SARAH R. PIOT CPA

Sarah is a shareholder in the tax advisory practice with over 15 years in public accounting. She specializes in providing various tax services primarily to tax-exempt organizations including institutions of higher education, arts and cultural organizations, social service organizations, private foundations and business and professional associations. In addition to supervising the preparation of tax-exempt organization returns, her areas of expertise include issues unique to tax-exempt organizations such as compensation and private inurement issues, unrelated business income analysis, assessing foreign information reporting requirements, analysis of board member relationships and transactions with disqualified persons, evaluating state solicitation requirements and conflict of interest best practices and annual execution.

Education

B.S.- Accounting, Robert Morris University

Professional and Community Involvement

Member—Schneider Downs Higher Education Industry Group

Member—Schneider Downs Not-for-Profit Industry Group

Team Leader—Schneider Downs Tax Technology and Efficiency Committee

Member—American and Pennsylvania Institutes of Certified Public Accountants

Board Member—Environmental Charter School at Frick Park

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Do you have a hobby/personal passion?   
Traveling

Who is your role model? 
My parents.

What was your childhood dream? 
To become a maid.  I love to clean.

What is the best or most interesting thing about your career?   
I started at Schneider Downs as an Intern when I was in college.

What was your first job?   
Dairy Queen

Do you have a “motto”? (spoken or unspoken) 
You never know what people are going through Be Kind.  Always.

When you have an hour of free time, what do you like to do?
Relax and watch Netflix.

Do you have advice for young professionals? 
Find a mentor.  Be confident, yet humble.

Our Thoughts On

FEATURED

Big Problem: Cybersecurity Defenses Compromised By Employees’ Passwords


Big Thinking: Significant Updates To The Cybersecurity Environment.

Shareholder ERIC WRIGHT has been involved with Information Technology with Schneider Downs since 1983 and oversees the firm’s thriving Technology Consulting and IT Audit & Compliance practices. Through this role, Eric brings extensive experience in assessing IT infrastructure and identifying cybersecurity risk and exposure.
One of our clients felt fairly good about their existing cybersecurity defenses. But they were still afraid of the unknown and newer cyber attack techniques. Through our regular audit procedures, we inquired about their current cyber controls and their confidence in withstanding an attack. We then performed a network penetration test which simulates an external adversary hacking their network. This procedure identified the client's unknown weaknesses in their defenses through a live test. “Within 48 hours, we were able to guess the passwords of close to 10% of their employees, effectively giving us VPN access to their corporate network and certain employee utilities, like email.” Eric said. "We also found that their corporate intranet site was visible over the internet and susceptible to login via the bad passwords. After identifying these issues, we worked with the client to make significant changes to their environment to make it harder for an attacker to break in." Schneider Downs provides Big Thinking and Personal Focus in delivering a variety of services for large and small businesses, both publicly and privately held, as well as nonprofit organizations, government entities and more. Through our commitment to thought leadership and knowledge management, we deliver the solutions our clients need with a personal commitment to service.

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Breached?

Every moment counts. For urgent requests, contact the Schneider Downs digital forensics and incident response team at 1-800-993-8937. For all other requests, please complete the form below.

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