Runway

Are you doing finance? Or are you just doing accounting … but in the future? What is finance? I talk to a lot of finance leaders, and what finance even means is different from company to company, from leader to leader. Most finance teams agree that finance involves reporting accurate numbers, running smooth budget cycles, and working with accounting to close the books. But if that’s all you’re doing, that’s just accounting, but in the future. The best finance teams, they know that finance is about strategy and creativity. It involves making strategic decisions that involve the entire company. That requires an understanding of what really drives your business, so that you can creatively generate new ideas to drive the business forward together with the entire team. That’s how you make a real strategic impact, and that’s what finance is really about. I spoke recently with Cooper Lycan, founder of SoBet on how we helped their team do exactly that. You can read it in the comment section below, if you like.

Finance isn’t just about finance — it’s about the whole business. It’s about your product roadmap, your marketing strategy, your hiring plan, and how your sales team operates. Every project has a financial outcome. Does your FP&A platform help you see this clearly?

I love many parts of my job, and one of my favorite parts is meeting with leaders of various software tools and discussing their journeys. I love learning how they got started, why they started a planning software, and what makes them different in the marketplace. One tool in particular, that has been very interesting to follow, is Runway and its founder, Siqi Chen. In the linked article below, published in partnership with Runway, I share how I first learned about Runway and my experience watching it grow. I talk about how I wondered if they would ever come to market as it took years before they launched, and for the longest time, All I saw was a cheeky website poking fun at finance. I also share what it was like meeting and interviewing Siqi for the first time. He is a dynamic leader and not your typical CEO for finance planning software. From him wearing a silly hat to talking about his vision of Runway as a thought tool, not a workflow tool, he had me intrigued. I would love your thoughts in the comments. Should planning software be a thought tool, a workflow tool, a hybrid, or something else altogether? Stay tuned as I share other experiences with tool founders in the coming days. https://lnkd.in/gy6_pmyi

Day two at the Money20/20 conference! Swing by our booth (#3203) for a chance to win one of our launch jackets.. 😉

One of the hardest lessons I've learned is this: What's obvious to me isn't obvious to others. I realized this when we were refreshing our company strategy doc. I'd rather build things than write strategy, but at our size, I can't make every decision. So it’s useful to have a clear strategy that aligns the team. I wrote a draft, and asked for feedback. I was told it wasn’t clear. Fine, I added more details. Still not clear enough. Okay, more details. Still the same response. I felt frustrated pretty quickly. I thought I got it all down, and it seemed pretty clear to me. At one point I just wanted to say, “look man — just tell me what you want to hear, I’ll write that.” Eventually what I realized is that the problem was that I had a deep aversion to including anything “obvious” in the strategy, but that’s exactly what the team needed from me. I actively avoid saying the obvious things, because I want to be liked, and when other people say things that are obvious to me, I think they’re being pedantic and condescending, and worse — stupid. And I don’t want people to think that about me. But the obvious things are only obvious to you because they are deeply informed by your own intuition and experiences — those obvious things are the things that are most likely to be inside your zone of genius. They are actually the most important things to communicate. Thinking that other people are like me has impacted me over and over — to think what’s obvious to me should be obvious to everybody else, he way I would react is the same way everyone else would react. When I realized what the team really needed me to do is offload my intuition, and especially the things that were most “obvious” to me, overnight, the team told me the strategy became much clearer and more useful. I have to remind myself of this often: people think differently from me, and we each have our own zones of genius that aren’t the same. That’s what makes teams powerful — if we hold back the things that are “obvious” to us, we don’t get to multiply each other’s effectiveness. We hold the team back.

If you're at Money20/20, stop by our booth! We’ll show you a finance platform your team will actually love. We're at booth #3203.

Whether you're the first finance hire or prepping for an IPO, scaling your team is everything. Join Charly Kevers (Carta CFO), Siqi Chen (Runway CEO), and Nicolas Kopp (Rillet CEO) as they share how to navigate the challenges of growth from Series A to exit. You’ll get insights on early hires, rebuilding your financial model, the right tools to scale, and keeping your sanity through it all. Don’t miss it!

How are Mercedes Benz, Chanel, and KPMG using AI for financial planning? We're sitting down with @bouchernicolas to know how he’s helped these companies leverage AI for real-world finance challenges. Join us to know more: https://lnkd.in/gbSdUcRM

The latest G2 reports are out, and we're thrilled to be named a leader (again)! This recognition is more than just an award—it’s a reflection of our commitment to putting customers first. Every piece of feedback and every rating shows that we’re making a real impact and earning the trust of the businesses we work with. A huge thank you to our amazing customers for trusting us and helping us lead in key categories like: - Financial Analysis - Budgeting & Forecasting - Decision-Making Software - Cash Flow Management We’re just getting started—and there's plenty more to come as we continue raising the bar.