How FP&A Can Use External Data to Improve Forecasting with Jeff Casale and Rich Wagner
In this episode of FP&A Tomorrow, host Paul Barnhurst (The FP&A Guy) sits down with Jeff Casale and Rich Wagner to explore the role of Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A). They discuss how AI, external data, and continuous planning are transforming the industry, making FP&A a more strategic function. The conversation covers the power of AI-driven forecasting and how businesses can leverage external economic indicators to gain a competitive edge.
Jeff Casale is the CEO of Board, a leading FP&A software company. With previous leadership roles at MarkLogic, Dell Technologies, VMware, and EMC, Jeff has a deep understanding of enterprise technology and how finance functions can drive business growth. Rich Wagner is the Field CTO at Board and the former CEO & Founder of Prevedere, a predictive analytics company that leverages external data for accurate forecasting. With over 20 years of experience in technology, consulting, and Fortune 500 leadership, Rich brings valuable expertise in the intersection of AI, finance, and business strategy.
Expect to Learn:
How AI is transforming financial planning, reducing manual work, and improving decision-making.
Why integrating external data is essential for more accurate forecasting and risk management.
Why traditional budgeting cycles are outdated and how real-time, agile forecasting is becoming the new norm.
How CEOs and finance leaders rely on FP&A teams for strategic decision-making.
How finance professionals can improve their skills and become more valuable business partners.
Here are a few relevant quotes from the episode:
“AI is revolutionizing FP&A by reducing manual work and improving time-to-value.” - Rich Wagner
“The companies that embrace continuous planning will be the winners in their industries.” - Jeff Casale
“External data helps FP&A teams anticipate risks, not just react to them.” - Rich Wagner
This episode reinforced the idea that FP&A is evolving into a strategic powerhouse. AI, external economic data, and real-time forecasting are changing how companies plan, react, and make decisions. FP&A professionals must develop both technical and strategic skills to stay relevant.
Operator’s Guild:
Operators Guild is where the best CEOs, CFOs, VPs of finance, and BizOps leaders in the business connect, network, and grow together. Built by operators for operators, this members-only community is home to more than 1000 of the most elite high-growth operators in the world. Experience connection and knowledge share with professionals who understand you like no one else does. Learn more and apply at https://bit.ly/43p8jwD
Follow FP&A Tomorrow:
Newsletter - Subscribe on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=6957679529595162624
Follow Jeff:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreycasale/
Board- https://www.board.com/
Follow Rich:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rich-wagner1/
Prevedere - https://prevedere.com/
Follow Paul:
Website - https://www.thefpandaguy.com
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/thefpandaguy
Planning in BI Showcase:
Gone are the days of juggling multiple platforms. Now, with business intelligence tools you can integrate planning directly into your BI system. Join Paul on March 20th for the Planning in BI Showcase, where industry leaders will demonstrate how top BI tools are reshaping strategic planning. See firsthand how modern FP&A solutions can drive real value across your enterprise. Don’t miss out!
Register today for free at https://bit.ly/4aR4xOw
Earn Your CPE Credit
For CPE credit please go to earmarkcpe.com, listen to the episode, download the app, and answer a few questions and earn your CPE certification. To earn education credits for FPAC Certificate, take the quiz on earmark and contact Paul Barnhurst for further details.
In Today’s Episode
[01:49] - Welcome & Guest Introductions
[03:53] - What Does Great FP&A Look Like?
[06:22] - Why Enter the FP&A Software Space?
[08:05] - Acquiring Prevedere: The Strategy Behind It
[14:28] - How External Data Improves Forecasting
[18:54] - How AI is Changing FP&A
[24:29] - How FP&A Teams Can Start Using External Data
[33:57] - The Shift to Continuous Planning
[41:50] - FP&A’s Role in Leadership & Decision-Making
[47:48] - The #1 Skill for FP&A Professionals
[56:33] - Who Would You Swap Jobs With?
[59:53] - Final Thoughts & Where to Learn More
Full Show Transcript
[00:01:49] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Hello everyone. Welcome to FP&A tomorrow, where we delve into the world of financial planning and analysis, examining its current state and future prospects. I'm your host, Paul Barnhurst, aka The FP&A Guy, and I'll be guiding you through the evolving landscape of FP&A. Each week, we're joined by thought leaders, industry experts, and practitioners who share their insights and experiences, helping us navigate today's complexities and tomorrow's uncertainty. This week, I'm thrilled to be joined by two guests. I have Jeff Casale and Rich Wagner with me. Welcome to the show.
[00:02:27] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Thank you. Happy to be here.
[00:02:30] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Really excited to have you, Jeff and welcome Rich. We're excited to have you.
[00:02:33] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Thank you.
[00:02:34] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right.
[00:02:35] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So let me give a little bit of background on both of these gentlemen. And then we'll jump into some questions and have a great chat here. So Jeff serves as Board's chief executive officer. Prior to that he served as CEO of Marklogic, where he delivered significant profitable growth and an acquisition by Progress software. Previously, Jeff was a president at Dell Technologies, where he created and led the DTS Group into a global multi-million dollar business and held senior executive roles at VMware and EMC. Rich Wagner serves as Board's field CTO. He is the former CEO and founder of Prevedere, a predictive analytics company that helps enterprises create highly accurate forecast models by incorporating the global economic leading indicators. Prior to Prevedere, Rich was director of IT Innovation and Strategies for Momentive, a global leader in specialty chemicals. He brings over 20 years of technology, innovation and leadership experience from big four consulting and Fortune 500 companies. So again, thanks for joining me, both of you. I like to start every interview with this question and we'll go to you first. Rich, what does great FP&A look like? What does great FP&A to you?
[00:04:01] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah. You know, great FP&A to me is really about helping FP&A become, you know, a better strategic partner to the business, someone that's not just about accounting and back office numbers, but someone that actually helps kind of steer the ship and is thought of as a a real key input to all major strategic and all the way down to operational decisions. Somebody that's data driven, fact based, unbiased and really there to support the operations of the business.
[00:04:31] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thanks. Appreciate that. Rich Jeff, what's your thoughts?
