Christian Asare-Tuah was earning his bachelor’s in accounting in Ghana when his mentor gave him a piece of advice that would eventually change his life: apply to the Robinson College of Business. Asare-Tuah’s mentor had earned his Master of Taxation (MTX) from Robinson and landed a great job with PricewaterhouseCoopers. He recognized Asare-Tuah’s potential and knew Robinson’s MTX program could propel him to the next level.
After moving to the U.S., Asare-Tuah landed a job as a tax preparer, but soon made a career pivot. He earned a master’s in information systems management from DeVry University’s Keller Graduate School of Management while also working as a database administrator for Williams-Sonoma. He landed a similar role at Dalton Carpet One Floor & Home while juggling a consulting position for a small tax firm. He realized he was hungry to learn more about the complex world of corporate taxation. So in 2019, he acted on his mentor’s guidance and enrolled in Robinson’s MTX program.
In Lynn Comer-Jones’ Tax Analytics class, Asare-Tuah discovered where the future of corporate accounting and taxation lies: in automation. Through hands-on projects, he analyzed large data sets with advanced software programs like Alteryx and UiPath. He also formatted his findings in clean, professional presentations with data visualization software Tableau.
“These are special software programs you can’t easily access,” Asare-Tuah said.
Balancing full-time work at Dalton Carpet with school presented Asare-Tuah with a challenge, but his supervisors supported his ambition. “My manager gave me the opportunity to come in early on Tuesdays and Thursdays and leave at 3:00 so I could go to class,” he said. The company’s flexibility paid off; Asare-Tuah developed the ability to run high-level data analysis on prices across a broad range of products.
Since graduating in 2021, Asare-Tuah landed a tax analyst job with ASR Analytics, a company providing process engineering, advanced A.I.-driven analytics, and data visualization technology services.
Asare-Tuah’s mentor ended up being right. “Robinson increased my marketability by 100 percent,” he said.