From FP&A Analyst to Private Equity Operator with Alex Fabry: The Day-2 Lunch That Changed Everything
In this episode of FP&A Unlocked, host Paul Barnhurst is joined by Alex Fabry, the founder of KFA, an advisory firm focused on scaling businesses.. Alex takes us through his journey from FP&A to private equity, sharing his valuable experiences working at firms like Saber, BCG, and Charles Bank Capital Partners. Their conversation explores how FP&A can serve as a stepping stone to leadership and investment roles, and the key skills that helped Alex succeed in both corporate finance and private equity.
Alex Fabry is the founder and managing partner of KFA, a private investment and advisory firm focused on growing and scaling businesses in Saint Louis. Before founding KFA, Alex started his career in FP&A roles at Saber, where he supported multi-billion dollar business units, managed complex budgets, and played a pivotal role in the $1.2 billion sale of Active Network to Global Payments. Alex also has experience as a Vice President at Charles Bank Capital Partners. He holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
Expect to Learn:
How FP&A provides a solid foundation for leadership and private equity operator roles.
The significance of automation in improving FP&A efficiency and enabling more strategic analysis.
Why private equity and FP&A require different skill sets but can work in tandem to drive business growth.
Key skills FP&A professionals need to transition into private equity.
The value of relationships and trust in both FP&A and private equity environments.
Here are a few quotes from the episode:
“The real value of FP&A is in helping businesses make decisions, not just report numbers.” - Alex Fabry
“Being a business partner looks different depending on the business—it's about them, not you." - Alex Fabry
Alex shared thoughtful and practical insights into the evolving role of FP&A in driving business success and the transition to private equity. He highlighted the importance of automation and strategic analysis in improving financial operations, the value of building strong business relationships, and how FP&A professionals can leverage their skills to thrive in the private equity space. Alex’s journey serves as a valuable playbook for those looking to navigate the complexities of both FP&A and private equity, emphasizing the need for adaptability, operational efficiency, and a keen understanding of the bigger business picture.
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Follow Alex:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/alex-fabry/
Earn Your CPE Credit
For CPE credit, please go to earmarkcpe.com, listen to the episode, download the app, answer a few questions, and earn your CPE certification. To earn education credits for the FP&A Certificate, take the quiz on Earmark and contact Paul Barnhurst for further details.
In Today’s Episode
[02:27] - Alex’s Background
[03:50] - What Makes Great FP&A?
[14:03] - The Three Key Questions in Finance
[18:38] - Private Equity Operations and FP&A
[27:14] - Early FP&A Experience at Saber
[36:36] - The Reality of Private Equity
[43:16] - Lessons from 100 LinkedIn Posts
[53:47] - The Biggest Excel Lesson
[54:32] - Wrapping Up the Conversation
Full Show Transcript
[00:01:03] Host: Paul Barnhurst: FP&A guy here, and I'm excited to introduce you to our title sponsor, Meet Campfire, the AI native ERP built for modern finance and accounting teams. Automate revenue, streamline your clothes, and centralize accounting all on one unified platform. Learn more today by going to campfire AI. That is campfire AI. Are you tired of being seen as just a spreadsheet person while others get a seat at the table? Well then, welcome to FP&A unlocked where finance meets strategy. I'm your host, Paul Barnhurst, the FP&A guy. Each week we bring you conversations and practical advice from thought leaders, industry experts, and practitioners who are reshaping the role of FP&A in today's business world. Together, we'll uncover the strategies and experiences that separate good for professionals from great ones, helping you elevate your career and drive strategic impact. Speaking of strategic impact, our title sponsor is campfire, the ERP that's helping modern finance teams close fast and scale faster. Today's guest is someone who's earned that coveted seat at the table. I'm excited to welcome Alex Fabry. Alex, welcome to the show.
[00:02:24] Guest: Alex Fabry: Thank you. Happy to be here.
[00:02:26] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, really excited to have you. So let me give a little bit of Alex's background and then we'll get going. Alex began his career in FP&A roles at saber, an active network where he supported multi-billion dollar business units, managed complex budgets and played a key role in the $1.2 billion sale of active to Global Payments. His experience in financial planning, pricing and deal execution laid the groundwork for a broader career in strategy consulting and ultimately, private equity. After earning his MBA from Kellogg, Alex joined BCG, then served as a vice president at Charles Bank Capital Partners, where he worked with CEOs and CFOs on value creation projects within the $18 billion firm. Today, he's the founder and managing partner of KFA, a private investment and advisory firm focused on growing and scaling businesses in Saint Louis. His journey from FP&A to private equity offers a playbook for how foundational finance roles can open doors to leadership, investing and entrepreneurship. I love the background. Really excited to have you with us today, Alex.
[00:03:40] Guest: Alex Fabry: Thank you Paul. I love your content and everything you're putting out there. So I'm really excited to connect today.
[00:03:45] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thanks. I'm looking forward to this conversation. So let's get started. What does great FP&A look like? Tell me what it looks like to you.
