FinOpsPod

Episode 48 Advocating for Billing Features

Connecting two FinOps community call threads on getting SaaS vendors to improve billing data, featuring Mike Rosenberg of Nubank’s two-year push that led a major vendor to ship a requested billing capability in private preview. Helped by persistent, fact-based advocacy, networking with engineers, and renewal leverage. The episode also highlights a FinOpsX 2025 talk by Laurent Kiss and Priyanka Pandey (Delivery Hero) outlining four moves to drive vendor adoption of FOCUS format.

00:00 Welcome Back FinOps Pod

00:27 Mike’s Vendor Win Story

01:47 How He Worked the Process

03:11 Leverage and Business Case

05:04 Two Community Calls Connect

06:12 Delivery Hero Four Moves

07:31 Ask Precisely Not Just Small

08:21 Focus Versions Reality Check

09:29 Scale the Ask as Community

10:32 Before You Ask Check Support

10:51 Wrap Up and Call to Action

• Join the Tech Value Community
• Get Started with FOCUS Data Sets
• How to Work with Your SaaS Providers and Internal Stakeholders for Broad FOCUS™ Adoption
• Mike Rosenberg

Episode 47 Benjamin van der Maas: Using AI to Scale FinOps

Benjamin van der Maas discusses how his team is using AI to scale their FinOps efforts. Topics covered include the necessary groundwork for effective AI implementation, the importance of domain expertise, and how AI can streamline reporting and analysis. The conversation also touches on AI's role in sustainability and the potential challenges of relying on large language models (LLMs). 

• Automating Anomaly Investigation with AI - YouTube
• FinOps Certified: FinOps for AI
• Benjamin van der Maas | LinkedIn

Episode 46 Brad Payne: Integrating FinOps and Business Strategy

Brad Payne, who leads the FinOps team at PointClickCare, shares how his team tackled cloud cost challenges not by jumping straight into optimization — but by focusing first on allocation and unit economics. That shift helped them uncover how cloud costs connected to specific products, customers, and revenue — sparking deeper collaboration with finance, pricing and packaging, and product teams. This resulted in FinOps moving beyond infrastructure to influence real business decisions.

• FinOps Certified: FinOps for AI
• Brad Payne | LinkedIn

Episode 45 Kim Wier & Ron Tatro - Revisiting FinOps as Product, 3 Years Later

Kim Wier & Ron Tatro return to share how their FinOps products have evolved over the last 3 years at Target. They share success and challenges they have had with forecasting both public and private clouds, the impact the introduction of AI has had, and how they provide cost, stability and tech debt information to over 5,000 developers. And they make it all sound approachable!

• FinOps as a Product - Kim Wier & Ron Tatro - YouTube
• Ron Tatro | LinkedIn
• Kim Wier | LinkedIn

Episode 44 Larry Advey - Leveraging FOCUS for Stakeholder Management

Larry Advey discusses the significance of standardizing FinOps nomenclature through the FOCUS (FinOps Cost and Usage Specification) project to streamline communication across multi-provider environments. Larry shares his insights on the impact of FOCUS in reducing confusion among stakeholders by creating a unified language for billing data. The episode also highlights Larry’s experiences from recent FinOps events, upcoming plans for FinOpsX, and the importance of engaging with the community for continuous improvement.

00:00 Welcome to FinOpsPod

01:25 January Recap and FinOpsX Planning

06:28 Focus Project and Stakeholder Management

09:36 The Role of a Focus Maintainer

16:23 The Vision for Focus

20:11 Exploring FOCUS Nomenclature

21:09 Utilizing the FOCUS Sandbox

21:32 Diving into Use Cases

22:49 Navigating the Focus Website

29:12 Engaging with the FinOps Community

34:24 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

• FinOps X 2025 - The Home of FinOps
• FOCUS Sandbox
• FOCUS™ - FinOps Open Cost & Usage Specification
• Larry Advey | LinkedIn

Episode 43 FinOpsPod Year End 2024

In this episode, hosts, Joe & Stacy, with special guest Sam Benson, highlight significant events like the successful FinOps X and FinOps X Europe conferences, community growth, and the evolution of FinOps practices. The episode wraps up with reflections on the past year's achievements and aspirations for 2025, encouraging practitioners to stay engaged and keep learning.

