Lillian Mills, dean of the University of Texas at Austin's McCombs School of Business, has received the 2023 Outstanding Accounting Educator Award from the
The award committee received more than 30 nomination letters from Mills' research co-authors, former students, peers at other U.S. institutions and Texas McCombs colleagues, including associates and professors of accounting Lisa Koonce, Michael Clement, Lisa De Simone and Braden Williams.
"Dean Lillian Mills is recognized as the most prolific and impactful tax researcher in the accounting academy," said Steve Kachelmeier, chair of the McCombs Department of Accounting, in a press release. "Her teaching reputation at McCombs is second to none, both in the school's No. 1-ranked master of professional accounting program and in her supervision of many highly successful doctoral graduates over the years."
Coming from a family of liberal arts educators and clergy, Mills said she never expected to pursue a career in accounting. And yet, her long career has included countless developments, such as working on tax reform at the U.S. Treasury Department as the Stanley Surrey senior research fellow, consulting with the IRS for 20 years, practicing professionally with two CPA firms, and serving as a faculty member at the University of Arizona and at McCombs School of Business at UT Austin.
Eventually, her professional accomplishments culminated in chairing the department for four years, before becoming the first woman to be named permanent dean of McCombs in 2021. Her position allows her to oversee 6,500 students and 600 faculty and staff, which Mills said gives her work an even broader impact.
"Teaching is a way to transform lives and prepare students to change the world, a most honorable duty," said Mills. "As interim dean at McCombs, I learned I was an extrovert with pent-up energy, so I competed for the permanent job. Becoming dean at Texas McCombs, a world-class business school, is an honor of a lifetime."
The nomination letters described her as someone who's deeply passionate and enthusiastic about the profession and her students, as well as an educator who manages to brighten and simplify the most tedious tax-related topics. Mills won multiple teaching awards throughout her career at McCombs and the University of Arizona and still serves as a mentor for McCombs doctoral candidates.
Mills believes she owes her successful career to two mentors who inspired her academic journey and taught her the meaning of "making gratitude an action." During her early research career, the written comments that Katherine Schipper offered colleagues and students helped elevate her writing. Her second mentor, Linda Bamber, praised an early review Mills had done with a yellow sticky note on the copy of her editor's letter, and the latter said this simple gesture motivated her for years.
"I paid both of those forward by helping junior colleagues with their papers for 30 years, and always offering concrete praise — both in person and by email with a copy to their department chair or advisor," said Mills. "McCombs Assistant Professor Amit Kumar has published multiple papers about the power of acting in gratitude to boost the well-being of both the recipient and the source. I experience that every day and, as we each build professional capital, it is so much more rewarding to expend it helping others who are more junior."
Throughout her career, Mills has published more than 50 research articles in journals such as the Accounting Review, and she still conducts research on the intersection of financial reporting and tax compliance. She attributes many of her accomplishments to McCombs and said the university participated in shaping the business leaders of tomorrow as well, by being "human-centered" and "future-focused."
McCombs alumni notably include the chairman of Southwest Airlines, the former CFO of Walmart and the CFO of Zoom, which Mills said are testament to how useful accounting is if a student wants to aim their career at the C-suite or wealth creation. She sees the University of Texas as an environment that fosters an appreciation for individual passions while maintaining a collaborative spirit, which Mills believes to be the embodiment of the university's motto, "What starts here changes the world."
"At McCombs, we maintain an optimism that our work can better the world and I believe this for accounting, specifically," said Mills. "If the U.S. capital market stays strong, and when the economy prospers, that makes more seats at the table for everyone."
As the accounting field suffers from a shrinking pipeline, Mills considers bringing more people into the conversation and raising awareness to be more important than ever. She said it's common for finance positions to be attractive during an economic boom, but in less certain times, it's the accounting profession's combination of short-term stability and high long-term value that the field needs to promote to attract talent.
Mills herself entered the profession in 1981, just after spreadsheets had replaced ledger paper. The complexity of decision-making under uncertainty made her love her position as an accountant, and today she believes artificial intelligence will help make these careers even more interesting by escalating the analysis faster. A practical leader recognizes ebbs and flows in market trends, and she hopes to continue guiding such leaders for the rest of her career, for the good of the discipline and society.
"Accountants remain front and center in some of the most critical and fundamental decisions businesses face," said Mills. "Accountants are trained in thoughtful measurement and evidence-based thinking, and we're trained to communicate well with others, sell ideas, and lead."
The award she is receiving was sponsored by the