[00:03:51] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, well, for me, I think it looks different. It's highly context dependent. And I say that I'll give a quick example. So a CFO I worked with in the last couple of years, he had his own model, like his own spreadsheet that only he worked on. It had all the metrics and everything. That was his thing. So for his team, organized around data quality and some of these things, they didn't have to have millions of dashboards. The CFO, because he was really on it, clashed with one of my firms working with the GM that didn't look at a number all month, like I had to be really on it in FP&A and looking and building and sort of telling him. So I don't think it's one size fits all mold. I don't know that that's a super organic thought there, but that's sort of my grade for.
[00:04:33] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I would agree it can be different from each company. Can you share a time maybe, when you've seen great FP&A in action from your career, kind of what that looked like. Share a little bit about that experience.
[00:04:44] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And I think maybe the other great FP&A I left out is I think there always needs to be a and this ties in here is pushing for a culture of speed and efficiency because it's easy within the cycle of FP&A the closed meeting, the forecast, the budget. You can kind of mail it in a little bit for years and years and do well, make good money, but not really improve anything because you don't have to. When I was at saber, we did a project really around organizing the teams and different things, getting the clothes processed down, automating different parts. And that really, I think was a good culture because then we had more time to do analysis or do other things.
[00:05:17] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah. No, I hear you are able to do more analysis and do other things. And so really that kind of gratitude was going through and analyzing those processes, shortening those time frames so you could focus on the business.
[00:05:29] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And I think I mean, the other example I'm sure you're familiar with. How many closed meetings have you done? Was that a regular thing for you?
[00:05:36] Host: Paul Barnhurst: More than I care to remember. Yeah.
[00:05:39] Guest: Alex Fabry: So yeah, I remember somebody left after three years and I was like, that was 36 closed meetings. You just did. But I think it was when I was active, a good example. I was an active network. We were in the middle of our sale process, probably like two months left and we were barely closing the books, like, because we were focused so much on doing that and all the diligence requests and everything. And I remember that the numbers were tracking budget forecasts pretty closely. And I think we did the whole meeting in 15 minutes. The CFO didn't ask one question because we just had it down. Everybody had their part, knew the variances and what was happening. The forecast was pretty clear and it was just super efficient. And it was almost like we didn't need the meeting in some ways. Yeah, no.
[00:06:18] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And when you said how many clothes I've done, I was thinking I had one where we had clothes for each of our different business units with accounting, and we had the clothes with the business. We had multiple differences. Then you often had corporations. I think I had one company where I was probably doing ten closed meetings a month between all the different units and stuff I supported. So it's in the hundreds.
[00:06:39] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, well, and even in one because we would do closed meeting then like the forecast meeting a few days later, then the cashflow meeting and then they had like three and then you had the long range planning, but one like um, SVP of finance, I they work with. The way he ran his closed meetings was like he was talking to everybody, like he was reading the deck. Telling you what he thought and then going at people with questions versus like, maybe the classic like presenting to somebody. Um, and honestly, it worked really well because you came really ready because you didn't know what he was going to push on this time.
[00:07:11] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And I like that. I've never been in meetings where, you know, it's a conversation with the business, not, hey, we're just going to present the numbers like, hey, what are you doing about this? What's the follow up? How do we fix that? Those, to me, are the best meetings. That's how it should be with the business. It's a little different if you're meeting with accounting. It's much more of those closed meetings where's this accrual? Why does this number look way different than I expected? Help me understand so that we can make sure it was right before we went to the business and got all those questions ourselves, because the numbers were wrong. We've all been there. We've all gone through a month closed, and you look at the numbers going, there's no way this can be right. If it is, I'm screwed.
[00:07:49] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And one time in those meetings, that same, um. The SVP of finance dropped. Like, I feel like the biggest gem for me. It's like he's like, what I want to know, guys, is what happened. Why did it happen? Will it happen again? He's like, that's your whole job. Just do that. Well.
[00:08:05] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I, I sum it up a little differently. The framework I love is. Okay, tell me what happened then. You got it. So what? So why do I care that that happened? Now what? What does it mean for the business going forward? What should we be doing? Are there things we need to change? Is there. You know. So kind of that predictive side. And I think that's getting automated more and more. Yeah that's becoming pretty routine. I've seen different tools that can do a pretty pretty darn good job of it. If you have good data telling you what your job now is, well, now what so what? That's what the business needs your help with.
[00:08:46] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And I know in all of that I didn't say be a great business partner. I thought you have to be a great business partner, to be in great FP&A. But I feel so much more than that. Um, well, I think again, it looks different. Being a business partner looks different depending on the business. It's about them, not you, you know.
[00:09:04] Host: Paul Barnhurst: No, I completely agree. The type of business partner, you know, that's why it's really hard. You know, you see finance degrees, but you see very few, you know, there's really not a degree program for FP&A. There's plenty for accounting. It is very different company. We're seeing more and more certificates. Yes. There is base work you have to do at every company and things you have to understand. But it can vary a lot of what your task and what it looks like depending on where you work. I agree.
[00:09:32] Guest: Alex Fabry: On that. On that topic, why do you think so? Because I don't know the answer to this. A university hasn't fully picked up FP&A because corporate finance is in every finance degree. But that's Miller, you know, like a little higher level than FP&A.