[00:04:34] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah, I would say a lot of the same similar themes as rich as a CEO. I think there are very few decisions that impact the company, where you don't want to have FP&A with a very loud voice at the table. You know, the reality is, you know, to start to think about whether or not its defensive moves based on competition, whether it's expansion, whether it's certain global markets that you want to move into, you know, to do any of those things without really having a very strong FP&A capability and mindset at the table, just puts you at a huge disadvantage. And so to me, it's really a critical element to how we do business.
[00:05:17] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Fully agree. I'm glad to hear that. I'd be a little worried if it wasn't critical, given you're an FP&A software.
[00:05:23] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Absolutely.
[00:05:24] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right. So I want to start with you, Jeff. You've been CEO of Board for a little over a year now. Talk to us what that experience has been like. How has it been at Board?
[00:05:35] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: It's been a fantastic experience. Incredibly fortunate to be getting involved with Board. It's an incredibly exciting company. Several thousand customers has a rich history in Europe as really sort of the preeminent FP&A platform in many of the countries in Europe, and we've seen an opportunity to expand that beyond continuing to invest in Europe. But there's clearly an enormous market opportunity, obviously, in places like the US. And so we've been taking advantage of that and just having a lot of fun, you know, sharing the story of what we've done with customers, the transformations and really expanding that growth into other markets. So it's not just us. We're really a global company.
[00:06:22] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I'm curious what attracted you to the FP&A software space? Most of your experience was in other industries and areas. Dell. And you figure out Marklogic what interested you in FP&A software and Board particularly?
[00:06:34] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Well, I think it goes back to my earlier comments. I mean, I really don't think that you can be running a company or in a leadership position without effective, at least do those and be successful at them without really leveraging the FP&A function. So it's something that I'm obviously very familiar with. I enjoy working with FP&A counterparts and understanding how far to take that, and this is an industry that's going through an incredible amount of transformation. I've watched the evolution of a lot of the CFOs that I've worked with become CEOs. Many of them have moved on to become CEOs. And so there's not just a transformation in the technology. I think there's a transformation in terms of how much can be done by really combining the core FP&A capabilities with the strategy of your business. And so as I started looking to to my next company to get involved with, I just couldn't be more excited when I saw a Board and the opportunity to get engaged in a company with something as exciting as being on the forefront of the evolution of that.
[00:07:45] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And I know I love being on the forefront of it and getting to talk to people in different companies. And it's an exciting time for FP&A. It's become much more strategic. As you talked about. It's much more important that we serve as almost like a consultant, a business partner. We're not just running reports or back office. And so I really appreciate that answer. We'll have to ask you one more question and then we'll come back to you Rich here. But Jeff, last November you guys acquired Prevedere. Can you walk me through the reasoning? Why? Why was that the right acquisition to, you know, help carry you forward in this changing times for FP&A?
[00:08:19] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: So private area was really an incredibly exciting journey. And it's been exciting to get involved with Private Area. And it's been even more exciting now that Rich and I have gotten to know each other. And he's part of the team and the private area organization has come together. But, you know, to answer your question, a lot of what I do comes from customers. I'm a very customer facing executive. That's the way I started. That's my DNA. Having worked at companies like EMC and VMware. And, you know, the more I talk to customers, it just became very apparent I would focus on what do you need from an FP&A partner? Like what? What do you need to be more capable in terms of running your business? And what I heard over and over again was, hey, you know, there's different levels of improvement that they can do in their overall FP&A capability, but they were all running into challenges with what I would call a closed strategic planning process that was designed within the walls of their building. And then you get out into the realities of business and all the external things that can sort of punch you in the face and throw your plan out the window. And they were looking for ways to be more proactive, to look around the corner and to be, you know, to plan better for the unexpected coming out of Covid.
[00:09:40] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: I think everybody appreciates more our need to be prepared to plan for the unexpected. And so I think it came from those conversations. First of all, really frankly, from a defensive standpoint where these companies were looking, you know, how do we not get surprised? And then I think many of them started to realize this is the competitive advantage, right? If we can foresee some of these things and other companies are not doing it, how do we get a better view of all of the external factors and integrate that in with our planning? And there's a lot of sort of, I would say, inefficient ways and manual ways to do that. And you can throw a lot of bodies at it and put people in the room. But I hadn't, you know, these companies, including myself, who just had not found a way to do it elegantly. That's what led us on our search. We thought about building the capability internally, which was going to be an incredible effort and a multi-year effort. And then we stumbled on to private air, and I was really sort of shocked that the capability was available and how far Rich had gone with it. And that's probably a good, good segue to Back to You and to Rich.
[00:10:47] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Perfect. Thanks, Jeff. And I know for me, I was really excited when I saw the acquisition. It made a lot of sense because that external data is an area that I know throughout my career, I didn't utilize anywhere near the level I should have, and in general, it's an area I think we need to get a lot better at. Like you said, you know, kind of peek around corners and help bring in those external factors to better think about things. Because as you mentioned, you get punched in the mouth from the outside world, Covid wars, whatever it might be. If you've never thought about that or brought some of that in, it makes it even harder to, you know, be able to forecast accurately for sure. All right. So, Rich, why was Board the right company to acquire Prevedere? What kind of led you to go, hey, Board is the right fit for us?
[00:11:34] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah. So in my career, I kind of saw an evolution of software like what Board was already doing over in Europe kind of come to fruition. You know, when I first started my IT career, I implemented SAP and ERP systems, and then we'd bring in Treasury like Hyperion and financial consolidation tools in all these functional applications. So it was really more the ERP space than business intelligence and data warehousing.
[00:12:01] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: I really thought about what I was building in that area and thought, you know, that's probably the end point solution is I'm going to be acquired by or we're going to be acquired by one of those solutions. And then lo and behold, tools came around that did this consolidation and things around integrated business planning. And there I knew, hey, we even fit there better. But at that time I didn't know a Board. You know, being in the US primarily, it was something that I hadn't heard of until, you know, maybe several years ago, where I started seeing some even employees and things tell me about it. And people transition their careers to it or from it. And I started looking into it and I realized, well, Board does the internal right. It consolidates all these functions and this data in a great way. We can complement that with the external and the predictive. And I started engaging with them. I really became a partner first and integrated our solution to theirs and really a matter of hours and got on the phone with their chief operating officer, who was very new as a lot of the leadership team is, and says, hey, I think there's something bigger here. I've worked with all the other tools, the competitors. I haven't found one as elegant and it is easy to integrate with is I had it Board.
