Welcome back to the Count Me
In podcast. I'm your host.

Adam Larson in today's guest is
really interesting. Casey. Woo.

Casey's been a strategic financial
leader in Silicon valley for the past two

decades, investing in an operating high
growth tech and tech enabled companies.

He is the CFO of landing,

the former head of strategic finance at
WeWork and the co-founder of operators

Guild, a knowledge sharing community
for CFOs and other business operators.

And that's just what he is
been up to lately today.

Casey and I put the microscope on the
CFO and how the role has evolved from

being the sheriff of cost and budgets
to now being a company-wide business

partner, focused squarely on the
most important metric of all growth.

I hope you enjoy the conversation.

Casey, thanks so much for joining
us today on the Count Me In podcast.

we're going to jump right into some,

questions we're gonna be focusing
in on the CFO. And so to start off,

what are some common misconceptions or
what is the hook's historical perspective

on the role of the CFO?

Yeah, I think I'm probably not
going to be novel here in my

answer.

There is a pretty classic
stereotype of a CFO,

to borrow a phrase from a
friend, you know, there's CFO.

No is basically one of
them is Dr. No, the,

you know, DBER, you know, the nickel
and dimer, the no personality,

the, yeah,

the one that says no to everything in
terms of costs and other words like

the budget, right? The
people think of, you know,

my travel and expense
reimbursements like that.

That's when you get to real stereotypes
of just don't you do my team reports,

you know? And so, of course at the
corporate level, you know, CFOs are,

I don't know, misconception, hopefully
this is a good conception, but they're

the honest broker, right?

They're the one who engages
with the board as the air quote,

pseudo check on leadership, et cetera.

So there's not some misconceptions,
some that's true. Absolutely.

You have that. A lot of
it now is not true. Yes.

We manage budgets and money and have that

purview. But I think there's also,

what's now called CFO
grow rather than CFO know.

And I do think there's
a healthy way to manage

in a very responsible way money, but
also, and I think the word is invest,

right? So they call it strategic
CFO. Money is meant to be invested,

I guess, saved as well. Right? So when
you're, especially in high growth,

VPs are not giving you money to sit on it.

It's put it to good use and the
word is good. Use, not reckless use.

and of course you're going
to balance a lot of things.

So one is just a strategic minded

investor mentality of where you want
to allocate resources is I think more

what's happening. and it's not just
about nickel and diamond. there's also,

you know, more personalities CFOs than
people think it's very, cross-functional.

Some are extroverts, most are not,

but they can be a very
friendly person who empowers

ends a business partner
rather than a police force.

So when we look at the space
of a CFO as an operator,

you talked a little bit to me
about your operator's Guild.

What personal experience do you have and
what have you gained in this level of

expertise?

Yeah, so, I mean, for
those who don't know,

the operator's Guild has been
going on for eight years.

It started as a eight,

nine person friend group of operators
that we support one another.

Now it's about 600. I say this because
there's a lot of conversations,

there's a lot of learnings. So I'm
only going to scratch the surface. A,

few things. One, all of
businesses, all of startup is,

is a bunch of people who decide to get
together at eight in the morning to build

something,

to sell for more than hopefully
it costs that's all the businesses

or a startup. Let's call it a startup
call, whatever you want to call it, just,

and notice it's humans,
you take away the humans,

computer's not going to do anything
themselves. And that's number one is

business is a game. So when things
are crazy or stressful, it's like, no,

one's dying here. This is not
real life and death. It's serious.

Don't get me wrong. We are very
competitive, but there's a lot of natural

dysfunction when you toss in
money, growth expectations and

people, dysfunction is just basic.
So that's kind of a learning. and,

also work with good people.

It just goes back to the business is just
a bunch of people. It's not worth it.

You can make your money elsewhere. If
it's not with good people who respect you,

who you respect them, shared values.
It's actually very similar to a marriage

it's just not intimate, right? But
it's the same thing. Shared values.

You go on dates that are called
interviews. You get divorces, you know,

it's because when things
are not matching up,

another one is don't let stereotypes or

misconceptions tell you how you should
act in your role, play your strengths,

establish yourself as if you're gonna
be a strategic CFO, be one that said,

maybe you have a, stronger person who
compliments you on the expense side.

