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Annual strategic planning is a complete WASTE OF TIME 😤😤😤 ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ㅤ ...unless, you're able to map in 1 or 2 pages the priorities and the financial plan to actually make it happen. ㅤ ㅤ Planning can be unpredictable Planning can lack focus Planning can be tedious ㅤ ㅤ Here's our foolproof process at THRIVE Global CFO and our CEO Katherine Castro, CPA 🔥on how we implement this with our strategic planning clients: ㅤ 1 - Set a time period to plan ahead. ㅤ 2 - Review past business performance ㅤ 3 - Review vision, mission and core values ㅤ 4 - Identify top 3 priorities ㅤ 5 - Map targets into a financial plan ㅤ 6 - Cascade to the team for execution ㅤ ㅤ Hope this guides you for 2024 and beyond! ⭐⭐⭐

We redefine success in an era of rapid change by partnering with CFOs to lead innovation, ensure compliance and foster a culture of growth. Learn about us: https://accntu.re/4bRGVIw -- Image description: The image shows several people walking down a busy street in a city. The people are all wearing business clothes. The image is taken from a low angle, which makes the people look larger than life. The background is a blur of buildings and sky. The text on the image reads: "Empower CFOs to drive value, boost performance and transform finance. Learn about our Strategy & Consulting team. Work at the heart of change."

The CMO-CFO relationship is the key to marketing success (...and job security) As a CMO, you know building a tight bond with your CRO is crucial. But there's another C-suite connection that can make or break your tenure: The Chief Financial Officer. Why is the CMO-CFO relationship so critical? ✅ Collaborative planning - Work with the CFO to map out your fiscal year investments and activities. Align on quarterly budgets and targets. ✅ Prove your value - Partner with finance to demonstrate clear ROI on your marketing spend. Tie your efforts directly to revenue impact. ✅ Secure your position - CMOs with strong CFO relationships have the longest tenures. When you're in lockstep with the money, your seat at the table is safe. The more they're connected to the CFO, the longer the tenure and the happier everyone's going to be. Don't just chase alignment with sales. Make finance your best friend. Because when the CFO has your back, you have the resources and runway to drive real results. Dig deeper into this CMO success secret in this quick video: How have you built trust with your CFO? I'd love to hear your experience!

🔑 The CMO & CFO Dynamic: Friend or Foe? 🔑 In today’s fast-paced business world, the relationship between the CFO and the CMO is more important than ever before. Yet all too often, marketing is seen as a cost instead of a value add, with marketing feeling like they don't have enough financial resources to make a difference, while finance feels like marketing is asking for too much or not delivering real results. Marketing is the function with its finger on the pulse of the industry and its customers, and done well, is the driver of revenue and growth for any successful organisation. By working together, these two power players can together drive business growth, mitigate risks and ensure resilience in the face of change, all of which leads to improved financial performance and sustainable business success. So how can this be done? 💡 Shared Goals: CFOs can support marketing by identifying goals, objectives, and budgets. Marketing can then showcase ROI and value. 💡 Informed Decisions: Joint collaboration allows for leveraging financial insights, leading to more informed marketing decisions and better optimised budgets. 💡 Joint Risk Assessment: Adapt strategies together to stay competitive during market shifts. 💡 Tech Investments: CMOs provide insights on tech improvements; CFOs analyse financial implications. Aligned investments ensure success and minimise risks. AND ABOVE ALL 💡 Trust: A true partnership is based on trust. The CMO and CFO must have awareness of and empathy for each other’s challenges and concerns. Unlock the power of a strong CMO-CFO partnership with our exec search dynamic duo: Sarah Daniels (Wallace) Daniels – Head of Practice for Marketing Jo Riley – Business Director for Finance   #Leadership #CMO #CFO #BusinessGrowth #Collaboration #Marketing #Finance #ExecutiveSearch #recruitment 

❗ Strategic planning is essential for setting long-term aspirational targets that guide a company's growth and profitability. These targets should be well-considered, including both financial and non-financial metrics, and remain adaptable to changing conditions. Aligning strategic goals with budgeting and forecasting ensures every short-term plan and financial decision supports the company's overall objectives.   📹 In this video, Guilherme Saraiva, ex Senior Director, FP&A at Discovery Inc, Washington D.C. FP&A Board Ambassador, discusses the importance of linking strategic planning to business planning.    He highlights how FP&A can bridge the gap between long-term goals and short-term execution by aligning strategic targets with budgets and forecasts, avoiding the common "hockey stick" problem, and ensuring consistent communication of strategic plans across the organisation. ▶️ Follow the link to learn more: https://lnkd.in/drYGHVcH #fpatrends