[00:13:21] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: And as I researched, they hit the same target verticals manufacturing, CPG, retail primary focus. That was our primary focus and experience. They loved enterprise customers where we had great enterprise customers in the US. They serve functions like finance and was their primary use case that was ours, but also supply chain, marketing, sales. Everybody needs this across the org, and we have customers that fit all those functional profiles as well. And then lastly technology. We built our cloud computing environment on Azure. And lo and behold Board is on Azure as well. So very easy for us to integrate understand. And it just became the people, right. The energy to grow in North America. The new leadership team is exciting. It almost feels like a startup here in North America, you know? So for me it was, hey, this is a great place for our energy as a company, our innovative product and really the complete us now.
[00:14:22] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thank you. Thank you for sharing. I appreciate hearing that and starting as a partner in building and how you felt. It was a natural fit. What I want to talk a little bit now is I want to switch more from the acquisition to the actual software and what you're doing, right.
[00:14:35] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I know you use a lot of what we'll call it external economic intelligence, you know, bringing that data in. So walk us through how you bring that in, how that improves forecasting. And then if you could share a real world example from a client. We'd love to hear one.
[00:14:50] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: So for us it starts with data. Certainly. Right. There's data of course, inside your organization. But this data outside your four walls more of what's becoming readily available every day. Our whole world is digital. What we do, what we want to do, what we're searching for, what you know, geopolitical crisis is happening. We get those signals all the time. And what we found is if we look at not only macro microeconomic, consumer behavior, alternative data, and we marry that with your historical results, we can find things that truly are leading indicators of changes in demand or volume and quantity of your products, your financial performance that sometimes are not just weeks or days, but months and quarters in advance. We'll see these signals change. And that's really the genesis of our, our, our product is to take this global data, this 5.5 million things we collect from almost every country in the world. Marry that technically with companies data to find those leading indicators, or at the very least related indicators, so that we can inform companies of what's coming next.
[00:16:02] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: And then what we've done is we've found that we used to, by hand, try to build econometric models. We would take inflation and interest rates and employment, and then we would try to build a model that to shape our demand right. And see what it's telling us. Well, AI has sped that up so much, and it's so powerful that we can do that at scale for companies. So it's really about identifying what you should pay attention to, quantifying it not only in how much it impacts the timing of when it impacts months quarters in advance, and then using that to inform your forecast. So what companies do? There's large CPG manufacturing companies. Great case studies out there will actually take their volume and quantity. Let's say you're a chemical manufacturing business. What they've always told us is, hey, 90 days. We kind of understand demand, right? That's our order cycle. We know what we're going to produce and what we can produce and what our customers wanting 90 days in advance. But lo and behold, 4 to 6 months out, something always happens that we didn't expect and it cost us millions. So what we do there is we'll say, okay, let's take a look at that. Major product categories major shift to induce markets will marry that with the external.
[00:17:20] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Let's build an econometric model to see if we can find what's shaping demand for six, 12, 18 months in advance. And we certainly can't. It's much better than just guesswork. It serves as an input into the planning process when your business unit comes or your sales team and says, hey, we're going to grow by 10%. Well, now you know, well, based on market conditions, you're history. That's never happened. Right. So you can kind of challenge the business and say, I know we want to grow 10%, but there are some headwinds. Not only do we not see growth, but we see a decline coming. What are we going to do? What do we think our consensus forecast should be? That's what we call kind of real world planning, right? It's not biased. It's not unbridled optimism from the sales team. It's not sandbagging. It's really quantifying factors in the way you performed in the market and what's going to happen next.
[00:18:12] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I appreciate that, and I like you said, it's not, you know, not sandbagging but really quantifying, right. We probably all dealt with that a little bit. Both sides the overly optimistic and come on I know you have more than that. Where are you hiding it? Is he Jeff, laugh a little bit. You never dealt with that, right?
[00:18:30] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: It's coming. Coming from a sales background. Let's just say I might be happy that there were times in my past where people my boss did not have private area. It was a little bit of crystal balling going on there, I'm sure.
[00:18:44] Host: Paul Barnhurst: One thing I'd love to get both of your thoughts on. Just. You made me think of this. You know, Rich, as you talked about how AI has sped things up a lot and made them a lot easier. So I'd love to get both of your thoughts on how you see AI impacting FP&A, and maybe what you're seeing today and how you think about it in the future, because that's the topic seems like everybody's talking about. You're probably like not AI again, but I'd love to get both of your thoughts. Maybe we'll start with you, Jeff.
[00:19:13] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Sure. Yeah. I'll take maybe a different perspective, because I think I know where where Rich is going to go. There's so much that we can do in leveraging the, you know, enormous complexity of and just the volume of the macroeconomic data that we have in something like proprietary. You know, what I think is probably the area that we could tap into the most. With AI, that's going to be the fastest time to value, which is one of the things I focus on a lot whenever I look at some of these investments is that there's still a movement in FP&A, where the executive leadership team is relying on a level down or two levels down, and there's there's a delay. So you've got people that are comfortable with these systems. They're comfortable in accessing it. But but maybe when you get into the leadership they're more they're they're more accustomed to going and having those second level conversations. And there's so much power and information that is available today, whether or not it's what we're talking about with things like promontory or just the overall real time information that is available when you pull together, instead of all these disparate Excel spreadsheets, you have everything in one real time system. It gives you the ability to do some what if planning that, that gives you a real competitive advantage, but it can be overwhelming and I think it can be intimidating. And if we can start to leverage AI to simplify that, to allow interfaces where executive teams can do some very easy modeling, right? Just asking questions around, hey, what if we went ahead and we decided to go move, you know, 10% of our excess utilization of resources into some of these high growth markets? What would be the flow through implications in terms of, you know, margin and expansion? And and, you know, what do we see as some of the markets that are really trending more higher growth on on some of the verticals that we're very strong in? And what would it look like if we sort of did some reutilization of excess capacity into those areas? And in some cases it'll work.
[00:21:27] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: In some cases it won't. But I think leveraging AI, you can run these models at such a speed and get such quick feedback. And the accuracy is increasing so significantly, partially because you can now take in all these external factors and all this other data. So I think one of the areas that is not talked about enough is how AI is going to improve the level of adoption and interaction of executive teams with their FP&A team, and with that data and the power of the data. And I think it's a very natural flow towards the role of the office of the CFO becoming far more strategic, because it's going to get to a point where I don't think you're going to have many CEOs that are going to want to do very much without having that group at the table.