Who's, much more, you know,
doctor knows so to speak, right?

That're all really, or, vice versa.
You're someone that's extremely conscious.

You know,

you need to marry that with someone
that's a little bit more strategically mi

nded and growth minded. Just,,
that's just an example, but,

play to your strengths,

be who you are and hiring is super

important. Probably the key to everything,

all things in start are just problems.

All we're doing is
problem solving every day.

If you can put together the
right team tools, resources,

you can solve any problems. So
those are kind of learnings.

Okay. No, that's great. I
think that's really nice.

and just thinking about the CFO, you
talked, when we, my first question,

you talked a lot about the
misconceptions you knew.

I think you laid that out
very nicely with the Dr. No,

and the Gilbert examples and stuff.

but a lot of people tend to under
underestimate what the CFO sees because

because of this, these
misconceptions that can be there.

And if the CFO hasn't established
himself as like a business partner,

it can be very difficult
to get a seat at the table.

Can you talk a little bit about what the
responsibility the CFO has to kind of g

et there so that they're
not underestimated?

I think the first one is before you
get married, you should establish that.

I would question

a company where CFOs not at the
table, not, not because of CFOs,

you know, all that. It's just
because it's, too important

of a function just like CRO or CTO.

So that's just point number one,
if you're fighting to get there.

So something's already a little
off and you need a question,

how they value and what they
expect from the function.

If you're in the unfortunate
seat of, you're not,

don't have a seat at the table.
I think it's a very clear,

I believe in explicit conversation
and communication. It's like, Hey,

Mr. And Mrs. CEO, this is a function
that's critical to the business.

I'm not talking about myself.

I'm talking about the function and
for the sake of the business and our s

takeholders,

it's important that I'm in the room
or whoever's leading a function.

Would you agree or
disagree if they disagree?

I would seriously consider finding a
place where you can make a bigger impact

and, and be valued, because it
should be a high impact role.

So you're you have the seat
at the table, you know, ,

you're there with everybody. What
does that look like? What does that,

CFO's responsibility look like
today? As opposed to, you know,

the stuff we've already talked
about, the misconceptions and the Mr.

No's and all that stuff.

The,

first thing is I believe all functions
should be business. First function,

second business, first legal,
second business, first accounting,

second business, first marketing, second.

Everything is in service of the business.

So I think that's the first
mindset you should have.

The second is there's a difference
between tactics and strategy asking

very important questions I
think is actually something

that people underestimate in
terms of stirring conversation,

getting to know the business
better, and at a certain level.

So I think when you're at that
table, depending on your audience,

you do need to operate and talk at a
higher level and not get caught in the

weeds at the same time to be at that
table. You need to know the details.

If you don't know them for
details, they, you know,

they just call you ivory tower. Right.

You're just talking without really any
true understanding of the business.

So it's both understand the business well,

but elevate up and talk at
a very strategic high level.

in terms of topics of
conversation, I think generally

I like to call it non-linear so
rather than, oh, we need more revenue.

So I guess we need to grow
the sales team. Like, okay.

That's like tactical and
sometimes obvious it would be

if we have an asset heavy model,
should we consider asset light?

Have we tried to take this entire team
and move them to a lower cost area?

We do, you know, one idea that was
awesome. Wasn't mine, but it's like,

Hey, we, do host checkins. What
about self-service checkins?

So be a part of the business discussion,

product discussions and all of
them. When you think about it,

just lead to better
allocations of capital, right?

People think capital allocation is,

more of a budget product is a
major allocation of capital where

you said where you spend it, what
types of products generate, what

the return on that.

So that that's really where
I think the CFO now sits.

And of course there's fundraising, right?

The most unique thing about a CFO
is that they really help with the,

capital needs of the business.

So there's a whole bunch of
strategy there there's risks.

You take there's intentional risks,
there's unknown risks. There's.

