GrowCFO Show

Scott Bly is the CFO of Seattle-based International Parking Management. He is an entrepreneurial CFO with a passion for helping small business owners articulate and realize their vision. Scott joins the GrowCFO Show to talk about values. In particular, the importance of aligning personal and company values.

When it comes to company values, there is no "one size fits all" approach. Every business is different, and as such, it will have different values that are important to them. The key is to ensure that your personal values align with those of your company. If they don't, you're going to run into trouble down the road.

values are the foundation of any successful company. They provide guidance and direction for employees and help to create a cohesive culture. When values are aligned, both personally and within the company, everyone knows what is expected of them and what direction they should be moving in. This creates a sense of purpose and unity, which can help to improve productivity and satisfaction.

There are a few key things to keep in mind when trying to align your personal and company values, and Scott outlines these during the episode.

Links

Scott Bly on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInGrowCFO Strategy BootcampCFO Competency Framework

Timestamps

0:12 Scott’s background and how he got into finance.

3:00 What advice would you give to someone who’s on that journey at the moment?

7:06 How do you help your customers and vendors be successful?

11:05 Think about strategy and where you’d be going in a boot camp.

13:28 The importance of diversity of views in business.

17:24 How do we get more diversity into the finance team?

19:33 The importance of being honest with your customer.

23:17 The challenge of having the willpower to be present for your family.

25:30 What would Scott’s strengths be in mentoring an up-and-coming CFO?

Gary Cokins is an internationally recognized expert, speaker, and author in performance improvement systems and advanced cost management. He believes that many organizations are far from where they want and need to be to improve performance, and they apply intuition, rather than hard data, when making decisions.

Gary explains why Enterprise performance management (EPM) provides a portfolio of managerial methods that can make a real difference. These include:

strategy execution with a strategy map and its companion balanced scorecard (KPIs) and operational dashboards (PIs); enterprise risk management (ERM); capacity-sensitive driver-based budgets and rolling financial forecasts; product/service/channel / customer profitability analysis (using activity-based costing [ABC] principles); customer lifetime value (CLV); lean and Six Sigma quality management for operational improvement; and resource capacity spending planning.

In this episode, we take a brief look at the tools and explore why many companies are slow to adopt them.

Links

Gary Cokins WebsiteKevin Appleby on LinkedInCFO Competency FrameworkBusiness Strategy Boot Camp

Timestamps

0:12 Gary’s background.

4:37 If your competitors are adopting and integrating all of these methods, they will have a competitive advantage -.

9:43 How do you solve the problem of a company that hasn’t adopted these methods?

13:52 The importance of understanding what people spend their time doing.

15:43 What is customer profitability?

19:21 How to make your customer more profitable.

23:02 Process improvement people get the benefit of the balanced scorecard.

26:27 Gary’s frustration with the slow adoption rate of ABC.

30:11 What might a CFO do in the next 100 days to start going down that journey?

Chris Roling is the CFO at Coinme. He has 25 years of commercial and private equity experience having served in board, CEO, COO, and CFO positions with a number of global public and private companies. His previous experience is deeply rooted in venture capital, making him an expert on the current state of investor funding and how to acquire it in a bear market.

Chris provides some great insights into the following:

What best practices and insights on critical strategies can assist companies in improving and sustaining their valuation/operations to attract investorsWhat alternative fundraising strategies work in a disruptive marketHow to seek out and determine which investors best fit a company’s business model 

Chris Roling has also been a partner at Ernst and Young. We know from GowCFO research into routes to CFO that it's very unusual for a resume to contain both CFO and Big 4 partner roles. We find out from Chris how that came about.

Links

Chris Roling on LinkedinKevin Appleby on LinkedInRoutes to CFO Research ReportGrowCFO Fundraising Transaction SimulatorGrowCFO Future CFO programme

Timestamps

00:12 Welcome and introduction to Chris Roling.

02:38 How Chris became a CFO at a very senior level.

04:40 What does it mean to be a direct admit partner?

06:54 What is the current state of investor funding?

11:15 If you do not have enough cash runway you can get yourself into a predicament.

14:00 What is the difference between B2B and B2C companies?

16:19 How to separate the wheat from the chaff in the fintech space.

20:24 The importance of having a shortlist of investors to approach.

22:14 What you need to do to become investor friendly.

24:48 The importance of having a cash flow forecast.