[00:22:18] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And now a message from our title sponsor. Being an operator is not for the faint of heart. It often feels like you're jumping out of an airplane and building the parachute on the way down. CEOs, CFOs, COOs, top Company leaders can relate. That is why I joined Operators Guild. It's home to more than 1000 of the most elite, high growth operators in the world. Think the Special Forces for Business Scaling members have access to over 150 in-person events across all 25 global chapters. The modern startup founder, CFO and COO are really just multidisciplinary problem solvers, which is why having the best problem solvers together has created the ultimate diversity intelligence of any operator group in the world. Operators Guild gave me the chance to meet my own personal Board of directors. People I can bounce ideas off, and their online form allows you to get answers from your peers as questions pop up, like how do I run an employee secondary? Or what should I pay as a base commission rate on SAS deals? I've made great friends through attending the highly acclaimed OG summit. Join Operators Guild Build and access the Navy Seals of high growth business. Scaling a group by operators for operators. Learn more and apply at operators-guild.com. That's operators-guild.com and tell them the FP&A guy sent you.
[00:23:50] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thank you for sharing that. And as you're talking about that I was thinking about, you know, meetings I've been in with executives and they ask a question. It's like, can I come back to you in a week to after I've rebuilt the model or whatever, you know, sometimes maybe you could do some on the fly, but I agree with you.
[00:24:05] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I think AI and where we're heading will make a lot of that easier and be able to have those real conversations with executives where you're often not like, well, I'd be guessing at this point, let me get back to you. Or best I can do is really high level. There's a lot of excitement there. See? Rich nodding his head. He's waiting patiently for his turn. So your thoughts, Rich?
[00:24:27] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah. No, your example hit home. You know, we used that in my company. Come back from a Board meeting and it'd be a fire. We'd have to go figure out, well, what happened over here. You know, maybe it was in Europe. We had a miss by the time we could get answers back. It was a new fire, right? That wasn't even the question anymore. We just couldn't get it back to them soon enough. So I also see that the time to value is much, much faster. The time to insight is much faster. It really reduces the routine and mundane. You don't have to do that as a human right. We don't have to do 24 statistical tests by hand. Write or select 50 different variables and try and plot them out. Let's do that so we can be more strategic. So I think that's a huge part of it. Time to value, time to insights.
[00:25:16] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Amount of data we can process. Certainly Jeff is exactly right. The thing that I think makes what we build at private area now on Board what we call signals and foresight so valuable with AI is it now also brings the context? Does it just do the math for us? I actually explains models like a team of our internal data scientists and economists could do. And it does it in seconds. Right. So this is giving an answer of okay, you're down 10%. Not only that, but why. And it sounds very educated. It understands what drivers it makes sense. Business leaders need to adopt technology to adopt things like AI. They need the context. This makes a naive person an FP&A sound like an economist. Sound like a data scientist, right? Sound like an industry expert in minutes. And I think that's where this is now becoming mainstream. Right? We actually bring the context, not just the numbers.
[00:26:14] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I would have loved to have that. So I could have sounded good when I was working with our FP&A. You know, it kind of speaking to that. I'd love to get both your thoughts, you know, bringing in external data just in general. So not talking Prevedere or Board but just, you know, FP&A departments. It's an area we've struggle with. I'd say very few have brought it into forecasting. So someone's listening to the show and they're like, well, where do I start? How do I think about this? Because sometimes you think data science, econometrics, you know, statistics.
[00:26:45] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And the head just goes, yeah, I'm out. No thanks. I got my spreadsheet and I'm good. So where should people start? And I think we'll start with you on this. Rich, I'd love to get your thoughts on what advice you could give to the average kind of FP&A team out there that's trying to do a better job of bringing this type of data in?
[00:27:03] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah, there are two really good examples of what I learned. You know, certainly as a technologist, you start getting really into the weeds quickly when you start talking about data and modeling and statistics. But what I learned is listening to CEOs, one of them came to us and actually we were in a meeting with him and his executive team and he said CPG companies said, hey, you know, guys, I know that you guys know in this case, demand 30 days out. Wasn't it three months like a chemical company. He said also, you know, there's always something around the corner that we didn't see coming cost us a fortune. And that's really what private is about. So what he was trying to do is just really get ahead of some big disruptions, right? Some, some events that would happen that they didn't see, that maybe they could have. And it's not every single indicator, every factor they should look at. It's these big things. Hey ink prices are going up. When's that going to affect us? Right. It's a main ingredient, one of our products. How long is that going to take.
[00:28:04] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: So we don't just ignore it. Another CEO, large logistics company, one of the largest in the world, came to us after in Covid. We were getting Christmas presents in January, not December, because they didn't anticipate demand correctly, he said. We need an early warning dashBoard and to me, that's it. That's what these guys were looking for, right? Those early warning signals, they would tell them that there's some event that's going to impact them, that otherwise they would ignore. And it may be a big indicator like industrial production or raw material prices for key ingredients for them that they just were ignoring because they didn't have an automated, systematic or repeatable way to watch those signals. So I would start with that. I would get myself an early warning dashBoard. Things that keep the CEO and CFO up at night. Make sure you're not missing them. Then we can always get more granular. We can always get more statistical, add more horsepower, more data to it, and then start really getting granular models out there to the rest of the organization.
[00:29:07] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So if I'm hearing you right, kind of that early warning dashBoard, you know, example, what's happening with the ag industry, if that's one of your key products, maybe you're tracking what's happening to the supply. Right? Right now it's gone way up with all the issues they had with chickens and they had to put down because of the disease and stuff. And so if you were tracking that, you would see that at least a little bit before it flowed all the way through the market. And you could start preparing yourself. Is that the way to think about this?
[00:29:36] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah, you're exactly right. You know, very rarely do things happen all at once, like maybe Covid, definitely in my history of my, you know, it career or my leadership career, Covid is the only time I saw immediately everything shut down and stop consumer spending. Then you would see reciprocal effects on pricing and supply chain disruption. Things happen over time. And those things like starting to see cases of bird flu rise, people searching for it online, good indicators that there will be something happening or something coming maybe months in advance. So that's what I would do. I'd look for those key things that impact your business, do some discovery in a system to see what's impacted the last time you had a big miss, and then make sure you're paying attention to that.
