Portrait Of Tax Excellence: A Conversation With Nicki Howard

Nicki N. Howard is senior tax counsel for CSX Transportation Inc. Headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, CSX is a rail carrier servicing states east of the Mississippi as well as portions of Canada.

There have been a number of articles discussing why women are leaving tax. However, there is more to say about the women that remain, as they continue to strive for excellence and make a difference in the field. The road may not always be easy, but when the dust settles, the road is ablaze with their efforts. 

Bland had the pleasure of speaking with Howard on several topics, such as her interest in tax law, her position with CSX, her experience with domestic and international tax affairs, and CSX itself.

The Early Years

Many tax professionals make their career choice early on — perhaps in college or graduate school. Others make the choice after completing their studies in another discipline, including those who choose to enter the legal profession. 

Howard belongs to the latter group. She earned her undergraduate degree in accounting, and her master’s degree in business from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, an historically black college in Tallahassee, Florida.

While in college, she was a tax accountant intern at UPS, working with the state and local, and the research and development teams. Although she had no interest in law school at the time, she began to question her path, wondering if her motivation in the field came from her work at UPS, which she greatly enjoyed, or whether there was some other area in which she might find fulfillment.

As often happens, it was the push and support from her supervisor that helped her take the first steps to becoming a lawyer. She was fortunate to have a mentor, Maurice Agresta, who’d taken a keen interest in her career and strongly suggested she attend law school. Taking his advice, after earning her MBA, Howard enrolled in law school at Georgetown University Law Center.

In law school she explored several different areas, including mergers and acquisitions and the death penalty, working on several death penalty cases. Ultimately, she settled on tax because “nothing made me as happy as tax.”

After she earned her law degree, she earned an LLM in tax law from the same institution. Howard and her mentor remain close today, and when she married, it was only fitting that during the reception Agresta and his wife had seats at the family table with her parents.

Today, Howard, as senior tax counsel, wears several hats. Whether it be through research; supporting the preparation of income, franchise, sales and use, and property tax returns; or defending the corporation’s tax positions in federal, state, and local jurisdictions, Howard is determined to lead in all she does.

She is involved in transactional tax planning for CSX at the federal, state, and local levels, and she drafts, supports, and defends state tax legislation that affects the rail industry. Howard’s roles within CSX are not limited to domestic tax issues; she also supports the corporation’s Canadian and Mexican tax interests.

Entering the International Arena

Howard’s expertise in the federal, state, local, and international arenas has given her a perspective on tax law that a professional whose practice is confined to a single arena may not have. The international arena can be especially difficult because “every country handles things differently.”

Before joining CSX, Howard worked for a large firm with clients that had operations in Hong Kong and Mauritius. The tax treaties in Western countries are fairly similar, and since the foreign nations have an established relationship with the United States, the general understanding of these treaties across the nations is familiar to all parties, “but the application of the treaties” is different.

The United States takes the approach of substance over form, but foreign nations take, “almost without exception,” the approach of form over substance: “They are very legalistic in the way they read documents,” Howard says, pointing to Canada as an example. In Mexico, she says, “the rules are a little bit looser,” so “you have to learn [about the] country you’re dealing with, you have to learn its environment and decide how you’re going to approach it.”

Howard finds several differences between her preparation of domestic and international tax issues. Domestic tax questions are addressed under statutory law, case law, or both, whereas international tax questions are governed by application of primary sources of law and the treaty between the United States and a foreign country, such as the tax treaty in force between the United States and the United Kingdom.

Dealing with an issue arising at the state level, she explains, requires that she not only look at statutory law, but the case law as well to determine how the former may have been interpreted. Also, Howard must have a clear understanding of the differences in how each arena addresses a taxpayer’s activities within its sphere. 

Cultural Awareness Is a Must

Howard embraces her work with foreign partners and stresses the importance of awareness and respect when dealing with different cultures. When working with foreign partners, she finds it important to learn the basics about the partner’s culture in order to have a productive relationship.

She related that while in private practice, one of her clients was a U.S. company with interests in Japan. Japanese culture is formal and places a heavy emphasis on ceremony and politeness.

For this reason, in legal and business dealings, a simple “no” may be communicated in a softer, less aggressive manner. Once Howard was able to understand and adjust for this different style of communication, she was able to ensure her clients received optimal legal counsel and guidance.

Another aspect to working with international clients is scheduling. The practitioner must conform to the client’s schedule, not the other way around.

“When working with foreign clients, you have to be willing to adjust your schedule,” Howard said.

Regarding her Japanese client, Howard completely adjusted her work and home schedule because the daytime in Japan corresponds to nighttime in the United States. In other words, while her colleagues were at home asleep, she was in the office in case her client needed her.

The Challenges in the Federal, State Realm

The federal and state realms require different preparation as well. One substantial difference between the federal and state tax realms is that the federal realm is very procedure-oriented, and when litigating a case, it is important to lay groundwork properly “so we don’t preempt ourselves.”

On the other hand, the state realm requires multiple searches to answer a single question because state laws can be so diverse.

For example, Howard points out that some states may decouple from a federal tax provision, while others may not. Among the states that choose to decouple, there can be differences in the way in which they do so. 

CSX operates in 27 states, so when a question is raised, there is not just one answer — there are 27 answers. Before coming to CSX, Howard said she “had limited experience with state tax law.”

When the CSX vice president of tax asked her to research a question regarding Georgia tax law, she researched only Georgia law. The director then asked, “What about the other states?”

Working in the state realm is “more complicated and demanding because of the sheer volume of work it involves.”

Also, what makes working in the state realm different is the various personalities one has to deal with within each state department of revenue. It “varies from audit to audit, protest to protest,” and more.

It Takes a Broad, Holistic Perspective

Having an accounting and legal background has been one of the keys to Howard’s success in the tax profession, providing her with a broad, holistic perspective of the field. Another important key is her versatility: Howard’s experience with tax issues in all three spheres — international, federal, and state and local — endows her with the kind of flexibility that is vital to a corporation like CSX, which has a small tax law department and whose operations extend not just to the domestic landscape, but internationally as well.

Working in these spheres has allowed her to appreciate the central role that cultural understanding plays in her ability to work smoothly with foreign entities worldwide, as well as federal, state, and local entities as a CSX representative.

As one can imagine, Howard’s position with CSX is quite demanding. Nonetheless, CSX’s corporate culture is very supportive of its employees, she says, adding that the company recognizes the need for flexibility and accommodating employee schedules outside the traditional office hours.

This, Howard said, is the corporation’s philosophy — “CSX wants to make money, they want to continue to excel and succeed, but they also want their employees to be safe and happy.”

Moreover, CSX employees are a pleasure to work with: “It’s nice to work with people who feel like family,” she said.