They tell you never to meet your heroes. So did Kevin Appleby make a mistake inviting Laura Vanderkam on to the GrowCFO Show? You will have to listen to the episode and make up your own mind about that!

Kevin recommends Laura's book "168 Hours" every time he runs a module 3 workshop on GrowCFO's Future CFO Programme. It's essential reading if you need to find a few extra hours every week to sort out your own personal development and career progression. Laura tells us more about 168 hours in this week's episode.

Laura Vanderkam is a keynote speaker and author of multiple books. She is about to release her latest work "Tranquility By Tuesday" based on a time diary study of over 150 people. In the book, you’ll learn nine tried-and-true “rules” to easily build opportunities for joy, nourishment, and fulfilment into your schedule. These strategies will help you make what you want to happen, actually happen, instead of letting the minutiae of everyday life get in the way. Better still, listen to the podcast episode as Laura reveals to Kevin what all 9 rules are. These rules of course are of limited use to Kevin. He might get to have tranquillity next Tuesday, but his problem is he still can't get the hang of Thursdays!

Links

Laura Vanderkam websiteKevin Appleby on LinkedInLaura Vanderkam on Amazon UK and Amazon USGrowCFO Future CFO programme

Timestamps

00:43 Why is Laura Vanderkam Kevin's heroine?

01:35 Laura explains 168 Hours

03:40 How do you make time?

5:22 Doing a time audit

7:55 168 hours is a recommendation in Module 3 of the Future CFO Programme

09:15 The importance of a morning routine

12:31 Tranquility by Tuesday

14:10 The 9 different strategies or rules

15:20 Rule 1 - Give yourself a bedtime

15:50 Rule 2 - Plan on Fridays

18:44 Rule 3 - Move by 3pm

20:35 Rule 4 - Three times a week habit

23:00 Rule 5 - Create a backup slot

24:55 Rule 6 - One big adventure, one little adventure

27:27 Rule 7 - Take one night for you

29:37 Rule 8 - Batch the little things

31:20 Rule 9 - Effort full before effort less

Do you want to be a great finance business partner? If so, you're in luck! In this episode, Oliver Deacon joins Kevin Appleby and gives us some great tips that will help improve your relationship with your colleagues in the rest of the business. Oliver Deacon is a member of the GrowCFO Mentoring team. He runs the GrowCFO Business Partnering Boot Camps and is a former FD at Microsoft.One of the most important things to remember when trying to become a great finance business partner is that communication is key. You need to be able to effectively communicate with your colleagues in order to build strong relationships. Make sure you are always clear and concise when conveying information, and take the time to listen to what others have to say. It is also important to be responsive to questions and concerns that your colleagues may have.It is also essential that you are able to build trust with your colleagues. This can be done by being honest and transparent in your dealings with them. Make sure you keep your promises and always follow through on what you say you will do. If there are ever any issues, make sure you deal with them in a timely and professional manner.Remember that it is important to show your colleagues that you are invested in the success of the organisation. This can be done by offering help and support when needed and being proactive in finding solutions to problems. Your job is to sell ideas and provide options. If you can do these things, you will be well on your way to becoming a great finance business partner.

Building a strong relationship between finance and the rest of the business is essential for the success of your organisation. Listen in for some great information on how to make things work well between you and your fellow business managers!

Links

Oliver Deacon on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInGrowCFO Business Partnering for Finance Teams Boot Camps

Timestamps

00:43 What is a finance business partner?

02:11 About Oliver Deacon

03:26 How to become a great business partner? Where do you start?

03:59 Relationships and selling ideas

05:38 How do you start forming great relationships?

06:15 Asking questions, showing people you are interested in them

09:43 Can you figure out what your business partners' biggest problems are?

10:39 Stop; Start; Continue

12:16 Turning data into insights

15:40 What are we going to do differently as a business?

16:38 Finance business partnering boot camp

18:48 How is the boot camp structured?

21:17 What's covered in each workshop?

23:32 How do you attend a bootcamp?

24:41 What surprises people most on the boot camp?

100 Episodes of the GrowCFO Show, that's 2 years' worth of podcast episodes. Dan Wells, founder and CEO of GrowCFO joins regular podcast host Kevin Appleby to celebrate the milestone, reflect back on the last two years and talk about some new exciting developments in GrowCFO.