[00:30:22] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I love that, and I think it speaks a lot to scenario planning, which we haven't necessarily talked about, but I think so often people just do scenarios is worst case, base case, best case instead of what happens if there's regulation that impacts my key ingredient and how do I track that? So I know what changes I should make based on scenarios. I think that kind of feeds that. So I really appreciate that answer there. Thank you. Jeff, anything you'd like to add to that? Any thoughts on your end on what the department should be doing?
[00:30:54] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Maybe the one thing I would add to that is just the level of simplicity at which that can be done. I think oftentimes organizations sometimes don't appreciate the number of sort of factors that could externally impact their organization or their business. And when they realize how easy it can be to literally go pick off a menu and go choose and then, you know, after 30 or 60 or 90 days. If you feel like, hey, some of these are not really materially affecting it, but maybe there is another set of factors that would, I think, just again, applying the same what if methodology that you do to any great for business, do the same thing when you think about external forecasting. Right. What’s going to work for you? And I think you know, what Rich has probably seen a lot of times in his career is oftentimes it's not what you would expect. People are surprised. You know, sometimes it's the secondary or tertiary tertiary effects where there's leading indicators that maybe are very far off. And you just hadn't thought that those could potentially be impacting your business. So I do think, you know, as Rich explained, there's very little that happens all at once. Most of these things are a series of factors that are put in play in motion, and it be really becomes a bit of a map. And some people have that map. You know, I think of it a little bit of, like, night vision goggles. You know, some organizations have those and some don't. And, you know, wouldn't you rather be the organization that is able to sort of see through the dark a little bit, look around the corner. And so I would say, don't be afraid to go in and just start by pulling in some of the ones that seem like maybe they're obvious, and then adding other ones in as you go and do some modeling.
[00:32:47] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I love that it doesn't have to be difficult. Start simple with a couple couple things out there. Ask your leadership. They're probably going to have a good idea of what some of those things may be. You know, you could also look at external. You know what other companies are doing, what they list as their risks and things that they're concerned about in their annual statements or whatever, and get an idea of a couple of things. I really like that. It's a great point of, you know, start small and build. But one thing I think both of you have mentioned throughout and I think is really interesting. I'd love to get your thoughts is you've mentioned kind of, you know, being able to look out ahead or kind of look around the corner. So there's a CEO of a large company who started his career in FP&A, worked up a CFO, and he always says, I want FP&A to be able to peek around corners. And that's kind of what I hear in a little different words. And the other one is somebody once said, the top skill I want in FP&A person to have in the team is the ability to anticipate. I'd love to get your thoughts on that idea, and maybe Jeff will start with you. Just because I see it seems like it's been a little bit of a theme here and would love to get your take.
[00:33:54] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah, I think it absolutely is a theme. And, you know, I just think of the way I leverage our FP&A group and the way we think about it. And, you know, when it comes to what we talked about with that forward sort of 90 day view, you get that through just interactions with your team. If you're talking to your CRO, how's the visibility. Oh, I just went out. I was on the road. I talked to my team. We're talking to these customers. Everybody has a generally good idea. Right? You go and you figure out, you know, how's it looking in inventory? We have an idea. I go to the developers. Right. Where are we at in terms of software releases? I mean, everyone is ultra confident on this 90 day window. So what I would say is the 90 day window is table stakes. Nobody is going to beat anybody based on what, you know over the next 90 days. So the true competitive advantage is beyond the 90 day window. And I would say some companies are pretty good at 90 to, you know, 120. And you start to but the further you push that out, I think what starts to happen is all of the major competitive differentiation or advantages that companies have, they all start to dissipate rapidly the further out you go, because just so few companies really make that a core competency and a core skill. And so I think that just becomes a huge differentiator.
[00:35:21] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: The other thing I would add, which we're seeing, you know, on our leading customers, I would say on a regular basis, is when we talked about it a little bit at the beginning, it's this, you know, hey, do I have to wait and go get an answer and come back? Well, the opposite to that is yes. You are trying to really be very forward thinking, but there's a time to value. We'll combine the two of those. Combine that desire to have an instant answer with looking around the corner. That's this whole idea of total agility and planning, right? Complete continuous planning. And I think for most organizations, whether it's just become, you know, the history where we came from, these batch based systems, and we're used to waiting for the new cycle to run and get the updates. And, you know, for whatever the reason, most organizations don't actually run with true continuous seven by 24 planning. And that is where, you know, I'd say where the puck has been going. And now we have a lot of companies that we work with that are already there. And that to me is nirvana, right? You want to be at a point where there is no daylight between the planning, between the questions. You're running real time, continuous planning all the time. And if you're doing that, it allows you when you leverage AI or some of these other capabilities. Now, as soon as an idea pops into someone's head, you're modeling out what that looks like.
[00:36:44] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: There's no delay. And that's where it gets super exciting. That's why I think you've mentioned on some of your podcasts, and I hear more and more we really are getting to sort of the next evolution of the strategic value of FP&A. And I think people have seen, you know, only small glimpses of it. But when this you get more organizations moving to continuous planning with a level of agility that I think is sort of game over, right? It's going to be the differences between companies. Doing that and not doing it is literally going to be winners and losers, and you're going to hear it on the earnings call when you get on an earnings call. And a CEO is like, whoops. Right. You know, I have to yeah, I'm going to have to surprise you. Even though I told you three months ago that the future was looking good. Now I got to tell you that it's not looking good. And the stock plummets on almost every one of those cases. You can go and look at the earnings call, and I can tell you which company does continuous planning and which one doesn't. You do continuous planning. That just doesn't happen, right? Unlike what Rich said, can a Covid happen? Okay. But there are signals and they're out there all the time. And I think that really is the exciting part of what's happening in FP&A is this continuous planning.
