Clean books and polished dashboards might make it look like the finance function is working. But the real question to ask is: Would leadership make different decisions this week with or without those numbers?

In this conversation, I sit with Nick Jain to explain the difference between transactional finance and strategic finance, with a focus on companies growing in the $1M–$30M range.

(00:00) Introduction
(01:48) Strategic Finance and Business Decision-Making
(02:33) What Strategic Finance Actually Means
(04:10) Warning Signs of Transactional Finance
(05:29) Dashboards and KPIs: Metrics Are a Means to an End
(06:51) What a Practical CFO Actually Does
(07:58) Should CFOs Teach CEOs Finance?
(09:14) How Much to Invest in Accounting and Finance
(10:35) CFO Cost Benchmarks and Rules of Thumb

Finance has three core pillars:

 → Accounting: recording what happened

→ Treasury: managing cash in and out

→ FP&A: interpreting the numbers and supporting decisions

When finance stops at accounting and treasury, it remains transactional. Strategic finance lives in FP&A and CFO-level thinking, where financial data gets translated into decisions about hiring, investments, and growth.

Metrics are a means to an end. The end is better decision-making.