What's Rarely Measured Matters Most

CFO

1130: Building Resilient Finance in Uncertain Times | David Obstler, CFO, Datadog

When David Obstler joined Datadog in 2018, the company’s co-founders had already built momentum with a product that observed modern cloud workloads. What struck Obstler was the alignment with a powerful long-term trend—the shift from legacy, on-premise systems to modern cloud applications. “It was a product that had a lot of product market fit in…
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Scaling Toward One Billion Goal | Laura LaPeer, CFO, UHY

Earlier in her career, Laura LaPeer reframed treasury and procurement from transactional functions into strategic levers—investing idle cash and aligning vendor decisions with business goals. The shift delivered tangible financial impact and taught her to zoom out, reassess timing, and connect everyday tasks to long-term strategic objectives. Now Watch our Complete Episode Featuring CFO Laura […]

1129: Turning Transactions into Strategy | Laura LaPeer, CFO, UHY

On her first day as CFO of UHY, Laura LaPeer asked a simple question: “Do you guys do Copilot?” She had grown accustomed to using Microsoft’s AI assistant for tasks ranging from summarizing documents to creating slides, and she wanted it in place immediately. The request, she tells us, reflected both her pragmatism and her…
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1128: Capital Discipline in a Usage-Based World | Ben Gammell, President & CFO, Brex

In 2018, Brex made a defining decision: rather than rely on middleware providers like Stripe or Marqeta, it built its own payments infrastructure from the ground up. That move, Ben Gammell tells us, gave the company a direct integration with MasterCard and the ability to issue corporate cards in “over 50 plus local currencies.” The…
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Building a CFO’s GEMBA Habit | Damon Lee, CFO, C.H. Robinson

Early in his career, Damon Lee questioned why identical parts were sourced from different vendors across two plants. His analysis uncovered a $3M savings—20x larger than any other project. The lesson: finance’s curiosity and willingness to speak up can transform operations, not just report results. Now Watch the Complete Episode Featuring CFO Damon Lee of […]

1127: Lean Finance in a Volatile World | Damon Lee, CFO, C.H. Robinson

When Damon Lee reflects on his first conversations with C.H. Robinson’s CEO, he recalls how natural the alignment felt. “We spoke the same language. We were finishing each other’s sentences,” Lee tells us. For a finance leader whose ambition had long been to step into the CFO chair, the clarity of vision he encountered at…
Listen to the Episode Below (0:51:32)
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Culture, Strategy, And AI Converge | Jay Peir, CFO, Pigment

Jay Peir’s Finance Strategic Moment revealed how CFOs shape culture as much as strategy. Inspired by Tableau’s CFO Tom Walker, he embraced rituals that united teams and reinforced the mindset: “You either sell the product or build the product,” guiding his own leadership at Pigment toward cultural impact. Now Watch the Complete Episode Featuring CFO […]

1125: Finance Lessons in the AI Era | Jay Peir, CFO, Pigment

At 30, Jay Peir stepped into the CFO role at SunPower, a high-efficiency solar cell manufacturer. The appointment came after leading M&A and venture investments at Cypress Semiconductor, where SunPower was the largest portfolio company. “I had my first CFO experience at the age of 30,” Peir tells us, recalling how corporate development responsibilities opened…
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1124: Rewiring the Marketplace for the AI Era | Craig Foster, CFO, Pax8

When Craig Foster talks about artificial intelligence, he begins with scale. Pax8, the enterprise marketplace where he serves as CFO, connects vendors like Microsoft and CrowdStrike with 43,000 managed service providers. Those MSPs, he tells us, serve between 700,000 and 800,000 small and midsize businesses worldwide. Against that backdrop, Foster describes how AI is reshaping…
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When Data and AI Reshape Precision Medicine

Jim Rogers applied lessons from Groupon’s rapid growth by steering Tempus toward disciplined expansion. He prioritized oncology as the core focus, deferring broader disease or international moves until sustainable, long-term growth could be assured—ensuring strategy aligned with impact without disrupting day-to-day operations. Now Watch the Complete Episode Featuring CFO Jim Rogers of Tempus AI Jim […]

1123: From Accounting Rigor to Strategic Leadership | Jim Rogers, CFO Tempus AI

The pivot began when Jim Rogers raised his hand. Groupon was shifting from mobile daily deals to a goods business in Europe, and—still early in his career—he volunteered to help lead the finance work. That step, he tells us, bridged his path from technical accounting into FP&A and set a pattern: seek out the build…
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1122: Capital Allocation as a CFO’s North Star | Chris Miorin, CFO, apexanalytix

Chris Miorin’s path to the CFO office began in a crucible of leadership. At West Point, and later at Ranger School, he was forged in environments designed to test resolve. Commissioned shortly after 9/11, he knew combat was certain. Leading an infantry platoon in Iraq, he found himself working side-by-side with a colonel “30 years…
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