[00:38:03] Host: Paul Barnhurst: FP&A guy here. And I want to tell you about the planning and by showcase. Gone are the days of juggling multiple platforms. Now with business intelligence tools, you can integrate planning directly into your BI system, the same system your entire company already uses. Join me on March 20th for the planning and BI showcase, where industry leaders will demonstrate how top BI tools are reshaping strategic planning. See firsthand how modern FP&A solutions can drive real value across your enterprise. The event features live demos from leading BI solutions. Whether you're a CFO or an FP&A professional, you'll discover the tools that can help you deliver more value across your enterprise. Don't miss out! Register today at www.accelevents.com/e/Planning-in-BI-Showcase and take the first step towards smarter, data driven decision making.
[00:39:16] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I really like that term continuous planning. I've seen some use connected, you know, all different things, but I love that idea of hey, it should be connected and continuous. We need to move to a much more agile process. Six months for budget forecasting every quarter for the average company is just outdated. It's not sufficient nowadays. So I'm with you on that. I really like that. So thank you for you know, kind of sharing your thoughts there. I want to go to a next question here and we'll start with you on this one. Rich, both of you have served in leadership leadership positions.
[00:39:47] Host: Paul Barnhurst: You both been CEOs. You know, Rich, maybe talk a little bit about, you know, what do you look for from FP&A like maybe earlier in your career and as time went on, did it change much? How do you think about FP&A?
[00:40:01] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah. You know, not only, you know, been part of it, the smaller organization and the software company that I started, but also in a large, you know, enterprise company that was a conglomerate, privately held, lots of companies, lots of M&A activity. What I saw through my career and then as I scaled my company was first its accounting and numbers. I've got to do this, you know, I've got to close my books, got to pay taxes, etc. so I need someone to help me with that. It really just an Excel jockey, right? When you're small. And then what I saw is actually the enterprise company we worked with, our CEO started really relying on our CFO as his right hand person. I mean, they essentially started even moving functions like it underneath them because they became more of a strategic partner, because it's so important. There are so many other things to do around finance, financial planning, working capital decisions. All those things take someone that really that's their day job. They've got teams of people.
[00:41:04] Host: Paul Barnhurst: That's their day job. They're looking at financial data. They're doing analysis they have access to actual numbers within the business across functions. That's when I think they became a partner. I saw it quite a bit. You know, even as I grew my company from from two people to maybe 50 people, it became more and more important that I had somebody kind of a right hand person looking out for me, because there's lots of things you have to do to operate a business, to manage people, to manage your Board of directors. There's lots of risk out there, and you've got to have somebody with a finance background, you know, a good planning analysis team that can actually identify those and kind of help protect you. So I see them as really a partner to the CEO more so than ever. Love it. And I'd love to I'll ask both of you this and see, can either of you maybe share an example where FP&A brought something forward in case where you worked with them, where it made a real difference? Maybe they brought an insight, an idea, kind of that strategic moment where like, oh, I'm really glad they, you know, helped guide me in this area. I'd love if either of you maybe have a kind of an example you could share. Yeah, I'll give you a customer example that I thought was really interesting.
[00:42:15] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: I smiled when you said it. One of our customers came to us. He's. He's a VP in finance, head of FP&A. And he came to us and said, hey, because of what we were able to show them that was coming in their forecast, it saved all their bonuses that year. He said, because the internal team came and they actually were projecting something that was completely unrealistic. They were able to see there are other elements to their business that were impacting their business, adjusted appropriately. So hey, we all got bonuses because of you. And for him it became one of our oldest customers. Been with us a long time. But to me that's pretty neat. He had the opportunity not only impact finance of his own career, but he really helped the whole organization meet a goal, a realistic goal, and that ended up paying off for the entire company.
[00:43:06] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I love that everybody likes their bonus, right? I still remember the first year I was in a new business and didn't have much help. I totally screwed up the forecast and after a month I pretty much had to tell the leadership there's zero chance we're getting a bonus. That was not fun. So I appreciate that example, Jeff, but what about you?
[00:43:23] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah, I mean, we've had so many, I think, over the last couple of years. I mean, one of the ones that happened just the other day was, you know, we had a customer that felt the company was not being valued fairly because of the way that they were presenting their earnings on their earnings call and the way that they ran their business. And ultimately, part of the reason for that was, like many companies, they didn't have one comprehensive system. They had a number of different systems, and each of the business units had their sort of favorites of those systems. And so what would end up happening is there was a consolidation process that had to happen, and they each looked at their business in an individual light, and they rolled up the data. And then from a collaboration standpoint, it made it very hard for the executives to collaborate because by the time the information would be rolled up, you would then go right into your quarterly meeting with the executives, and everyone's very focused on their business and presenting how they did. And so they got into this loop where they just kept presenting information the same way. And when they got into being able to have all the data in one comprehensive system, and now you didn't have all of this excess time required just to massage the data across silos to present it instead. What ended up happening was the executive team now had visibility to everyone else's data. So they started having really interesting conversations.
[00:44:47] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: And as part of those conversations, what they realized was they had cash trapped in different parts of their businesses that basically was not being utilized. And they started to realize collectively they all had a shared bonus and they were like, hey, wait a second, why don't we pool this? And then why don't we all have direct visibility on how quickly we have the ability? And depending how the different businesses are doing, we can rapidly move that cash and deploy it. They ended up being able to move inventory quicker, getting faster returns, driving profitability. And it became directly measurable. They now were able to show that they were able to operate with a more efficient cash basis. They were able to show that they were able to operate with more efficient inventory, because in some cases, they had similar inventory in these different business units. And then the end result was they had higher earnings per share, and it was a direct result of the bottom line. And the other real benefit was the team was now collaborating together on how to help the company succeed. Whereas before they would go into those meetings very competitively trying to figure out, okay, which business unit did better. Like who's better or who's worse? And so getting to the point where everybody is looking at the same data, the data is real time. You have an opportunity to collaborate and talk about it. And because it's in real time and you're agile and how you do it, you can what if.
[00:46:11] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: And so you had executives say, hey, what if we did this? What if you guys helped us in this part of our business? And I think you just see that that amount of reducing friction, which is really what I think it is at the end of the day, these are non-value added tasks that are being eliminated. That to me is just friction. And what do you do with that excess productivity? It goes into forward thinking ideas, right? Hey, we have the extra time and we have the data. Why don't we go spend it thinking about what we could be doing? And those are, you know, and we have a lot of those direct customer examples. But I think the common theme is, Paul, what you said at the beginning of this. Right. There's just some of these things around. Yes. It makes sense to look around the corner, right? Yes. It makes sense to sort of do better planning. I think a lot of organizations would just tell you they don't have the time to do it, like they don't have the people, they don't have the bandwidth. And what I would tell you is they have all of it. If you just look at the amount of time in the day that they're spending on manual tasks, moving data, consolidating information, cleansing it, you know, getting 17 workbooks into one, I think people would be surprised how much time they have.
