Doug Leyland CPA, CA, MBA
Thanks for clicking on “About” to learn something about me. I hope you get a sense of who I am.
I grew up in Burlington and since childhood I’ve always been entrepreneurial; paper routes, cutting lawns and shovelling snow back in the days we had snow! A graduate of Nelson, I made many lifelong friends and learned a great lesson that I had to work hard and smart to make my way in the world. So, after upgrading my marks in Grade “14”, I was onto Wilfrid Laurier for a Hons. BBA. Here I began to figure out what I didn’t want to do with my career. Business interested me but not working in the corporate world, so I pointed myself to the world of accounting thinking this would be a great way to learn how family businesses work and I was right. After articling with Clarkson Gordan (now Ernst & Young) and obtaining my CA, I decided a life in public accounting was not in the cards. So, onto McMaster and an MBA later I was still trying to decide how to spend the next 50 years or so.
Through a family connection I found myself in the Wood Gundy training program. It was the second week of October 1987 when the stock market crash occurred. I thought I’d give the financial world a shot despite the turmoil at the time. I figured I could build a client base and utilize my financial and tax knowledge to help families build a financial plan to help them grow and protect their wealth. Doing so over these many years I have gained tremendous pleasure in helping people.
Fast forward to the year 2000. Remember Y2K? Planes were predicted to fall out of the sky! Things were going well at a well-known US based investment dealer, but I was becoming frustrated with being told by management what proprietary products to sell to my clients. I resisted. Most of these manufactured products made money for the firm but not so much for my clients.
I realized that any financial institution that both manufactures investment products and sells investment advice is in a conflict of interest.
So, I left and started my own investment firm yourCFO Advisory Group and a life insurance and living benefits company called yourCFO Insurance Solutions. Not an easy task by any means! I wanted the name to reflect our focus on our clients and the expertise we provide. Also, by this time I had realized just how connected estate planning is with life insurance and with investments in equities, bonds and alternatives. I had other independent thinking advisors join the yourCFO companies which was a wonderful validation that I had taken the right independent path for both advisors and clients. Over the next 15 years we navigated through 9/11, the tech meltdown and the great recession of 2008/09. These are the rocky times when you really earn your keep with your clients. Like most recently with the onset of Covid. The world can be a scary place at times and like a good airline captain we all need that calm voice when things get a little bumpy!
In 2014 my partner Jordan Matters joined me after earning his CA with Taylor Leibow in Hamilton. You’ll have to meet Jordan to appreciate what a knowledgeable, talented and outstanding person he is. Yes, I’m a tad biased so I’ll leave it up to you to decide.
Today we enjoy an independent environment where we conduct our Leyland & Matters wealth business through Aligned Capital and our strategic estate planning and life insurance business through Leyland & Matters, Private Client Insurance Advisors using TruStone Financial as our Managing General Agency.
Through out my career I have had the pleasure of serving our community by chairing the Leadership Group of the United Way and while doing so I had the pleasure of having hockey legend Bobby Orr, a client, act as an honourary co-chair. Yes, everything you’ve heard about Mr. Orr is true. He is a true gentleman and one of the nicest people. I’ve also served on the Investment Committee of the Burlington Community Foundation.
And on a personal note, in 2013, alongside my children Andrew and Claire we climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. As the mountain guides say “pole pole” in Swahili which means “slowly, slowly”. Also, the best way to protect and grow your wealth.