And the last thing I think is
preparing ahead, seasoned operators,

the benefit they bring is they see
six months, 12 months, 18 months,

24 months out because a lot of
times the breaking distance on these

high growth companies are so far,

you have to be making decisions
today to affect 12 months from now.

And unseasoned people unfortunately find
out when the brick wall is in front of

their face and you're going
at 700 miles per hour.

That's quite a visual there.
what you've been describing,

really kind of connects
for me like the CFO,

how important they are with things like
strategy and data and understanding

those things. And you present those
things properly for the organization and,

and giving the, the input that,

that is there for the strategy when,

determining those things and having the
right data in place to, to support that,

are there, can we maybe focus a little
bit on tools because when you're a CFO,

you need the right tools at your disposal.

Are there some common tools
that help drive strategy?

And maybe you can talk a little
bit about innovation there.

and I think what's most important
for our listeners is, you know,

how do they go about getting their hands
on these tools and learning from them

and learning to use them?

Because I think that's because
you don't want to be that, that,

CFO with the brick law, right in
front of you going 700 miles an hour,

you want to be prepared and get to that
point where you will become seasoned.

And that way you've described.

And the biggest change that
I actually forgot to mention,

but misconception is I think the office
of the CFO will eventually become

the business intelligence
center right now.

BI lives can be living under
itself. It can live under a COO,

it can live under product and
engineering's very common.

But when you think about a centralized
organization, a CFO comes to mind.

Why? Because we're finance.

I think about like the nervous
system nervous have to be everywhere.

The bloodstream, it has to be everywhere,

but it feeds nourishes and helps
and partners with air quote,

the organs or the
functions of the business.

So number one tool is data. So
number one is having the data.

Number two is clean data, which
is the biggest and hardest one.

After that it's systems and
tools to democratize and

extract decision making insights.

That's what I think is where the CFOs
headed. And this goes back to, you know,

my, I have a mentor who,

made a famous analogy of finances
like the weather there's three levels.

And the goals that get to level three,
which most do not get to level one

is reporting the weather.
What happened yesterday?

It was sunny. It was cloudy. That's just
called reporting. Not easy to do well,

but you get that done after
you get that done. Level two is

forecasting the weather it's gonna
be star. It's going to be stormy.

It's going to be dark.

It's going to be sunny
translation forecast P and L
the third is influencing the

weather. I'd go. As far as
I say, changing the weather,

it's going to be stormy six
months from now. We can do X, Y,

and Z and make it sunny that's data.

The more data rich of businesses,

the more complicated a business is the
more power there is of influence there is

to actually say,

did you know that half our
users are looking for this?

So why don't we change our product
to do that? You know, sounds easy,

but those make all the difference in
the world. Times a hundred of those.

So the number one tool is business
intelligence, which combines everything.

It's not just about sitting on top of
data. It's, not about a fancy system.

It's putting it all together. And lastly,

why is the CFO uniquely qualified
or the office of the CFO?

Most people work in a
function, sales, marketing,

engineering, their job is to
focus and dedicate in one arena,

the job of CFOs to tie it all together
and help bring it all together.

And then there's obviously, you
know, other functions like that too.

But when you have finance,
that's a lot of data as well.

People forget that accounting is a
crap, ton of valuable data of all sorts.

So the combination of accounting,
data, forecasting data, customer data,

sales data, product data is I
think going to be the future.

And it's gonna sit somewhere around the
CFO space, obviously CEO space as well.

So as I think that's great, those
tools sound very clear for the youth,

for the CFO, as they're
looking at that, you know,

as we wrap up our conversation, I
think, you know, I wanted to ask you,

because I know that you're in
a number of different ventures.

Are there other opportunities out there
for CFOs to connect with other CFOs,

so that they can help, you know, build
themselves up and just really, you know,

get the knowledge needed at a time?

I mean, selfishly, the answer is the
best one I know is called operator Guild.

like co-founder did, like I said,
as an innocent solved problem,

I had about eight, nine years ago.
It's a wonderful community and

it's a great way to give
back mentor mentee. So

operators Guild is, is
the place, in my opinion,

for the most value of getting
support, giving it learning, giving,

and participating.

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