[00:47:24] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Now, when you take out the non-value added tasks, it's amazing how much more time you have. I've been in roles where, you know, I had to spend a ton of time on dirty data and bad data and just amazing how it makes it difficult. You're either working 24 over seven or you don't have time for the strategic kind of one or the other. And as you express those as a company, it makes a huge difference. So we're going to move into a few kind of standard questions I like to ask guests. So we're going to move to that section here. And the first one I ask every guest this and Jeff will start with you. What is the number one technical skill that FP&A professionals need to master?
[00:48:04] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah. So I think it's a great question. And I think in some ways I'm the least qualified to answer it because I didn't come up through the FP ranks. But I'll tell you when I'm on the other side of the table dealing with the FP team, I really like the critical thinking skills. I mean, one of the things I value enormously is, you know, oftentimes I'll go ask questions. And I think it's a great question and I'm in love with it. And, you know, I can't wait for people to sort of, you know, respond to my brilliant idea and and to have somebody on the other side of the table have the critical thinking to sort of poke a little bit and really make sure, you know, is that really what you're trying to ask? I mean, how, you know, with the understanding of how the company really runs, which I think is one of the unique values of FP&A like you want to go to, to talk to people who actually understand how a company runs. Follow the money. You're right where you know how it comes into the company and where it goes. And I think that critical thinking skill of being able to apply the knowledge that they have of that process, right, and then turn it around and make sure that people are even asking the right questions, because you can spend a lot of energy, not just me, but a leadership team can spend a lot of energy going down a path, and it's probably not the best use of their time. And how many times in organizations have people been at whatever level, and a request comes down from the Board or the executive team and they're like, here we go. We did this before. This is basically going to be a big error, and we're going to gather all this data and we're never going to hear anything again. And so I think oftentimes the FP&A team becomes the voice of reason. It's where the rubber meets the road. And I really think that critical thinking skill is fantastic.
[00:49:55] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And I love getting a perspective from someone who didn't come up from FP&A. It's good to see what they think versus what finance people think. So thank you. Appreciate that. Rich.
[00:50:06] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah, I think, you know, for me in the FP&A it's the analytics. You know so there's there's lots of tools and technology that are available new ones every day. You know there's AI agents now. There's all kinds of things that you can just ask simple questions. It'll run a Python script for you. So I don't know if it's that really is the key thing that knowing that one technology because it's going to change. It's just the analytical mindset and being able to actually translate that into something that others that aren't as technical can understand. You know, maybe it's somebody that's got a day job that's not analytics, that's not in math, that doesn't understand modeling or what you mean by modeling versus an econometric model versus statistics and Python. How can I translate that, you know, to to my business leaders. So I think that it's not so much a technical skill, just analytical mindset that's got good communication skill because technology is going to change.
[00:51:04] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: You may have been great at Hyperion, Essbase 20 years ago, but it's not quite as relevant. Maybe today in your career, maybe there's another application, you know, another technology. Or maybe technology is becoming less of a barrier, right? With AI, if it's natural language. So I think it's being able to translate all that, you know, analytical thinking into something that others can understand.
[00:51:27] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah, I appreciate that. And you made me think when you mentioned tools. I've seen some job descriptions sometimes that will list 15 different tools you need to know. And I'm like, shouldn't it be about critical thinking, analytics, understanding, modeling? Like, yes, I can get listing a couple tools, but in general it's not that hard to learn one tool over another. If you have the right mindset and you're curious and you're the type of person that would be a good FP&A professional. So I'm like, are you focusing on the right area? But I probably digress a little bit. But you know, sometimes I'm just like 15 different tools. Really. Good luck.
[00:52:02] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. Especially when you see, you know, these LLM models are going to start to do a lot of this stuff. And so what's the stuff that's not in the model. It's are we asking the right question. And have we framed the question in a way where we're going to get a useful response before we go spend a fortune to go fire up those GPUs to get us that answer? Because you know how you go about thinking about these questions and the skills that you have, the analytical skills, the critical critical thinking skills, there's plenty of horsepower now to go do the crunching, right. We're going to have to get commoditized. But where the value chain is going to be flipped is who are the people that actually have enough technical depth to understand these models, to figure out the intersection point between what the business is trying to achieve and what the models can do, the good and bad of the models, right? Because the models are, you know, they're going to drift and they're going to come back with answers that don't always make sense. And that's going to come back to the framing of the questions. And I think that's that creates a huge opportunity for people in FP&A.
[00:53:17] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thank you for both those answers. I really enjoyed that. The next one is what's the soft skill or human skill that they should master? Rich, we'll start with you.
[00:53:26] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Yeah. You know, I think that collaboration is really key to success in my career. Even I worked a lot with CEOs and CFOs, business units and finance teams, supply chain teams. It was really the ability to kind of collaborate and put all the pieces together. So. So I think the personality, you can't be just behind a desk, you know, maybe at home in a dark room. It's really going to be about collaboration and being able to understand the business end to end. And just think of it, you know, hey, we're a chemical manufacturing business, right? We're not an FP&A business. I want to understand that business. And I want to be able to see how I can support all these different functions with the role that I have in the organization. So I think it's collaboration. Yeah.
[00:54:14] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: I think the FP&A talent that's going to really come to the surface are the ones that are moving more on the emotional intelligence curve, where that's not what you typically thought of with FP&A. Right? You thought of who really has these skills to be able to go through and has the accounting and has the analytics. And as you mentioned, Paul, you've got these 15 things you can list. And again, as more and more of this is able to be done by AI and other capabilities, and as you're going to see more and more companies on comprehensive systems where executives are collaborating all the time and talking, and it's continuous planning. I think you're going to need people that can sort of manage all that disparate activity, like, you know, personalities matter. Who are these people? Do they tend to be overly pessimistic? Do they tend to be overly aggressive or optimistic, or, you know, what are the other dynamics that are going into this? Because now it's not just going to be a spreadsheet. And what's the answer on the spreadsheet? Everybody can look at that now. It's going to be we have all the information in one place with all the econometrics in there and all these factors.