[00:09:44] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So I do think several universities offer anFP&A course now. Okay. Part of the challenge is Engineers if you haven't had experience in Fpna. How does a professor really teach that? Corporate finance, investment banking, all those other areas are a lot, I think, a lot easier, a lot more structured, a lot more similar. For somebody who's just gone through education to be a teacher. Most of these programs are usually part of an MBA. They're one course on FP&A, and I'd say all the ones I'm aware of are taught by practitioners, which doesn't surprise me. So I think that's the challenge. But we're seeing like, you know, Wirt online partnered with Wall Street Prep for their newFP&A certificate, you know, CFI. So we're seeing a lot of the training organizations and AFP offer different programs with FP&A. And so we're definitely seeing more and more of a demand of that. And I think we'll start to see more courses offered by universities at some point. Some universities will try to create a full specialization, but I'm not aware of one yet.
[00:10:45] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, I do think the valuation courses or financial statement analysis can actually be a close cousin of FP&A because instead of valuing business, you value a project. For me, the fun part of FP&A.
[00:10:57] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah definitely value. There's a lot of stuff that you get in a fight. You know, the modeling course if you do a financial modeling course. Right? That's core FP&A. You take a course on learning Excel. We all have to know it. So I definitely think there's a lot of things that you can get in your general degree that can help the valuations. Any kind of your strategy course should help, right? If you're doing good FP&A, you should be thinking strategically. Even if you're not formulating strategy, you're still making sure your plan links back to it. And then the execution happens of the strategy. Yeah. So I want to ask a question. Yeah. Looking at your LinkedIn profile and you recently shared about the best finance lecture you ever had. And I really liked this. You said you mentioned how the teacher wrote on the board that all corporate finance boils down to three questions. Can you tell our audience what those three questions were.
[00:11:50] Guest: Alex Fabry: What you should invest in. How should we pay for it, and what should we do with the cash when it comes back?
[00:11:57] Host: Paul Barnhurst: You know, what did that do for you? You mentioned what that kind of was like, you know, just really an eye opening moment for you.
[00:12:03] Guest: Alex Fabry: I gotta break down a little secret. That's more of an apocryphal story. I just can't, I can't let you.
[00:12:08] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Man.
[00:12:09] Guest: Alex Fabry: Sitting in this class. So I did take the professor who. This is his theory. It's Mitchell Peterson at Kellogg. Great. Amazing professor. I don't remember if he wrote it on the board, but he definitely gave me a document, which I found like a week ago when I wrote this, that he had. And so. So that was the the first part, I guess the question was about.
[00:12:29] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, just kind of talk through those three. How did that kind of guide you? Because at the end of the day, right. If we think of FP&A first, what should we invest in? I think that's kind of a core question. And any analysis we do when they come to us and say, hey, I want to build a new plant or we should expand into this country. That first question we have to ask ourselves is this something we should invest in?
[00:12:53] Guest: Alex Fabry: And I think even before that, that's where core really comes in the budgeting, the planning. How much are we making? What levers do we have for margin? How do we create more EBITDA? What's a go get? You know, all of those things that inform what I call the fun part of, you know, should we get this new office in India and really expand? Should we push on this project in a new business unit? That's kind of risky. Like all of those things come together. And I think sometimes in the budget and planning cycle, it can get lost in that and not really think about how we really need to grow the business, not just keep track of it.
[00:13:26] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I definitely think there's a lot of times it's easy in FP&A to get caught up as we're a report function, which, yes, we have a lot of reporting, a lot of stuff we have to keep track of. But if that's all you're doing, just call yourself Fener and don't call yourself FP&A. Yeah. Because it's not really FP&A. That's like I said, you're planning and your reporting, which I think is really where we started and the analysis has become much more operational and strategic focused.
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[00:13:55] Guest: Alex Fabry: And I think to your original question, like number two, as I looked at these again, and that's why I love doing with that's honestly my favorite part of school is thinking about it years later, because I can look at notes and it just jogs things. And number two, how should we pay for it? So that's when I got to know really well in private equity, when I'm sure in 2022, mostly because we had already pretty highly leveraged, you know, capital structures for these companies when I got in there.
[00:14:20] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Private equity levers, things.
[00:14:22] Guest: Alex Fabry: When I first learned the term leverage, I think it was probably like 2013 because in college we didn't call leverage called debt, you know, bonds. Um, so it was like no more than forex. Like anything, forex is bad. Like, I don't think I was in a company under seven x like in the last three years. And so that's where I, I don't know when that changed, but I guess we thought like cash flow will never decline. But once it does then it gets really tight. And what do you do? Like you only have so many levers. People cut investment, you know, or do a liability management exercise. Another topic I write quite a bit about, um, on LinkedIn that will touch on that because of the process around it dealing with the creditors. But yeah, I don't know that one that made me think differently about finance. Sure.
[00:15:06] Host: Paul Barnhurst: The whole debt thing is very interesting. I think we could do a whole episode on that, but I'll get your thoughts on this. So I work for a company that was quite highly debt leveraged, you know, private equity owned, and they were even higher now. So they, uh, they tried to go public last year. I think they've tried a few times, but, you know, public knowledge out there, they've tried a few different times and none of them have worked out. And so they released the S-1 as they're getting ready to go public, $2 billion company. You want to guess what their interest expense was?