Dan and Kevin both choose their favourite episodes of the GrowCFO Show. Dan decided on episode 95 where Catherine Clark, head of mentoring at GrowCFO, talked about making the best decision for both you and your business. Kevin selected episode 102, yes an episode that is yet to be published, where he managed to get a guest from his own bucket list on the show. We'll leave you to wait another two weeks to find out who it is. The clue is Kevin talks about her book every time he delivers module 3 of the Future CFO Programme.

Three significant milestones arrive all at the same time. As well as the 100th episode of the GrowCFO Show we've published two great new resources. The first is a 100-page book that describes the CFO Competency Framework. The second is a white paper examining the career paths of 500 CFOs and exploring the many different career routes available to get to the top job in finance. Both have just been made available to download on the GrowCFO website

Links

Dan Wells on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInBecome a free member of GrowCFODan's Favourite episode (episode 95)CFO Competency FrameworkNew free resources: The GrowCFO CFO Competency Framework eBook and Career Routes to CFO reportFuture CFO programme

Timestamps

01:40 Two years ago, what was the original vision for GrowCFO?

03:17 How did Dan and Kevin end up working together?

06:02 Working with interesting people who simply want to give something back

07:23 Our favourite episodes of the GrowCFO Show

11:38 Whats GrowCFO all about?

16:19 plans for the next 2 years

17:19 The CFO Competency Framework

21:57 New research: What’s the optimum size for your finance function

24:56 Virtual Boardroom and Fundraising Simulator

25:34 Boot Camps for both Strategy and Finance Business Partnering

Alex Budak joins the GrowCFO show on the same day that his new book "Becoming a Changemaker" is published. Quite a coup for the podcast! The book is an excellent read for anyone wanting to become a changemaker, in particular for finance leaders wanting to enhance their ability to be a catalyst for change.

As a faculty member at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, Alex created and teaches the wildly popular course “Becoming a Changemaker,” which has quickly grown into one of the most highly-rated courses anywhere on campus. The course is regularly heralded by students as “transformative” and “life-changing” but has only been accessible to students attending UC Berkeley. That all changes from today as the course is condensed into a book accessible by anyone.

The Becoming a Changemaker playbook is a guide for anyone looking to lead positive change. It covers the mindsets and leadership skills needed to navigate, shape, and lead change, as well as how to thrive in uncertain times. The book is tailored to millennials and Gen Zers who are leaving school and entering the workforce. It is based on the popular UC Berkeley course by the same name, which students have praised as transformative and life-changing.

Links

Alex Budak on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInGrowCFO Competency FrameworkBecoming a Changemaker on Amazon UK and Amazon USA

Timestamps

00:51 Alex explains his background

02:26 Book being published on 13 September 2022

04:05 Change and the CFO

06:17 Technology and change

10:02 Can the changemaker skill be learned?

10:36 The Changemaker index

12:33 Dealing with resistance to change

15:06 Involving people in the change

18:28 Champions, fence-sitters and cynics

23:03 Impact = (mindset+leadership) x action

25:24 Who is the book aimed at?

28:06 How did you get involved in teaching "Changemaker"?

Jeremy Foster is an unusual CFO, he isn't an accountant and doesn't have a finance background. His origins are in sales and marketing. He changed course following an MBA at Notre Dame and has subsequently become a highly successful finance leader with strong strategic capabilities and significant M&A experience. Jeremy has been instrumental in multiple equity rounds, debt recaps, and a 9-digit platform sale to PE.

Jeremy's main interest is working with an organisation that wants to drive massive growth. He will typically be brought on board by a CEO who wants a co-pilot to go on that journey. In this episode, we talk about how Jeremy is currently doing that at Talroo and how that differs from his approach at previous companies Homeward and Kasasa. He explains how he operates as a strategic partner to the CEO and gives us some great insights to the thought process a CFO needs in helping build and drive strategy.

We explore some of the key KPIs you need to understand when investing in customer acquisition, and we talk about the theory of constraints. Jeremy shows how the skills he learned as a marketing director are extremely valuable to a CFO too.

Links

Jeremy Foster on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInTalroo.comGrowCFO Strategy Programme

Timestamps

00:53 A background in marketing for a bank

01:29 Did you miss out by not having an accounting background?

02:13 What role do you play as a non-accounting CFO?

04:01 Blitz scaling

05:26 The three big KPIs you need to know

07:53 Profit per customer

10:25 Jeremy Foster's experience growing the business at Kasasa

12:39 What issues do such rapid growth bring?