[00:55:27] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Now it's going to come back to the humans again, right? How are people interpreting this data and what decisions do they make. Because just because you have great insight around the corner that other people don't have, it doesn't mean that you then make great decisions with that data. And so I think that the folks in FP&A can really get to the other side of this and get some empathy and understanding who they're dealing with. I think that's where you're going to start to see many of these folks on the track of CFO running companies, because I think you really have the full skill set, right. You understand the full life cycle, you understand the strategy. And I would really implore folks that you're I think you're in probably one of the ideal positions that you can be in based on where technology is going. I don't think there's been another time where you're going to be more strategically relevant than over the next decade. The question now is just how do you differentiate right in that during that time?
[00:56:27] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I love that idea. How do you differentiate? Great advice for people I know we're pretty much near the end of our time, so we're going to ask each of you one question to kind of get to know you a little bit personally. Have a little bit of fun here. So we'll start with you, Jeff. If you could swap jobs with anyone in the world for one week, who are you going to swap jobs with and why?
[00:56:49] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah. So that is actually really easy because I just finished a book on Elon Musk. And then I watched his press conference, and I'm trying to figure out if he's a real person or a cyborg because apparently he has, you know, I don't know, like a dozen children. And he's now up to, what, seven companies? And he's also uncovering, you know, billions. So I would just like to be him for a week to figure out, first of all, if he's real, if it's the first sign of alien life, you know, on the planet but just to sort of understand how he is able to do what he does, I think it's humbling for any CEO when you're struggling to run one company and you've got a guy out there who seems to have, you know, nine, nine personalities all operating at the same time at a high level, all, you know, most of these fortune 500 companies, right, at this point.
[00:57:47] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, it is pretty crazy to see how much he runs. You have to wonder. So would love to bring you back on after you've had that week. That's really an alien or not. So if that happens.
[00:57:58] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: I'll be able to come back. I think I would, I think I would, probably be my last role. I think it would self-combust within the week, but it would be fun while it lasted.
[00:58:05] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Well, then I guess this will be the only kind but rich. One quick question for you. If you could go back and give yourself your younger self one piece of advice, what advice would you give yourself?
[00:58:18] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: Lots of lessons learned, I tell you, so there'd be lots of advice I would be giving myself. But from a career standpoint and building a company and working with people, one thing I learned that culture wins out over talent, and what I mean by talent is maybe technical talent. And I had to learn that lesson because I think there's when you're starting a company, when you're in technology, when you use technology tools a lot usually go for that. That person that you think or people you think have the highest degree of talent and you think, oh, that's that's what really matters. The entire company is being the most technically talented or the best at my trade. But boy, you build a company. If that person can't fit into the culture of the company, it really is a a big issue, right? You're not going to be successful. So you may be guarded thinking, I've got to protect this talent that I've got. No one's going to replace it. But you can't let the culture of the company really deteriorate because of that.
[00:59:23] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: It mattered so much more. You can replace talent, you know, I think we all think we're pretty special and gifted. But honestly, there's a lot of people like us maybe even more talented than us out there and available. So don't be afraid of that. Culture matters. People matter. You'll find technical talent and you'll find people that are really gifted in marketing. The point they can't get along with the rest of the team that. And I think you'll really suffer from it. So that was something in my professional career I learned.
[00:59:53] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thank you. I really appreciate that. That was a great one. And thank you both for joining me. I mean, I've really enjoyed this hour, getting your perspectives, you know, learning more about Board, talking about external data and a number of different things. You know, we'll put a link to Board if people want to learn more about the software in the show notes, as well as both of your LinkedIn profiles. But to give you kind of one last thing, if there's anything you want to add before we go, Jeff, any any last words you want to say before we close?
[01:00:20] Guest 1: Jeff Casale: Yeah. First of all, I just want to thank you, Paul. I mean, this has been a great session. I think to be able to have a forum like this where anything that's long form, I think is so much more powerful, and you see a lot of snippets out there about FP&A and sound bites, and I think they have people on TikTok and everything else, and, you know, but to be able to have a place where it's very clear content. You actually get into the issues. You have these discussions. I've listened to a number of yours, and I think it's great to have this forum because it creates a community, and that is where people want to go to learn. They want to find like communities, and they want us just to get into real dialog with real people. So I think this is a great forum to do it. And then I would just say again, I think this is, you know, for all your listeners out there, it really is even more exciting and interesting and dynamic than I thought. When I joined Board. The amount of change that has taken place I know is pretty significant. And as I try to peek around the corner and I try to do the best I can to see where things are going from an industry perspective, you know, hold on, because it really is an exciting place to be and it really is moving the needle for companies.
[01:01:40] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thank You. Appreciate that. Rich, any last words from you?
[01:01:43] Guest 2: Rich Wagner: I think I echo. You know, the sentiment here is it's awesome to see people that are really interested in their professional career and share information and act as change agents. You know, so I think it's a great forum. And, you know, it's something that's interesting to me. I love the thought leadership. Appreciate that. On the selfish side, you know, for me, the future is already here, right? There's so much information about what's going to happen. It's now technically possible. So I just think that every company is going to plan with both internal and external data. It'll be unheard of in just a few years. So my whole goal and vision is to help as many companies as we possibly can. You know, no matter if we're bored or if we're private area for any other of our competitors, I just think there's a better way to plan for your business. And it's technically possible, and that's what I get excited about.
[01:02:35] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I love that Rich. I think you cringe a little when you said other competitors. You paused for a minute like, no, come to Board, please. Now I'm just a little bit. But thank you so much, both of you. It's been a real pleasure. I'm so excited for the future of FP&A. Love what you know you guys are doing and bringing that external data. So thanks again for joining me. Thank you, thank you. Thanks, Paul. Appreciate it. Thanks for listening to FP&A tomorrow. If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a five star rating and a review on your podcast platform of choice. This allows us to continue to bring you great guests from around the globe. As a reminder, you can earn CPE credit by going to earmarkcpe.com, downloading the app, taking a short quiz, and getting your CPE certificate to earn continuing education credits for the FPAC certification. Take the quiz on earmark and contact me the show host for further details.