perspectives

The Top Three Takeaways from Spectrum Equity’s CFO Summit

I always look forward to our annual gathering of portfolio company CFOs. They are a talented group of executives and, because they all lead finance teams at high growth SaaS and data services companies, they have a lot of valuable insights to share with each other about confronting complex challenges and evaluating opportunities as they scale.

This year, roughly 30 CFOs from our portfolio companies joined us in Scottsdale, Arizona. Like our other gatherings throughout the year, such as our CEO Summit, Technology Summit, and Sales & Marketing Summit, we called upon executives and friends of the firm to share what’s top of mind for them as they head into 2024.

Here are my top three takeaways from our discussions:

  1. Macroeconomic uncertainty, whether we experience a soft-ish landing or “stronger for longer” economy, necessitates relatively conservative planning through 2024, including increased rigor and alignment of investments tied to sales and marketing performance more than ever.

  2. The most successful modern CFOs are empowered by technology and automation to maximize data-driven decision support, OKR frameworks and strategic imperative prioritization.

  3. It’s a constant balancing act to successfully navigate today’s hybrid office / remote work environment, yesterday’s “battle for talent” vs. today’s “quiet quitting,” and building a world class finance team to achieve the competing tactical vs. strategic priorities of a business is now more complicated than ever with potential game-changing generative AI risks and opportunities around every corner.

We reflected on these topics and several other important issues that are top of mind for CFOs today. I’ve included the full agenda below.

Thank you to all who joined us this year. I’m grateful for the opportunity to spend time together and am already looking forward to the next one!

2023 Spectrum Equity CFO Summit Agenda & Speakers

Economic Outlook: Charting a Course for 2024 & Beyond
Speaker:
David Lyons, Vice Chair, JP Morgan Private Bank

M&A Best Practices Panel (Buy-side and Sell-Side)
Moderator: Colin Moore, Connor Group
Speakers:
Emma Whelan, The Knot WorldWide
Ido Sakal, DispatchTrack
Reed McBride, Carta

Future of Finance: Enabling Automation for the Data-driven CFO Speakers:
Michael Belkin, Zuora
Brock Davis, ContinuServe

Veteran CFO Panel
Moderator: Brian Regan, Spectrum Equity
Speakers:
Andy Ivanovich, The Knot WorldWide
Peter Krivkovich, Bitly
Sean Brecker, Headspace

AI & Financial Innovation
Speaker:
Tim Sanders, Client Strategy, Upwork

Content contained in this blog post is not intended to and does not constitute investment advice. Your use of the information in this blog post and materials linked is at your own risk. Spectrum Equity does not make any guarantee or other promise as to any results that may be obtained from using this content. No one should make any investment decision without first consulting his or her own financial advisor and conducting his or her own research and due diligence. Past performance is not indicative of future results, and there is a possibility of loss in connection with an investment in any Spectrum Fund. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Spectrum Equity disclaims any and all liability in the event any information, commentary, analysis, and/or opinions prove to be inaccurate, incomplete or unreliable, or result in any investment or other losses. The specific companies identified above does not represent all of Spectrum’s investments, and no assumptions should be made that any investments identified were or will be profitable. View the complete list of our portfolio companies.