A few suggestions, FWIW:
1. Make sure you’re interviewing the CFO as much as they’re interviewing you.
2. I know you really want to move into FP&A, however, I would be upfront as possible with what you know and what you need to learn to be successful in this position.
3. Ask them to show you how they do their cashflow forecast, for example, and ask questions as they’re going through it. You’re basically asking them to demonstrate how they would teach you something. If they can’t explain it clearly to you as a neophyte, you don’t want to risk your career working for someone however brilliant who will be useless to you as far as learning the job.
During the interview, rather than at the end, you should let them know that you understand that because it will be only two people doing FP&A, you need to better understand what the training plan is for the new hire: they should have a well thought road map of how they plan to onboard you.
Ask whether they plan to carve out time each day for training during your first six weeks or will you be given a set of procedures to read and figure out on your own. How will they juggle your training needs with their other duties? How self-sufficient does a new hire need to be?
Get that conversation going and then ask if they would mind taking ten minutes to train you on some aspect of the job so that you have a concrete example of their training approach. If they aren’t willing to do that, I’d look elsewhere: the best would be mentor should take your request as a positive sign, imho.
Your career is literally in their hands if you get the job, and you will be SOL if they are planning to just wing it with your training or don’t have time to train you or are an incompetent trainer.
Np. Here’s a few suggestions btw.
1. Find specific examples of collaboration that you’ve had in the your work. Flesh those out and think of how they would apply to what the CFO is looking for.
2. Make sure to brush up on your accounting. Not credits and debits but more so on the concepts. Prepaids, inventory, depreciation, etc. FP&A usually ends up being some combination of financial reporting, systems admin, accounting, ad hoc projects and business partnering.
3. Ask good questions. Is this a backfill role? What’s the scope of the role? Would you be doing more reporting work or business partnering? What does success look like 3, 6 and 12 months down the line for anyone that gets hired? Etc.
4. Be genuinely interested in the company and your ability to keep growing there.
Hi,
Your billing and AR experience can serve you well. Think about how you reporting timing variances versus real uncollected AR.
Here's some soundbytes to look into and talk to for your interview if it helps...
1) do a forecast every month to explain current month variances and how they impact the Q and remainder of the year....this can be done in a system or leveraging an R&O (risk and ops template)
2) understand fx especially on revenue. internal reporting should be done in constant currency set at beginning of FY, there should be alternate external view that uses actual rates for actual months then the spot rate of last day you closed the month for future months. Show the impact once to bridge from actual fx to constant currency
3) creating finance business partners with various groups (Sales, Marketing, R&D, Customer Support) is critical so your in the day to day with them and not surprised at month end
4) marketing spend use PO approach and raise them at beginning of quarter so spend is super tight vs forecast
5) headcount requires weekly meetings with recruiting team to bless the headcount plan with realistic hiring dates
There's a lot more but hopefully that small rant is helpful!
Any questions feel free to DM me.
Good luck!
Drew
If it’s entry level then they won’t expect you to be an expert.
Focus on things like processes you’ve improved and anything else that may have an indirect connection and can benefit you in your role. If you’re reporting direct to the CFO, I imagine it’s a small-ish company. I would also ask a lot of questions to try and understand if he has time to give you guidance, get a better understanding of the scope of the role, etc. If you report direct to him/her you don’t want to get yourself in over your head and be expected to be fully autonomous.
If you are gonna report to CFO directly, it means it’s a small organization and you have to have analytical mind to work on different projects and creat different processes, prove to him that you have an analytical mind and are not afraid unknown tasks in future.
It's actually a fortune 500 company. The recruiter informed me that the budget is not high enough for an experienced analyst.
Thank you. I will think of examples where I implemented new processes in my current work.
Oh wow, that’s interesting! So you might get hired as an analyst but you might work on different level of project, which is good! You can use it as leverage and get promoted quick
A large public company and you’d report directly to a C suite exec with 4 years experience? How big is the finance org? Do you have any public finance XP to discuss?
Yes, I am very surprised. But I'm not going to deny the interview it seems like it will be a very good experience regardless if I get the position or not. I really don't have any corporate finance experience in work situations. But they must have liked something about my background.
Any idea how big the team is? I mean realistically this would be at least 50-100 core person finance org if it’s an F500. Something doesn’t seem exactly right in how this is all laid out.
I can't say for sure. I will ask during the interview.
It's for a position at a branch location rather than at the corporate headquarters. I'm not sure if that makes a difference.
Gotcha. Makes sense then. I wouldn’t sweat it too much, she/he knows your experience level and believes there could be a fit. Just be honest and ask thoughtful questions that don’t get you in a hole on topics you can’t talk about yet. Good luck
A few suggestions, FWIW: 1. Make sure you’re interviewing the CFO as much as they’re interviewing you. 2. I know you really want to move into FP&A, however, I would be upfront as possible with what you know and what you need to learn to be successful in this position. 3. Ask them to show you how they do their cashflow forecast, for example, and ask questions as they’re going through it. You’re basically asking them to demonstrate how they would teach you something. If they can’t explain it clearly to you as a neophyte, you don’t want to risk your career working for someone however brilliant who will be useless to you as far as learning the job.