[00:15:33] Guest: Alex Fabry: Wait, what was the 2 billion top line or EBITDA?
[00:15:35] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, top line revenue. Revenue is about around 2 billion, give or take, you know, 50 million, maybe 100 million at most, but could have been just over two, 500 $500 900 the prior year eight high eight something. It was 40 something percent of revenue. Yeah. You're. Look.
[00:15:56] Guest: Alex Fabry: What are their margins like 50% or something? How do they uh.
[00:16:00] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Actually they.
[00:16:00] Guest: Alex Fabry: Were. Oh, okay.
[00:16:02] Host: Paul Barnhurst: But still, that's a scary number. I don't care even if. Yeah, their EBITDA margins were in the high 40s 50s.
[00:16:09] Guest: Alex Fabry: And they're still solvent. They're still going.
[00:16:11] Host: Paul Barnhurst: They still managed to survive. They had quite a quite a cash flow before they levered everything up to. But you see that number and you think uh I don't want any part of that. Right. That's a pretty crazy interest expense. Now there was some refinance within that a little higher that year because they had restructured some things. I think it would come down some the next year, but nonetheless, that's not a pretty number.
[00:16:34] Guest: Alex Fabry: But on the other side, the reason for their bonds.
[00:16:35] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Are rated junk right now on their public bonds.
[00:16:39] Guest: Alex Fabry: But on the other side of that, that.
[00:16:40] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yield is going to pension funds that invested in private credit or the lender is.
[00:16:47] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Paying right now or something like that.
[00:16:49] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, that was it for me in private equity. Like it's the police, uh, pensions, firemen. It's good people that are funding these sometimes bad investments. And it's weird. Sometimes I didn't really feel noble for it, but that's what kept me going when I was feeling less than noble. Um, at times it's like, well, I'm helping grandma, you know?
[00:17:08] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah. No, I hear you. So, you know, I think we talked. How do you pay for it? You know, you get the question as a debt, is it equity? And then always, you know, what should you do with the cash that comes back? How do you reinvest it? And I think that is such an interesting question. And that gets much broader to strategy and treasury. And there's lots of people beyond just FP&A there. But FP&A plays a role, right? You know, look at like Microsoft and any company the first few years, they're they're paying no dividends and dumping everything back. And then at some point it's like, hey, do we pay dividends? Because with every dollar you need to earn more than whatever it cost you for that dollar at the end of the day, or you got a problem. You're not sustainable in the long run.
[00:17:49] Guest: Alex Fabry: A weighted average cost of capital.
[00:17:51] Guest: Alex Fabry: Um, I think this one really dovetails in with a real lesson, I think, for anyone in FP&A is that you need to have a point of view. And where should we put the cash back? Like, do you believe in this project or do you believe in a dividend or debt? Paydown. Like because an FP&A, you kind of get to touch everything, like you're working with treasury and capital markets, you're working with the business unit, you're working with the CFO, CEO, like. And that's what I love about FP&A. The access I had at a very young age to like the top levels of management, even in a 10,000 person company. Um, just because I have the spreadsheet that everybody wants to see.
[00:18:24] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yep. I mean.
[00:18:25] Host: Paul Barnhurst: You definitely get access to people beyond the level of many other functions, like, you know, many if you're a software analyst, coding, you know, you're probably not in meetings with the CEO or CFO at all. And there's a chance you could be as an analyst in FP&A. You may not always be, but you generally definitely have access to more senior leaders.
[00:18:47] Guest: Alex Fabry: And I.
[00:18:48] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Love that. It's great because you get to learn from them and start to, you know, realize what makes a great senior leader, because we see the ones that you're like, all right, I don't know how they got that chair. And you see others like I want to emulate what they do.
[00:19:03] Guest: Alex Fabry: Did you ever figure out what the secret was to getting in that chair?
[00:19:07] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I don't think there is. I don't think there is a secret. I think it depends on culture. Some cultures are around nepotism, so it's who you know and what you do and others. It really comes to healthy cultures. It comes down to performance and relationships. And I would even almost put relationships in many places first. But the great companies also have performance. Like I interviewed recently in this episode will come out after. But Gary Ridge, who is the CEO of WD-40 and his culture, his engagement scores were in the 90% for employees. Wow. 93% over his career. And so there's somebody that they were really promoting people on the right things and creating that right culture. And it was just fascinating to hear him talk about it and what he did, because, you know, he mastered tapping into people, making sure they're happy and helping them grow in their career. I mean, you have to have a 93% engagement rate. That's unheard of. I don't know if you figure out all the answers, let me know. We'll bottle it and sell it. I saw a.
[00:20:13] Guest: Alex Fabry: High level of competence in every senior leader. I didn't always like them, but I kind of understood differently. But if you're exactly right, it depends on how they climbed and who took them under their wing when they were 27. And like, you know, weird stuff like that.
