because I believe I’ve done in sort of a different way being in CA, then I’ve gone out and I’ve come back in.”
Ms Tuinamuana brings with her an immense amount of experience as well as a good network of contacts, to be able to build relationships, bring in new work and also to be able to mentor staff, train staff and contribute to the success of the firm.
“I think I’m quite approachable to staff so I think I’d be able to really mentor and be able to train the team to contribute more to the firm,” she said.
Ms Tuinamuana has enormous experience both in professional services and in the private sector and had been with the practice since August, 2020.
She said this was a pinnacle of her career to become partner to one of the biggest firms in Fiji.
“It’s quite, almost overwhelming to get to that point.
“So my career, I’ve always been an accountant interested in accounting.
“My father was an accountant, and sort of runs with a family,” said Ms Tuinamuana.