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AI Lowers Build Costs but Raises Coordination Costs.
AI makes building tools cheap but coordination expensive. Lessons on ownership, integration, and avoiding burnout. โ
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When AI Makes Thinking Too Easy
AI facilitates System 1 thinking and may suppress System 2 thinking. This is a hypothesis that I have been reflecting on lately. As Daniel Kahneman explained in ๐๐ฉ๐ช๐ฏ๐ฌ๐ช๐ฏ๐จ, ๐๐ข๐ด๐ต ๐ข๐ฏ๐ฅ ๐๐ญ๐ฐ๐ธ, there are two types of thinking: ๐ฆ๐๐๐๐ฒ๐บ ๐ญ โ automatic and intuitive, but prone to mistakes๐ฆ๐๐๐๐ฒ๐บ ๐ฎ โ deliberate and thoughtful, but requires more… โ
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AI Broke Every SaaS LTV Forecast. What Can FP&A Teams Do About It?
At a dinner event recently, someone floated the idea that every SaaS company that forecasted customer lifetime value (LTV) before AI was wrong. I had not made this connection before, but it makes sense that many companies overestimated LTV. It would have been impossible to predict the competitive threat of AI-native companies, both direct competitors… โ
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Strategic Planning For FP&A: Guide to Identifying Key Questions To Answer
As strategic planning starts to pick up for most companies, finance teams should start to zero in on the most important strategic questions facing the company.ย ๐ฏ Do you know how to do this? Hereโs a practical guide to identify strategic issues that need to be addressed: ๐๐ฆ๐๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ ๐๐ถ๐๐ต ๐๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐๐ผ๐ ๐ต๐ฎ๐๐ฒ Strategic questions are often… โ
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Strategic Planning For FP&A: How To Nail The Kickoff Meeting
Youโre in FP&A and the CFO suddenly asks you to lead strategic planning out of the blue.ย You just joined a few weeks ago.โกDo you know where to start? There is a lot to consider, but one of the first steps is a kickoff meeting with senior leaders.ย Here are some practical questions (not exhaustive) to cover… โ
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Strategic Planning For FP&A: Helpful Strategic Frameworks
Stop being just the FP&A reporting teamโlean into strategy. This post shares a practical framework any FP&A leader can apply to sharpen strategic thinking. ๐ฏ In Good Strategy / Bad Strategy, Richard Rumelt introduces the โkernel of strategyโ and breaks it down into three components:โข Diagnosisโข Guiding Policyโข Coherent Actions Iโm using this as the… โ
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Strategic Planning For FP&A: 4 roles That Are Essential
Strategic planning isnโt easy. When multiple teams and diverse skills come together, the process can go off the rails. ๐ค๏ธ Based on my past experiences, I have realized that there are four roles that are essential for successful strategic planning. Some people can play multiple roles, and multiple people may help execute a role, but… โ
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Rethinking ROI in Finance: Key Questions to Ask
โWhatโs the ROI?โย ๐ค This is a fair question that I have often asked during my FP&A career, but itโs not always the right one. To be clear, if the amount is large enough and/or the return is forecastable, then ROI is the right way to go.ย However, for โsmall-to-medium-sizedโ requests with uncertain payoffs, there is a… โ
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Building Scalable Hiring Processes in Finance
Current and future headcount data is critical for a financial forecast but can become a massive time suck ๐ for FP&A teams if a scalable workflow is not created from the beginning. Lately, I’ve been working with two clients, one early-stage and one more mature, which has made me reflect on how to build a… โ
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Follow up to ‘Building an FP&A team from 0 to 5’
Last week, I wrote about growing an FP&A team from 0 to 5, based on my experience. This week, I hand-picked sources, added them to Googleโs NotebookLM, and used the software to summarize insights. By selecting the sources myself, I avoid the โaverage answerโ that AI models like ChatGPT might provide. Next, I curated the… โ
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