[00:20:28] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So it does in general, I'd say, you know, the trends you see among senior leaders, especially the good ones, they understand it's about relationships. They're able to think quickly and boil complex concepts down to easy, manageable bites into something simple. Simplicity. And they generally have a really good ability to tie what's happening operationally to what that means for the financial side of a company, even if they don't have to be in finance, but they have that ability to to bring it back, because at the end of the day, it could be a great idea. But if it doesn't make financial sense, it's no longer a great idea.
[00:21:08] Guest: Alex Fabry: So I have the numbers.
[00:21:10] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right. Let's talk a little.
[00:21:11] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Bit about early in your career. You started with saber working in FP&A.
[00:21:15] Host: Paul Barnhurst: What was it you enjoyed about FP&A? You know, you started your career there. Talk a little bit about that before you went into private equity and consulting and all these other places.
[00:21:24] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So I think so . I graduated in December of 2012 from Texas Tech for undergrad and then started in January at Saber. And honestly, for the first call it year, maybe a year, I didn't really like it. It was not fitting me very well. I had what they call attention to detail issues, which in fact does not work very well. Oh it doesn't. I wasn't great at taking notes. I was handed a lot of processes. I kind of figured them out, but there would be mistakes here and there, some that mattered more than others. But I figured it out. But I started to like it because I figured out how to start automating some of the things I was doing with my spreadsheets, my models, even my decks. By the time I left in 2016, I had the full monthly board deck completely automated from my Excel spreadsheet. All the text, all the numbers. It was like a one click update. It was done. Now I had to do a lot of spreadsheet work to get it there and, you know, pull in different data sources. But for me that was like the puzzle. And I just loved automating as much as I could.
[00:22:29] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So ah, so did you learn macros. What were you talking about? Automation.
[00:22:34] Guest: Alex Fabry: So no, I don't, I never learned how to use VBA. I would sometimes like to get already made macros and paste them in here. I got, uh, an add-in called Mac Abacus. I think about 2014 and then evaluate my modeling on fire. Just the level of speed. I still use it today. I guess I'm over a decade on it now. I'll use it for the rest of my life. I'll be 85 and I'll have that subscription.
[00:22:55] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, they're owned by a corporate finance institute now.
[00:22:58] Guest: Alex Fabry: Okay. Yeah. Okay. So I love that tool. So it was so it was that. And then it just was thinking about the repetitive tasks that I did. And most of my work as a financial analyst, even senior financial analyst was pretty much monthly, bi yearly like.
[00:23:14] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Whatever. Yeah.
[00:23:16] Guest: Alex Fabry: And it was like there were for variances. There were like ten things that could go wrong. I didn't know which ten. And, you know, I'd have to write stories, but I figured out I could rank and do formulas and logic. I kind of learned that I was very good at logic, which I never learned in school. I figured that out through Excel, if weirdly as that sounds, but that helped me just think through the rules base of what could happen to basically a quicker output on all my deliverables.
[00:23:42] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, no. Makes sense. I'm curious. Obviously you were in the travel airline in particular. You spent a lot of time supporting the airline. But the travel industry, what are some of the key metrics you guys looked at at saber?
[00:23:55] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So working in the travel industry was cool because yeah, our biggest metric was we call PVS or passengers boarded. So I had in front of me 40 different airlines around the world and all their passengers each month and could see and do all these charts. And so one of when I first started my first year, I was responsible for the like, data processing costs. This was about $100 million, um, line overall. And we paid. We still use it, I think, even to this day. They still use mainframes for some of the GDS and some of the CSS.
[00:24:27] Host: Paul Barnhurst: It wouldn't surprise me at all if that's the case.
[00:24:29] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, because this saber actually owned it. They did a really interesting transaction in 2000 to editors to spin it out. Then HP bought it And then they were, you know, paying for the service. And this is when I learned how to do rate volume calculations. And like multi tree rate volumes to break down all the factors that could be increasing or decreasing. And now I just really like math and simplicity. It was more special than just sort of a static spreadsheet. So that was the fun part of it.
[00:24:55] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I got to do a lot of so I support I work in the business on the travel side at American Express Business Travel for our global distribution team, Global Supplier Relations, as we called it, which GDS was a part of that. And I ran a ton of reports before I moved into the role. A ton around city pairs. What was the average cost for those flights? How many were there? Which airlines did they grow over the prior period? What's their market share? All kinds of different things. So yeah, I can definitely relate. That was my big thing. And also on the okay, what was our revenue per transaction book from saber or whoever the other big players are in that space. Right? We had, I think, three different GDS.
[00:25:40] Guest: Alex Fabry: Saber really taught me how to look at mixes like variances, because if you had a flight in Europe, it was usually more expensive than the US. And like the incentive rates were different based on where it was booked and all this stuff. So you really had to like to break out the rate volume mix component.
[00:25:54] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Long haul short haul. Yeah, yeah.
[00:25:57] Guest: Alex Fabry: So that's where I still have trouble with the math on rate volume mix. Maybe you're a killer at it, but I feel like that's one of the, like, secrets of FP&A that people only know through apprenticeship. Somebody is teaching them how to how to do this.