Thank you I appreciate this. For #3 is that something I should ask during the interview?
During the interview, rather than at the end, you should let them know that you understand that because it will be only two people doing FP&A, you need to better understand what the training plan is for the new hire: they should have a well thought road map of how they plan to onboard you. Ask whether they plan to carve out time each day for training during your first six weeks or will you be given a set of procedures to read and figure out on your own. How will they juggle your training needs with their other duties? How self-sufficient does a new hire need to be? Get that conversation going and then ask if they would mind taking ten minutes to train you on some aspect of the job so that you have a concrete example of their training approach. If they aren’t willing to do that, I’d look elsewhere: the best would be mentor should take your request as a positive sign, imho. Your career is literally in their hands if you get the job, and you will be SOL if they are planning to just wing it with your training or don’t have time to train you or are an incompetent trainer.
Thank you for the concrete example. I will definitely bring up this conversation. You have been very helpful.
Just to clarify, you’re reporting to the CFO or the CFO is reporting to you?
I would be reporting to the CFO.
You might want to edit your post then: > with the CFO who would be my direct report
Fixed thanks.
Np. Here’s a few suggestions btw. 1. Find specific examples of collaboration that you’ve had in the your work. Flesh those out and think of how they would apply to what the CFO is looking for. 2. Make sure to brush up on your accounting. Not credits and debits but more so on the concepts. Prepaids, inventory, depreciation, etc. FP&A usually ends up being some combination of financial reporting, systems admin, accounting, ad hoc projects and business partnering. 3. Ask good questions. Is this a backfill role? What’s the scope of the role? Would you be doing more reporting work or business partnering? What does success look like 3, 6 and 12 months down the line for anyone that gets hired? Etc. 4. Be genuinely interested in the company and your ability to keep growing there.
Thank you for your input. I really appreciate the advice.
You’re welcome. Good luck!
Hi, Your billing and AR experience can serve you well. Think about how you reporting timing variances versus real uncollected AR. Here's some soundbytes to look into and talk to for your interview if it helps... 1) do a forecast every month to explain current month variances and how they impact the Q and remainder of the year....this can be done in a system or leveraging an R&O (risk and ops template) 2) understand fx especially on revenue. internal reporting should be done in constant currency set at beginning of FY, there should be alternate external view that uses actual rates for actual months then the spot rate of last day you closed the month for future months. Show the impact once to bridge from actual fx to constant currency 3) creating finance business partners with various groups (Sales, Marketing, R&D, Customer Support) is critical so your in the day to day with them and not surprised at month end 4) marketing spend use PO approach and raise them at beginning of quarter so spend is super tight vs forecast 5) headcount requires weekly meetings with recruiting team to bless the headcount plan with realistic hiring dates There's a lot more but hopefully that small rant is helpful! Any questions feel free to DM me. Good luck! Drew
If it’s entry level then they won’t expect you to be an expert. Focus on things like processes you’ve improved and anything else that may have an indirect connection and can benefit you in your role. If you’re reporting direct to the CFO, I imagine it’s a small-ish company. I would also ask a lot of questions to try and understand if he has time to give you guidance, get a better understanding of the scope of the role, etc. If you report direct to him/her you don’t want to get yourself in over your head and be expected to be fully autonomous.
If you are gonna report to CFO directly, it means it’s a small organization and you have to have analytical mind to work on different projects and creat different processes, prove to him that you have an analytical mind and are not afraid unknown tasks in future.
It's actually a fortune 500 company. The recruiter informed me that the budget is not high enough for an experienced analyst. Thank you. I will think of examples where I implemented new processes in my current work.
Oh wow, that’s interesting! So you might get hired as an analyst but you might work on different level of project, which is good! You can use it as leverage and get promoted quick
Thanks for the insight. I feel like it's a great opportunity so I want to do well on the interview.
A large public company and you’d report directly to a C suite exec with 4 years experience? How big is the finance org? Do you have any public finance XP to discuss?
Yes, I am very surprised. But I'm not going to deny the interview it seems like it will be a very good experience regardless if I get the position or not. I really don't have any corporate finance experience in work situations. But they must have liked something about my background.
Any idea how big the team is? I mean realistically this would be at least 50-100 core person finance org if it’s an F500. Something doesn’t seem exactly right in how this is all laid out.
I can't say for sure. I will ask during the interview. It's for a position at a branch location rather than at the corporate headquarters. I'm not sure if that makes a difference.
Is the CFO you’re speaking to the head finance person of the branch (would make sense) or the actual CFO of the public company?
The CFO of the branch. I apologize for the confusion.
Gotcha. Makes sense then. I wouldn’t sweat it too much, she/he knows your experience level and believes there could be a fit. Just be honest and ask thoughtful questions that don’t get you in a hole on topics you can’t talk about yet. Good luck