Heather (Perry) Moreland ’16: The High Calling of Business

Heather (Perry) Moreland '16 grew up hearing about Covenant from one of its founders, the late Joel Belz, who was an elder in her church. "From a young age he strongly encouraged me to consider Covenant. After looking at a handful of different Christian colleges, I chose Covenant because of its reasonable rules and boundaries for students, proximity from home (4 hours of driving was perfect!), and its deep commitment to helping students understand and live out the Reformed faith." 

Though she arrived on campus freshman year with some worry and uncertainty, the Lord provided a great group of friends. She describes many evenings and weekends spent in Founder's third lobby studying, playing games, having dance parties, and pulling harmless pranks together. That core group of friends provided a rich community for her. 

Covenant also helped her navigate her early young adult years. "It gave me a practical framework for how to sort through the difficult parts of life. It also gave me the space to ask hard questions and wrestle with the reality of the fallen world." Heather is also grateful to have met and married her husband, Robert, while at Covenant. They will celebrate their 11th anniversary this summer and they often reflect on what a gift they received to have met and grown at a place like Covenant. 

Finding her Place in Accounting

Heather grew up watching her father and uncles own their own businesses where they learned things the "hard knocks" way. She knew she wanted to also own her own business, so her parents encouraged her to attend college to learn the necessary skills to build a business from the ground up. She admits that she never intended to stay in school long enough to graduate. "But freshman year, I took Chris Dodson's Principles of Accounting and liked it. Every semester he encouraged me to keep taking the next accounting and finance classes, and I now joke that I fell into my career path." 

During her junior year, Heather interned at Southern Champion Tray in Chattanooga. After graduation, she entered full-time employment there as a manufacturing accountant. She also completed her MBA at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. She spent the next eight years at Southern Champion Tray and left in 2022 to start her own business. She founded Lakesite Accounting, an accounting and bookkeeping firm offering weekly and monthly services to clients across the U.S. She is grateful for her time in the private sector, "Accounting is a far broader field than simply filing taxes and performing audits. I did not spend any time in the public accounting space and I do not regret my path at all. Working for a private company and learning how an entire accounting system operates in real time was exactly the kind of preparation I needed for the kind of work I love." 

At Lakesite Accounting, Heather leads a team of five employees across four states, specializing in the routine activities that support year-end tax filings but not closing of the fiscal year filings. "Accounting and bookkeeping is, at first glance, a straightforward process of explaining what happened financially for a business or organization. Yet the numbers tell a deeper story about the health of the entity, the opportunities for growth or efficiency, and the ways individuals are affected by the financial decisions. Our work equips businesses and organizations to function with high integrity and have a clear understanding of reality within segments and as a whole." 

Business as a High Calling

Heather's experiences in the business department at Covenant equipped her to live out her faith in her work. She loves helping people grow and maintain healthy businesses and sees her work as a high calling. "Dr. Scott Quatro consistently showed us that doing good business that honors the Lord is a high calling, and that it is no less important or faithful than our fellow students who were pursuing ministry roles. Our efforts are part of the incredible web that allows individuals in our communities to have meaningful and fulfilling employment, and thereby provide for themselves and their families." 

As she navigates the daily work of running a business and managing employees, she leans on her faith in the Lord, seeking Christ and His glory: "All of life seems to be a delicate balance of pursuing whatever is ‘the next right thing' while also trusting the Lord to guide my steps. The Lord has called us to faithful obedience in all facets of life and that is actually incredibly freeing. When I have hard decisions to make, I can lean on first principles: Is it true? Does it honor the Lord and those around me? Is it consistent with Scripture? Does it allow me to continue in faithful living?" 

To learn more about Heather's work, visit Lakesite Accounting.