[00:26:08] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah. You have to understand 100%. You need to understand the rate, volume, mix. There's different ways to do it. Sometimes you're looking at gross profit, sometimes it's revenue and different things. But it is huge to understand how much volume impact, how much is price impacting this? How much is our cost impacting this and being able to understand what's driving your variance? Was it a volume issue? Was it a price issue? Was it a cost issue? Doing that is invaluable. And yes, there's I still have to look at the formula. I don't do well. I haven't done typical FP&A now for almost five years because the last role I had, I wasn't doing budgeting and forecasting. I was helping to support the business, to make a transition to SaaS and coordinating between all the different groups of how all the new metrics would look and all the reports. And so I didn't do budget forecasts per se, even though I did a lot of selling stuff and reported into FP&A. So I think it's been almost five years since I've had a month end close, so I'm a little rusty.
[00:27:10] Guest: Alex Fabry: Can you still model? Are you still a champion?
[00:27:13] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I still model. I'm not as good as I was, but I still model a fair amount. I'm. I took the AFM last year. I'm supposed to be taking the CFM, although I need to actually study for it.
Alright, so next question here. So you made the switch after going to grad school. You switched from FP&A, you went into consulting and then you moved on to private equity. Kind of walk me through that. What was the change? Was it just and wanted to do something different. Felt like, you know, hey, I can't see myself staying long term or FP&A or just walk a little bit through that.
[00:28:51] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So it it really starts back in 2013 right when I started at, at saber. So the, the CFO went to the same undergrad as me, a guy named Mark Miller. He's actually the CEO of Goosehead insurance now. He's an interesting career path. But he took me out to lunch because I was the only other Texas Tech guy on the finance team. That was my second day of of work. And we sit down. I remember I was wearing this, like really wrinkled shirt. I think people in the office were making fun of me. I know it if you had a dress or anything. Yeah, I took I. I'm a late bloomer. Um, I'm still blooming I think overall, but he first thing he says is about he's like, so where do you want to go to grad school? And I kind of looked at him like, I just graduated from school. Like, I gotta go back to school. And he's like, yeah. He's like, you work here for three years, then you go to HBS, then you go to McKinsey, and then you go to private equity. And I was like, what's McKinsey? I didn't know McKinsey was, uh, like private equity. Like the toys R us people. Like, what do you mean? Like, what do I have to do? Um, so that's where the conversation started. And he explained to me, and there was actually a guy, he was the president of the business unit, um, just like me, a decade before it started as a financial analyst and literally done that, went to HBS, went to McKinsey, and then now he's the president of the company.
[00:30:07] Guest: Alex Fabry: So he's like, look, just do what that guy did. Oh, I was like, okay. So that started me on this. Like what ended up being a five year journey was supposed to be a three, as you heard in the story, to go to business school. So it was sort of like work. I felt like I had this first half of my career, and then there was going to be a second half. The consulting and private equity came a little later, but, um, so I went to work for three years, then applied to grad schools, got denied, um and didn't get in, so I had to, like, I was like, what do I do? That was kind of a blow. But wait another two years. Which companies sold the company? Um, and then applied again because I just felt like I never have this chance again to do this. Um, if I wait ten years, I'll never be. So that's why I applied to Kellogg. And luckily, I got in, um, and that sort of started the business school part of it.
[00:30:51] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Got it. Makes a lot of sense. So I'm curious, you know, we have people in FP&A listening who may want to switch kind of work in private equity. A lot of people think, how do I get into private equity? How did you get into private equity and what advice would you offer for them? Obviously, you did some consulting. You did grad school. Those all help. But maybe walk through a little bit of how you kind of got into private equity and what advice you'd give to somebody who wants to, you know, be more in private equity.
[00:31:18] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. I think my favorite part about my private equity story is the only reason I really got to work for, like, a Boston middle market private equity firm is because of my experience. And funny enough, they actually got to see the resumes of every other person they interviewed for this role. It was like 15 people. No one else was an analyst in private equity. They were Ivy League schools and other stuff, you know, consulting for eight years. Like I stood out because I had been like the job that these kids honestly, frankly, wouldn't have wanted out of undergrad. Um, as bad as that sounds. But, you know, they were investment bankers or consultants.
[00:31:54] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, they all wanted to be in the event. Yeah. Everybody thinks outside of school. I need to go into investment banking. It's kind of sexy. Usually. Don't think FP&A is sexy.
[00:32:07] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, exactly. So, um, that's. I was because I didn't have I went to sort of a lower tier undergrad and no lower ranked undergrad. I loved it. Um, but I did have access. I had commercial banking jobs, and my day job was like the only one and like, it wasn't a big thing.
[00:32:24] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So I your school wasn't a topical where you're going to go work on Wall Street. It's not the typical path anyway you can get there, but it's not typical.
[00:32:31] Guest: Alex Fabry: Exactly. And I even even at saber, I held like a little bit of a chip on my shoulder because I was working with kids from rice and some other better schools, and I sort of was like, well, I'm not I'm not better than them, but I'm not as bad as I should be. Sort of like where I put myself. Yeah. I kind of feel a bit of imposter syndrome, which, I mean, I don't know if I've even shaken that today. Like, I think it might be a little bit good for me to be a little bit of an imposter. Um, never feel like I've quite gotten it, but, yeah, I mean, back to getting into private equity. I think there's two paths. And if FP&A you can go to do what I did, go to business school, go work for a consulting firm or a bank and then get to PE. Now that path is not for everyone. And for a lot of people it makes zero sense if you've got a.