15:53 Thinking about communication channels

18:38 The theory of constraints

19:50 The importance of good relationships

21:50 The role of a finance business partner

23:03 What advice would you give to a CFO coming through a more traditional route than yourself?

24:55 What's the role of the CFO in driving a high-growth business strategy?

Danielle Keeven has had quite a journey to get to her current role as VP of Finance at paddle.com. She has crossed the globe and changed industry sectors. She has gone from roles in large multinationals to working in high-growth startups. Danielle shares her experiences with Kevin Appleby on this week's GrowCFO Show.

Originally working in the Caribbean for large US multinationals such as Marriott and Hyatt, Danielle swapped to working in Europe for booking.com, then moved out of hospitality completely to work in fintech. This was a huge change and she tells us all about the challenges she faced in the episode.

Danielle Keeven is currently VP of finance at paddle.com. Paddle offers SaaS companies a completely different way to sell. Instead of assembling and maintaining a complex stack of payments-related apps and services, Paddle provides an all-in-one solution. Danielle explains how her finance expertise is applied to the design of the product as well as to running the finance team. We discuss in detail the problems that products like Paddle solve for SaaS founders, and some of the mistakes Danielle has seen these companies make.

Links

Danielle Keeven on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInPaddle.comGrowCFO Future CFO ProgrammeGrowCFO Strategy ProgrammeCFO Competency FrameworkFree Course: First 100 Days in your new finance role

Timestamps

01:00 Born in the Netherlands, growing up in the Caribbean

01:42 The accidental accountant

02:59 Hospitality: Hyatt and Marriott

03:45 Move to Europe and the tech side of Hospitality

05:00 Accounts receivable in a SaaS business

06:41 moving from Booking.com to Messagebird

09:23 Why did you join paddle.com?

11:47 What does Paddle do?

13:18 The complexities of online business and global tax rules

16:13 Will you move on from VP Finance to a full CFO role?

17:19 Roald Dahl's Matilda

19:13 What sort of mistakes do you see fast-growing SaaS companies making?

22:06 Building a strategy for internationalisation

23:15 Giving SaaS businesses the right data insights

25:26 What advice would you give other finance people looking to move to CFO roles

26:41 GrowCFO Competency framework

27:15 The art of delegation

30:33 The finance leader and fraud

The role of a finance transformation leader is a complex one. It requires someone with great technical skills, as well as strong people skills. A successful finance transformation leader must be able to manage and motivate their team, while also being able to communicate effectively with other members of the organization. Toni Betts, group finance director at The Travel Chapter is one of those successful transformation leaders and she shares her journey with Kevin Appleby on this episode of The GrowCFO Show.

One of the most important qualities of a successful finance transformation leader is the ability to manage and motivate their team. A finance transformation is a complex undertaking that requires the efforts of many individuals. A great leader will be able to keep their team on track and focused on the goal. They will also be able to motivate their team when things get tough.

In addition to being a great manager, a finance transformation leader must also be an effective communicator. This is important because they will need to communicate with other members of the organization, such as the CEO and CFO. They will also need to communicate with vendors and other outside parties. Effective communication is essential for ensuring that everyone is on the same page and that the transformation goes smoothly.

Great people skills are essential for anyone looking to lead a finance transformation. A successful leader will be able to manage and motivate their team, while also being an effective communicator. If you have these qualities, then you may be well suited for this important role.

Links

Toni Betts on LinkedInKevin Appleby on LinkedInGrowCFO Future CFO ProgrammeFree Course: First 100 Days in your new finance roleSusan Jeffers - Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway: How to Turn Your Fear and Indecision into Confidence and Action on Amazon UK and Amazon US

Timestamps

01:39 Toni's new group FD role

02:04 When did you decide to become an accountant?

04:50 Qualifying in an audit practice

06:52 Toni's first role outside practice and moving on to join American Express

08:10 Being part of a great leadership programme

09:46 Stepping out of your comfort zone: You need to get comfortable with leadership skills and push yourself to use them

11:32 Susan Jeffers - Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway

12:03 Moving on from American Express

15:09 Becoming a finance transformation expert

16:43 Learning from experience

20:24 Some of the practical challenges of transforming finance teams

24:14 Technology is forcing finance to change

25:03 What advice would you give other finance leaders?

27:42 Personal Awareness and feedback from others

29:01 The importance of how you present over what you are presenting

30:45 What does Toni Betts do to avoid stress and burnout?

32:37 What's the biggest challenge in your new group FD role?