If CFO Joe Aho's career DNA were uploaded to Ancestry.com, he would likely discover a family tree populated with no less than five financial planning analysts and 17 senior sales representatives. Needless to say, his career roots are multifunctional, with numerous titles and different tours of duty inside both finance and sales operations. Having joined…
It was the type of introduction that finance executives will invest decades of thoughtful career-building to receive. After dwelling nearly 20 years inside the capital markets and investment research corridors that scrutinize and energize the activities of publicly held real estate companies, Michael Knott was perhaps better prepared than most to receive an introduction to…
As for many CFOs, one company more than others dominates James Denena's finance career building years. Denena spent more than 10 years at Applied Materials of Santa Clara, California, where an executive development program encouraged him to move around inside the chip maker's sprawling finance organization. While Denena filled traditional FP&A and treasury roles, he…
Asked to supply us with a finance strategic moment, CFO Sean Sobers recalls an acquisition completed during an earlier chapter of his career. Convinced that the acquired company was capable of yielding only a meager profit, Sobers and the finance team set out to expose the company's shortcomings, only to discover the opposite. "It was…
The young man's smile is broad and welcoming. It's the type of photo that colleges and universities frequently use to attract young applicants. However, when featured on the home page for Tri-County Mental Health Services, Inc., the image's message seems less manufactured and perhaps more ambitious as it seeks to signal hope to families seeking…
Inside the middle market today, it's not uncommon to find a seasoned private equity executive serving as CFO of one of his or her firm's portfolio companies. Such an arrangement provides the business leader with a coveted split-screen view that buffers the investor's demands with real-world operational insights. CFO Steve Coughran, who last year entered…
A number of years after he first joined the lodging and hospitality industry, Ryan Hymel recalls being confronted by a fork in the road. Having labored deep inside his company's M&A growth engine, he realized that his native tongue would curtail his career opportunities as the company's appetite for growth became increasingly focused on Mexico…
Twenty-four months ago, CFO Mark Guerin had a pretty clear notion of what he wanted Onconova's financial footing to look like during the second half of 2019. However, the question that lingered was whether the plan that Guerin and his team were putting into motion had the vigor to overcome the obstacles along the way.…
Many CFOs have told us that storytelling is a big part of being a successful CFO today. However, quite a few finance leaders have told us that this did not come naturally to them and that in fact it was only by virtue of an "A-ha!" moment that they did finally lock on to the…
Years from now, when Katherine Edenbach looks back on her CFO career, 2019 might be remembered as a pendulum year--or a year when her priorities as a finance leader swung from growth to profitability. "Smaller companies are much more focused on revenue and revenue growth, which is very important, but we need to drive a…
When asked what his priorities are as a finance leader over the next 12 months, CFO Nadeem Moiz supplies an answer that uses the phrase "shareholder value" not once, but three times. Needless to say, shareholder value appears to be top-of-mind at Select Interior Concepts, a diversified building products and services company. Explains Moiz: "In…