Budgeting Your External Facing Time as a CFO: Tipalti’s Sarah Spoja

Run the Numbers

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Budgeting Your External Facing Time as a CFO: Tipalti’s Sarah Spoja

CJ Gustafson

Nov 25, 2024

Transcript

Sarah Spoja, the CFO of Tipalti joins CJ to discuss M&A as a growth lever and the evolution of the CFO role in high-growth environments. Drawing from her background in private equity operations at KKR Capstone, she shares insights on the current M&A environment and the boom she predicts for the near future. She also explains how to avoid crushing the soul of a startup in the M&A process and the value of getting your hands dirty in PE Ops. As the CFO of a rapidly expanding SaaS company, Sarah sheds light on how to evolve as the company scales. She shares how to reassess priorities, balance hands-on work with strategic oversight, and navigate external-facing demands like conferences and panels. The conversation covers building investor relationships while avoiding perceptions of always being in-market and highlights the CFO’s dual role as strategist and salesperson. From navigating M&A to solving problems across stages from seed to IPO, this episode is packed with insights.

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@cjgustafson222 (CJ)

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TIMESTAMPS:

(00:00) Preview and Intro

(02:13) Sponsor – NetSuite | Operators Guild

(04:52) Sarah’s Experience in M&A

(06:13) The Current M&A Environment

(12:17) Field Sales Versus Channel Partnerships

(14:23) How to Avoid Crushing the Soul of a Startup During M&A

(19:30) Sponsor – Maxio | Leapfin | Mercury

(22:39) The Value of Getting Your Hands Dirty in PE Ops

(26:10) How Sarah Has Evolved During Tipalti’s Hypergrowth

(31:00) Balancing Hands-On Work with Making the Best Use of One’s Time

(34:40) Reassessing the ROI of One’s Time

(37:09) Solving Problems Versus Handling People Issues from Seed to IPO

(40:21) Repeating Yourself as a Job Requirement

(42:24) How Visible a CFO Should Be

(43:52) A Framework for Choosing Speaking Arrangements

(50:43) The Risk of Being Perceived as Perpetually In-Market

(52:01) The Job of the CFO as Sales

(55:15) Long-Ass Lightning Round

(01:00:21) Finance Software Stack

(01:02:15) Craziest Expense Story

Discussion about this podcast

Run the Numbers

Run the Numbers is a twice-weekly podcast about financial metrics and business models, designed for ambitious people operating tech startups. It's a collection of things host CJ Gustafson (CFO at Partstech and writer of Mostly Metrics) has learned and thought about in the trenches as a tech CFO.

This show is meant to serve as a playbook of sorts for the stuff CJ wishes he knew earlier in his career, both from experience and from copying people smarter than himself.

Topics frequently touch upon Startup SaaS Metrics, Annual Budgeting, Financial Forecasting, Headcount, Equity, Dilution, and Fundraising – and how all of these drive business performance and growth.

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