[00:33:12] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Especially depending on where you're at in your career. It's like, I ain't doing that.
[00:33:15] Guest: Alex Fabry: Exactly. Yeah. If there's, there's a million good reasons why people shouldn't do that. And like, it's very expensive, all these things. So the path without that is through networking and really through working with private equity sponsors. So go get a portico job and a sponsor you respect. You really want to get in, figure out any way to get contact with them, ideally working for them. Not like a coffee chat, but through that years and years like then you'll get an opportunity because it's all about timing and like these things come up randomly sometimes and just getting those step up opportunities, I think that's the key. But the problem is it's a hard career path to get in. There's not that many spots in private equity. And frankly, I think most people would be better off doing other stuff like it doesn't benefit the world as much as education or some other things you could do. Even with, I think what you're doing, Paul, like, um, so that's that's where I'm like, I don't want to encourage more people to do it, but if you really want that, you can get in through doing really good finance work.
[00:34:14] Host: Paul Barnhurst: And just as I say, even sometimes, you know, with the right PE, if you're a critical person in FP&A, in a company where you've helped turn it around or really grow it and they see your value on the PE. They may tap you for a role. Say, hey, do you want to come over and do this or that? I've seen that happen to people and agree with you. You have to decide, is that really what you want? I mean, personally, my you know, I worked for a couple private equities and some of the experiences I had, I'm like, okay, never again in certain areas and others, you know, we're we're we're decent. But I never felt like, oh wow, I'm changing the world by working for this private equity. Not to say they're bad not they're wonderful people, and a lot of good things. But I don't think, you know, most people look at private equity and think, that's the area where I want to change the world, so to speak.
[00:35:04] Guest: Alex Fabry: When I think of private equity, like 90% of the deals are really good. Create a lot of value for a lot of people, give good jobs for employees, then there's 10%. 8% that you don't know about are really bad and awful. People get fired. That 2% that you do find out about and everyone thinks because of the two, the 90s bad or the hundred, the whole thing is bad. And like it is really about the operators and the people and how they treat their employees, I think more than anything.
[00:35:29] Speaker7: Yeah. I mean.
[00:35:30] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Private equity at the end of the day is just another way to fund a business. What? Right. It's an investment. Some are active, some are passive, some are semi, you know, all different levels. But at the end of the day, that's kind of how I think of private equity. It's just it's another way to fund a business. So we won't get into it. I have other opinions on that. You can argue how good it is for society and all that stuff, but we'll leave that for another podcast. I don't think that really fits into FP&A, so I'll, uh, if you want to know my opinion on that, someone can DM me and we'll have that conversation. But kind of coming back to this. Yeah. What was it like working in private equity operations and what are some of the things that maybe FP&A helped prepare you for? Maybe talk a little bit about what's that like?
[00:36:16] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So first, the difference is there's no cycle. There's no monthly cadence. Often you're doing something different every single day. Um, there'll be projects and timelines, but you can be working across 3 or 4 businesses in a week, traveling to 2 or 3 cities, potentially even like it's very different from that. There really is a yes sir mentality needed. And I'm saying this is like a good thing. You need to do this like you're the person there that like when something needs to get done, you go get it done or trace it down. That's the thing I think where I prepared myself really well for is that I understood the monthly cycle. I knew how I know how a finance team should work and whenever, if I needed to understand certain results or certain data, I could know what days to talk to people on because they have more time or that kind of thing. I also knew, like, I need to get into the database that I can query in Tableau or in power BI. I know how to hook it up so I can speak their language, even though my job is now completely different. And also I should mention earlier, like the best friend of any private equity VP is the head of FP&A at their company. Because if the head of fat screws up, the VP's life is a nightmare because there's all this reporting that needs all this stuff. So like, they have to be linked. Well. And yeah.
[00:37:32] Host: Paul Barnhurst: You have to. There is a close relationship between the PE and whoever's leading FP&A.
[00:37:37] Guest: Alex Fabry: And honestly, most particularly VP, more senior FP&A people actually really enjoy working with the private equity firm. And that is cool too, because like I would find I would ping something to somebody just thinking it's like a small random thing. Before you know it, I have somebody two levels above pinging me, being like, hey, what do you need all this stuff? And like, got anything I said? Even though I was the kind of junior in the private equity side, they would take it really seriously, which I felt bad about most of the time because it wasn't that urgent. Whatever I was doing, I was just trying to.
[00:38:05] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Oh.
[00:38:06] Speaker7: I remember.
[00:38:06] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Being the one in the chain sometimes, hey, the PE, can you get this information? Everybody drops everything and sometimes it was urgent and other times you found, oh, they said that for a month. I'm sure glad I rushed to do that today. Yeah, I agree with you on the whole best friend thing. And it's kind of like, you know, the PE person, a good FP and A is their best friend, the one I always say FP and his best friend is a good accountant, right? You kind of have that chain. You all need those people that make it critical for you to do your job. So what other skills would you say? What are kind of the key skills somebody needs if they want to be a PE operator?