00:00 Welcome to FinOpsPod!

00:28 Meet the Hosts and Special Guest

01:11 Year-End Reflections

02:45 Sam's Role and Contributions

05:49 Community Events and Highlights

08:44 FinOps X and Memorable Moments

10:18 The 'No Runners' Theme

11:56 Adapting and Evolving in FinOps

14:08 Is Rob a Master Gardener?

15:58 Highlights from FinOpsX Europe

18:05 FinOps Scopes and Expanding Roles

20:05 Focus and Community Engagement

22:47 Emerging Topics and AI

25:38 Looking Forward to 2025

30:49 Closing Remarks and Holiday Wishes

• FinOps X 2025 - The Home of FinOps
• The Scope of FinOps Extends Beyond Public Cloud

Episode 42 James Barney - The AI Episode

James Barney discusses the complexities and nuances of applying FinOps principles to AI usage in the cloud, explores various models of AI consumption, such as SaaS and self-hosted solutions, and delves into the challenges of accurately tracking and managing AI costs. Insights are shared from James Barney's recently contributed paper on AI cost management, emphasizing the importance of understanding AI's impact on cloud expenditures and business value. The conversation also touches on the necessity of open dialogue within organizations and the potential for AI to enhance non-customer-facing processes. Practical advice is given on how to approach AI cost management conversations and the value of learning by doing.

Note - views expressed by James are his alone and not those of his employer.

03:59 Understanding AI Cost Structures

05:38 FinOps Strategies for AI Workloads

12:10 Balancing Innovation and Cost Control

18:08 Tracking and Reporting AI Costs

19:34 Understanding AI Workloads

21:39 Guardrails for AI Usage

22:45 The Role of Context in AI

25:16 Politeness in AI Interactions

28:03 Exploring AI Tokens

31:35 Challenges in AI Cost Management

35:41 Community Involvement in AI

• James Barney | LinkedIn
• Cost Estimation of AI Workloads
• How to Forecast AI Services Costs in Cloud
• How to Build a Generative AI Cost and Usage Tracker

Episode 41 Anderson Oliveira - Facing Career Challenges

Anderson Oliveira shares his experience of losing his job as a FinOps Manager, how he stayed positive, and took his time to find his next opportunity. Lessons in this episode on community engagement and keeping the FinOps Principles in the forefront.

• FinOps Jobs - All the cloud financial management jobs in one place
• Anderson Oliveira | LinkedIn
• FinOps X Europe - Barcelona, Nov 11-14

Episode 40 Anthony Johnson & Brent Eubanks - Measuring for Success with Key Momentum Indicators

TJ & Brent Eubanks join Rob Martin to discuss their experience and lessons learned with how to use Key Performance Indicators. While KPIs are good for a moment in time, they learned the importance of making sure to measure progress - or momentum - towards organization success.

• Brent Eubanks ☁️ | LinkedIn
• Anthony "TJ" Johnson | LinkedIn
• FinOps KPIs

Episode 39 FinOpsPod Live - Day 2 of FinOps X 2024 - Community Lovefest!

If you aren't interested in feeling FinOps Community love, then this isn't the episode for you. Recorded at the end of Day 2, Stacy Joe and audience members go over their impressions from the conference. Highlights include discussion of the USS Midway party and keynotes, a wedding proposal, community appreciation, and a secret about Joe's career background that prepared him for FinOps.

• FinOps X Europe - Barcelona, Nov 11-14
• FinOps X ‘24 Day 2 KEYNOTE: American Express, FinOps Releases by Google Cloud, Microsoft, and AWS