How Becoming an Accountant Empowered This Latina

In the Latinx community, many of us have been raised in a culture that has a lot of questions or fear about money. However, that cultural norm has been a driving force behind the new generation of Latinx, whose passion for financial literacy has led them to make resources and opportunities more accessible, enabling people in their community to create and secure generational wealth. That’s where professional Latina accountants like Amy Cobb come in.

Based in Austin, Texas, Cobb works as an accountant, business coach, community leader, and owner of her own consulting firm. As an entrepreneur herself, she works in service of others and uses her cultural identity to empower her community.

Cobb was first exposed to money management as a young girl when her grandmother showed her how to fill out a deposit slip. From that point on, she wanted to figure out how to make money work for her. At the same time, she noticed that people in her community had limited financial resources. They didn’t understand how important it was to have a savings account with extra money in the bank. 

She recognized the accounting field needed someone like her to address her community’s specific needs. Despite initial intimidation by stereotypes like “accounting is all about math” and “college courses are tough,” her intimate understanding and life-long experiences with her community empowered her to move forward. Looking back, she’s glad she kept going, considering that the stereotypes she had heard turned out to be false! 

After graduating college, she worked as a Business Financial Analyst at Sprint World Headquarters, now T-Mobile, as well as a private firm. With the rise of COVID-19 in 2020, she noticed that minority-owned, especially Black-owned, businesses and nonprofits, were being denied Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans and instead forced  to sign inequitable lending policies. 

Cobb decided to start her own consulting business to help minority-owned businesses and organizations manage their accounting needs, delivering memorable and supportive customer service. In this role, she’s been able to help business owners on their entrepreneurial journey toward financial independence, empowerment, and growth. Once after a meeting, a new client profusely thanked Cobb for the information she provided regarding funding opportunities for a non-profit that supports foster children transitioning out of foster care, emphasizing her excitement about working together and gratitude for the clarity she’d been given. Every day, being able to help entrepreneurs through the complexities of finance is what makes her work so rewarding. 

As Cobb pursues her career, she hopes that her consulting firm will continue to grow. Throughout the past few years, she’s learned the value of opportunity and how important it is for people to see themselves everywhere they go, whether it’s the bank or their financial management office. Now more than ever, she believes that we need Latinas in accounting to empower ourselves, each other, and the communities we come from.

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