Happy New Year! I am following up on a previous post related to FP&A's vision and the four foundational pillars (Processes, Partnerships, People, and Platforms). This session is focused on 'Partnerships' and the goal is "To gain trust, obtain buy-in and have the ability to not only inform but also influence decision-making practices". I am capitalizing on a best practice framework created by Anders Liu-Lindberg and the Business Partnering Institute showing 6 tactics for becoming dynamic business partners to operational units and better understanding the business value creation lifecycles. ✳ Get Out of the Office - Break down organizational silos and instead encourage team collaboration via a free flow of information. ✳ Be Curious about the Business - Apply curiosity by asking questions, getting involved in business-related projects, and meeting business folks to understand their needs and challenges. ✳ Experience the Real World - Explore how the company's value proposition is delivered to customers. ✳ Look at Numbers with New Context - Assess information by seeing beyond the number. Look between the lines and connect the dots. ✳ Share Insights with Stakeholders - Share actionable insights and propose solutions to gain trust, buying, and credibility. ✳ Create a Continual Loop - Deploy a continuous improvement mindset. Finance Business Partnering requires a new set of skills and behaviors. According to many case studies and articles, effective business partnerships lead to better strategy formulation and execution. It also leads to building a competitive edge for the finance function and becoming a margin improvement unit! Thanks to Anders Liu-Lindberg, Christian Frantz Hansen, Benita Ulrichs Nilsson, Michael Lykke Bülow, Christian Katzmann, Ida Rytter Lund, Franziska Winter, and all the folks at the Business Partnering Institute for your passion and ongoing learnings to unlock the value within Finance via a critical area "Business Partnerships". #fpna #fpanda #financebusinesspartner #partnerships #partnershipsuccess #partnerecosystem #partnershipsmatter #financeeducation #financeleadership

In today’s "higher-rate" environment, companies without a thoughtful corporate portfolio strategy will fall short of their full value creation potential. It’s essential to know which parts of your business portfolio are creating value and which are destroying it – and reallocate resources from marginal positions to winning ones. In this recent article, my friends and colleagues from BCG on Corporate Finance & Strategy outline a three-step action agenda for business leaders to rethink their portfolio strategy -- good (and quick!) read ... ;-)

Transforming from a traditional CFO to a strategic growth driver is a significant evolution in any agency. Our blog discusses this transition, highlighting how modern CFOs leverage financial insights to influence strategic decisions that drive growth. Learn about the tools and strategies that empower CFOs to go beyond the numbers and play a pivotal role in shaping their agencies' futures. Join the conversation on how financial leadership is evolving in the agency sector. #CFOGrowth #StrategicLeadership #FinancialManagement #AgencyLife #SaaSTech #MarketingTech #AdAgency #MediaBuying #CreativeAgencies #TeamCounta #Accountability

A quick story about how to make finance transformation happen way faster in your organisation. Imagine there are 8 people in your team and each of them spends 2 hours a month trying to make progress on something. All 8 people are focusing on a different thing - they all rely on each other, but they are different. Often the ideas might conflict, contradict or challenge each other. Now, imagine instead that, all 8 people spend those 2 hours on the same issue, collectively making focused progress. Which makes the biggest impact? When it comes to finance transformation, the very first thing we can do across the team to turbocharge our progress is decide how we can get alignment on which order we're going to tackle opportunities and when. Try and discuss it at least each month in your team meetings. This should start to create patterns in your collective decision making. Starting to sound a bit like a strategy...?? How do you get alignment on your team's collective areas of focus?

As finance business partners, we are lucky enough to be close to the strategy of the business unit we support. And while I’m a huge advocate of finance not meddling in the operations of the business, I do think we can be helpful in providing our unbiased perspective on the ideas for improving the business. In the early stage of the planning process, listen for ideas that your business partners are throwing out for improving the business - help them to understand the potential timing and impact of those ideas. Here’s a simple framework to evaluate the ideas consistently: - Cost (qualitative and quantitative) - Benefit (qualitative and quantitative) - Timing - Risks - Mitigating factors Work with finance teams in other support functions to understand what initiatives they are hearing about and how they are framing up the cost/benefit of those decisions. This will help you to guide your business partners to put their best foot forward and ultimately let the leadership team make the best possible investment decision.