Insights
Short takes when there's a sharp point. Longer pieces when there's a real model worth showing.
A chip supplier is discussing anchoring its own customer's $100bn listing. When that supplier finances the customer, some revenue represents its own money flowing back, and revenue no longer provides independent evidence of demand.
Reviewing a piece of AI work costs $86, compared with $361 to do it yourself. It looks like a saving of three-quarters, and it is, but that $86 is priced in expert hours and has stayed the same even as the cost of generating the work has dropped a thousandfold.
Most CFOs now rank cutting costs and funding growth among their top priorities — simultaneously. That's not indecision; it's the new shape of the job. The problem is that almost every budget process is built for one hand only.
Most firms have quietly acquired a critical supplier they don't manage — for the most important input they buy: thinking. Procurement solved this problem decades ago. It's time to apply the discipline to cognition.
Finance is built on the premise that an answer is either right or wrong. The business it reports on has never worked that way — which is why the habit of updating cleanly is a CFO's real advantage.
'Culture eats strategy for breakfast' gets quoted but rarely designed for. Culture isn't the enemy of a good plan — it's the container the plan has to live in, and when the two don't fit, the container wins every time.
A firm can now rent increments of thinking — bounded units of cognitive work, metered and priced like compute. That sounds like a pricing detail. It isn't. It changes what the cost structure of a firm is made of.
Most CFOs are trained to make the balance sheet efficient. Buffett spent his career arguing the opposite — that its first job is to be unkillable, and that the reward for building it that way is the freedom to act when no one else can…
The question CFOs get asked at almost every Q4 board now: what are we doing about the buyback? Buffett's 2011 and 2016 letters give the hard answer most boardroom conversations skip…
For forty years Warren Buffett has been making the same quiet argument about the CFO function. Most CFOs still haven't fully internalised it — and the cost of not internalising it compounds…
The next great finance hire may not look like a traditional finance hire at all. Finance is shifting from a processing engine to a decision engine, and the talent stack has to follow…
Three landmark IPOs are coming. Read them through capital structure, governance, and partner dependency — not the hype.
I want you to look at the graph for a second. Really look at it. Look hard.
There’s a massive, hidden advantage to the fact that Finance has been the "under-invested child" of the fintech world for the last decade.
I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and I've come to believe there are really only two types of financial leadership — and the difference between them isn't talent or in…
A 10-part series
Over the last 25 years in finance - more recently as CFO - one thing has become clear to me:
In a recent post, I wrote personal reflections on the distinction between correlation and causation. This post is a few more personal thoughts on another related topic - outputs…
Example: A CFO saying, “I believe our company should diversify into crypto trading.” That’s a view.
Two months ago, I posted an article, on what I thought were the 10 commandments of FP&A story telling. It was born out of the some of my past frustrations of working with FP&A p…
In November 2023, I had posted an article about a storytelling cheat sheet for CFOs. This artcile is a continuation of that post, but targetted towards juniour FP&A professional…
Being a CFO in fintech sounds cool—until it’s 2:47am and you're wide awake, wondering if your fraud controls holds, your Series C runway will stretch, or your compliance stack i…
Ill thought tariffs, and unthought taxes are squeezing margins. Populist political agendas are resulting in unwanted (and shall I say unnecessary) challenges to the fragile busi…
Strategic planning and strategic preparation, while closely related, offer distinct approaches to achieving organizational success. For a CFO, understanding the nuances between…
As we approach the close of 2024, I find myself revisiting the series of articles I’ve shared here on LinkedIn over the past twelve months. When I began posting about a year ago…
I often find myself reflecting on how companies, teams, and even individuals measure success. In my opinion there are three distinct approaches : output focus, outcome focus, an…
Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are often seen as a fast track to growth, innovation, and market expansion. With what is possibly the beginning of interest rate cuts on both side…
Trust is the foundation of any meaningful relationship, whether personal or professional. In the workplace, it is the glue that binds teams together, fosters collaboration, and…
In November 23, I had posted a personal viewpoint on strategy, culture, and execution, in the context of a company. I took the stance that execution is the key differentiator. I…
This piece is a bit off-the-track as far as my usual writing goes - its neither finance, nor AI, nor anything that that needs any specialist knowledge. Yet, it is relevant to ev…
In November 2023, I had written a post explaining why storytelling is a CFO’s secret superpower. Having seen firsthand how compelling narratives can transform dry numbers into i…
The role of a Chief Financial Officer (CFO) is evolving and leveraging technology has become even more important to create value. After all, how good can a CFO be if they can't…
In a society that reveres stories of heroism and dramatic success, the image of a decisive, action-oriented leader dominates our collective imagination. This leader, lets call h…
Self-confidence and self-doubt play pivotal roles in business and personal growth. While the former is often viewed as a hallmark of success and leadership, the latter is typica…
In a world where change is the only constant, the art of building great teams requires more than just matching skills to roles. It demands a deeper understanding of the innate q…
Today, I'm writing about a topic that marries the ancient wisdom of collective decision-making with the cutting-edge challenges faced by modern CFOs. Inspired by the recent re-r…
In the heart of Vietnam War history lies a powerful lesson on resilience and faith, known today as the Stockdale Paradox. This concept was named after Admiral James Stockdale, w…
This week , I am departing from writing about something topical, but rather expressing a \strong\ point of view on why Treasurers should be considered as top candidates for CFO…
The allocation of funds towards brand investments, especially in sports sponsorship, stands out as a significant decision, especially for small companies. For CFOs, the challeng…
In today's fiercely competitive business landscape, customer experience can significantly influence a company's reputation and, ultimately, its financial health. While often ove…
Generally, finance is a world of numbers, graphs, and cold, hard data. Nevertheless, behind the world of spreadsheets and financial models, there is a very human sea of emotions…
In continuation of my recent post on the Future of GPT, I have been thinking about the role of leadership in the swiftly evolving landscape of General Artificial Intelligence (G…
Generative Pretrained Transformers (GPT) are a breakthrough, in the field of intelligence. They have completely revolutionized our understanding of what machines can do with the…
In this age of information, the significance and usefulness of traditional financial statements, for assessing a company’s wellbeing have become a topic of intense debate. As a…
As we stand on the brink of another year-end, I find myself musing humorously over a question that's more philosophical than financial: Why do we move forwards in time and not b…
As a CFO, my perspective on business strategy has always been grounded in the principle of focus. In a competitive marketplace, companies often face the temptation to diversify…
In the world of finance, numbers reign supreme. But what happens when the CFO decides to take a page out of a storyteller's book? Magic. Here are ten compelling reasons why the…
In the grand symphony of corporate management, the perennial debate between strategy and culture often takes center stage. As CFOs, while we may be inclined to lean towards stra…
As CFOs, we are often likened to navigators steering through the treacherous waters of corporate finance, where the twin beacons of growth and cash flow guide our journey. The p…
CFOs can harness the capabilities of large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to create value in several distinct ways. In essence, the com…
It’s more than a year since I posted on LinkedIn about the 10 commandments for the newbie CFO. It got over 4,000 impressions (number of times the post was displayed on a screen)…
1. Thou shalt help the Board in setting (& execution of) of corporate strategy.