FP&A Today is the podcast for Financial Planning and Analysis. The weekly show dives into the challenges and opportunities within the world of FP&A, interviewin...
Damon Fletcher, ex-CFO of Tableau, on Great Analytics
Today’s guest is perhaps the leading CFO name in data and analytics, the ex-CFO of Tableau and DataRobot. Now as Founder & CEO at Caliper, Fletcher draws on over a decade of executive experience at the intersection of finance and analytics. At Caliper, his mission is transform cloud cost and usage data into actionable insights
In this episode Fletcher discusses
The relationship between analytics and the CFO
Subscription, net dollar retention, customer retention, and annual recurring revenue as key metrics
Getting from CFO to CEO and the learning curve
How we rely on AI and predictive ML and seasonal patterns to find anomalies
Getting to base analytics and starting in AI
Challenges and waste with cloud and holding engineers accountable
The opportunity to save 30% on cloud spend
Moving from Excel to Google Sheets
Connect with Damon LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/damon-fletcher-bb8a6614/
https://calipersoftware.ai
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40:44
From a deep struggle with personal skills to Storytelling Leader
Walmart, Kraft Heinz, Blue Rock Therapeutics, and the Four Seasons hotels are just some of companies that regularly invite Ron Monteiro to coach their finance teams in storytelling. But Ron’s success followed decades of fear in presenting and public speaking in FP&A settings. Starting in accounting at Hitachi (“Ron Monteiro: “it was actually the only job I could get”) the CPA and CMA was inspired by a manager who gave him direction and mentorship doing FP&A as Kraft, as well as work over a decade in daily overcoming his debilitating fears. Now he delivers a playbook to teams across the world where finance is “expected to be at the table, not just tactically, but strategically.”Ron is also the author of a new book: Love Mondays which draws on his experience and interviews with finance leaders.
In this episode
Fear of public speaking I’ve carried through my life
Kraft Foods and a leap of faith from my manager
15 years at Kraft with 7 jobs and five promotions including FP&A manager, analyst and director
Transforming Kraft FP&A into strategic value: Kraft Singles and “Getting Our Shit Together” meetings
Brendan Flynn’s leadership of finance at Kraft developing future finance leaders
The downward trend of FP&A post 3G Capital’s buyout
CPG and the essential metrics
Learning what you can do to grow – listening tour as business partnering and putting your hand up
Love Mondays! A Proven Process to Bring Joy Back Into Your Work Week and Life Paperback by Ron Monteiro https://www.amazon.ca/Love-Mondays-Proven-Process-Bring/dp/B0DPMTVYY3
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46:20
The Consolidation King on Working Better with FP&A – Charaf Bourhalla
“Consolidation. A lot of people don’t know exactly what it is. They think that it’s just an aggregation of numbers. Like you just add numbers, but it’s more technical than that. Most of the time when we are talking about consolidation, it’s international big groups that have subsidiaries around the world. Consolidation is the process of converting those financial statements normally built locally, because they have to be compliant with the local requirements and be compliant with the GAAP of the group.”
Charaf Bourhalla has been Head of Consolidation at Nestle Skin Health, Vimian Group and Edify Investment Partner. He holds several key certifications, including the FMVA from CFI, ACCA with a focus on IFRS, and the PMP from PMI. His posts on LinkedIn reach millions of people explaining complex topics simply such as IFRS 10 – Consolidated Financial Statements, AS 16 – Property, Plant and Equipment and AS 1 – Presentation of Financial Statements.
In this episode:
From years of struggle, to Kimberly Clarke as a reporting analyst to entering a pharma company as business controller
13-year tenure as a consultant developing a deep understanding of IFRS, USGAAP, French GAAP, and IPSAS,
3 Jobs as Head of Consolidation including Nestle Skin Health with 70 subsidiaries around the world
Simplifying complexities of financial consolidation and non financial KPIs
Secrets to working with FP&A for consolidation and forecasting and building a mid-term plan
Continual training for teams in subsidiaries
Technology and complexity changing the consolidation game
How Charaf called in when a company found itself consolidating more than 70 legal entities using Excel
Not to pick consultants with partnerships with only one provider
Connect with Charaf on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/charaf-bourhalla-04760a1b/
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40:20
The perfect formula for FP&A and Beer – Pavels Cvetkovs at Carlsberg
Grab a beer and listen to this special episode. We are joined by Pavels Cvetkovs FP&A director at Carlsberg Group who reveals the formula of FP&A at the famous brand. Carlsberg was founded in 1847, has 140 brands, and 30,000 employees – and FP&A is core to their success, says Cvetkovs.
In this episode:
How my career in the Big Four (and audit) served as “finance military school”
Moving from business controller to FP&A
The essence of Carlsberg – innovation in brewing and sustainability
Distinct shareholder structure at Carlsberg run by Carlsberg foundation
What’s so special about the beer and beverage industry and our FP&A practices
Power of inventory management, sales seasonality, and supply chain and cost planning in brewing
Forecasting and planning and achieving highest levels of collaboration
FP&A set up and management of 10-20 KPIs at Carlsberg
Business partnering as a mindset at Carlsberg
Visiting sites in operations at Carlsberg
Biggest challenges overcome in budget season
Refining my financial modeling skills
Follow and connect with Pavels on Linkedin:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pavels-cvetkovs-471b231a
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37:36
Lies, Bias, and ESG in the finance function – Prof Alex Edmans
Alex Edmans is a professor of Finance, non-executive director, author, and TED speaker. He is regularly interviewed and writes for WSJ, Bloomberg, BBC, CNBC, CNN, ESPN, Fox, ITV, NPR, Reuters, Sky News, and Sky Sports. He was previously a tenured professor at Wharton and an investment banker at Morgan Stanley.
In this episode we talk to Alex about his new book “May Contain Lies: How Stories, Statistics, and Studies Exploit Our Biases – And What We Can Do About. He is also a co-author of the classic text book, “Principles of Corporate Finance” and top business book (his first book) Grow the Pie, How Great Companies Deliver both purpose and Profit. His Ted Talk on what to trust in a post truth world has alone been viewed nearly 2m time.
So many thought-provoking takeaways for anyone in FP&A!
Leaving Morgan Stanley to become a professor of finance
Why I give Ted Talks rather than just publishing research
How CFOs and FP&A leaders can think about purpose
Is ESG a tick-box exercise for finance?
How FP&A and finance leaders can check their biases
How you can control your addiction to bias
Silicon Valley Bank and why financial models were affected by bias
Follow Alex on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aedmans/
Links to Alex’s new book:
May Contain Lies: How Stories, Statistics, and Studies Exploit Our Biases―And What We Can Do about
TED: What to trust in a “post-truth” world
FP&A Today is the podcast for Financial Planning and Analysis. The weekly show dives into the challenges and opportunities within the world of FP&A, interviewing FP&A leaders, CFOs and other finance pros in order to give you the freshest insights and takeaways. Each week our top guests provide actionable advice about financial planning and analysis – from career goals to navigating challenges, and powerful Excel tips.
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