WDM Leaders

Inaugural Class of 2009

Denise M. Pierson graduated from Iowa State University in Ames, IA in May, 1989. She earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration, with an accounting emphasis.

She joined the public accounting firm of Coopers & Lybrand in July 1989, where she had the opportunity to receive both audit and tax experience. Denise was then employed with the Principal Financial Group beginning in 1992. She joined as a core member of the Corporate Financial Re-Engineering Project Team for Principal’s Corporate Financial Reporting Department. Denise then joined Principal International, a subsidiary of the Principal Financial Group in 1999 where she held the position of Financial Controller and Chief Accounting Officer. She collaborated very closely with her team of Financial Analysts, as well as her Financial Reporting Team, to ensure that the Principal International member companies, located in 7 countries, were reporting accurate numbers in an efficient manner and that PFG public reporting requirements were being met sufficiently with meaningful reports and analysis. After almost 15 years with Principal Financial Group, Denise left to take on an opportunity with the Iowa Foundation for Medical Care (IFMC) as their Senior Director of Accounting & Finance in November, 2007, where she currently leads 4 teams of accounting and financial analysts.

Denise holds her CPA, FLMI and ACS. She is a member of the ISCPA and served on the Insurance Industry Committee for 6 years, serving as the chair of this committee for 2 of those years and has now been a member of the Family and Work Place Issues Committee for the last 2 years. Denise served as a mentor to female CPA's for 3 years from 2003 to 2006 in the ISCPA Constructive Solutions program which was created by the Family and Work Place Issues Committee. Denise is also a member of the AICPA.