[00:38:41] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And FP&Ais a lot about the quant and the numbers. PE operations are 100% about the people. And how do you organize people against projects and initiatives to move things forward? Because when I would come into a business, I had no team, no one reporting to me, no one having to do anything I say, really. I mean, I could go up to the board because I'm basically with the board up, I'm coming, the board parachuting down. So it was all about just building real, genuine relationships with people where they could trust me. They knew I had the same goals and like things that they had and just, I guess, getting them to do things. What the new lens I got for private equity was that board room dynamic because I had made budgets. Gotten the budgets approved by the board before. But I wasn't in that meeting, really. You know, I never really been in, but I got to sit in through multiple board meetings, across multiple companies and kind of see how, like the FAA documents are interpreted in a room. And I think for most people, they'd realize how few of the pages get read, just read. And then second, like how few pages are actually understood by the people in the boardroom. And 80 pages of the 100 page board deck weren't needed. So why did we do that? But no one says that. You know, that was really eye opening for me for sure.
[00:39:57] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I'm sure that was. And I'm sure there are so few people listening, going. I mean, I spent all the time on the board deck. Nobody even reads it. Don't, don't tell them that you just depressed a bunch of people. I'm scared.
[00:40:08] Guest: Alex Fabry: The board deck is a good forcing function because even though I say we didn't need those pages, like we actually might have needed them, because if something was wrong, we would have heard about it, right? It was just sort of now I was reporting the news. So I don't think a hundred is needed. Most of it could be like a dashboard that people can look at if they need it, uh, versus the PowerPoint, which takes forever. But I do see the value somewhat of the board.
[00:40:30] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right. Well, there you go. Alex had a board deck suck. No, I'm just kidding. Well.
[00:40:36] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, there's some startup, I think. Some actors, some famous actors. Some, like kill the board deck startup. The guy from Fight Club. Check it out.
[00:40:43] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Interesting. Well, there you go. Everybody can go out and do that or ChatGPT or whatever the search engine is today. I know exactly who knows. I want to ask you, you recently shared about posting on LinkedIn. You mentioned how you did over a hundred posts over a 12 week period. What was your takeaway from that experience? I'm just kind of curious.
[00:41:06] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So actually the whole reason I made that post and counted the hundred was because of you, Paul. Because when we chatted to prepare for this podcast, you mentioned that you had done 500 in the past. And for me, the thought of doing 500 was so hard and long and I was like, I gotta cap this at. And so I hit 90 days and that's why I did it, because now I feel like I had more freedom to not post, because I sort of was like, oh, I did my thing. But the biggest takeaway, um, and the coolest thing that happened in posting is I got featured in Matt Levine's newsletter, the Bloomberg Finance one, and it was just because I emailed him randomly. One thing I wrote like and was like, hey, you might think this is interesting. And then the next day I suddenly get like a thousand views on an article. And I don't know, I usually get like 50 or 100 views. Sure. And so I was like, what are the algorithms messed up? How is this even happening? And then I realized it was at the bottom of the newsletter. And that was just a metaphor for a posting on LinkedIn in general, which is something I just kind of randomly started, thought it would be fun, and it became really fun. But just to everyone, like, just shoot your shot, you know, if they don't email back or in the same spot as you are right now, but you might be in the place that could, like literally change your life, right?
[00:42:17] Host: Paul Barnhurst: It goes back to the whole statement. You miss every shot you don't take. What do you have to lose? It's why I'm a ball hog on the basketball court. I don't think you're.
[00:42:24] Guest: Alex Fabry: A basketball player.
[00:42:25] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I played when I was younger, I never played competitively, but I haven't. I love basketball, but I don't.
[00:42:31] Guest: Alex Fabry: On the topic of LinkedIn through this LinkedIn post saying I had some coffee chats and one guy invited me to basketball on Sunday and we started playing, and he managed to elbow me right here, and I got a little cut. Yeah, I see it.
[00:42:44] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So if you're not watching this on video, go watch it and you can see the cut.
[00:42:48] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, he elbows me and it was a clean play. I was sort of going. He got in front of me. He was totally fine. But I started bleeding. And then I was thinking I was like doing this podcast. I was like, it's had to happen right now. Um, before I want to be on video, I'm not usually on video. I like phone calls personally. So it's just I'll look at this. Well, you know, when it drops and have a good laugh.
[00:43:08] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So I've had some times when I've had things where I'm like, yeah, that's not going to look pretty.
[00:43:14] Speaker7: All right.
[00:43:14] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So I want to move into our FP&A section. So how this works is we're looking for relatively quick answers. Yep. There's four questions there. Kind of standard questions. Just want to get your thoughts. So the first question is what is the number one technical skill that a professional should master.
[00:43:34] Guest: Alex Fabry: 100%. It's modeling Excel modeling to be the master.
[00:43:38] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right. So Excel and modeling those are the two most common answers we get sometimes. Well sometimes it's financial modeling. But some combination of that is very very common. Shocker, right. Although we're starting to get more and more AI as that continues to grow.
[00:43:54] Guest: Alex Fabry: What I would say is modeling can make you make better PowerPoints. If you're a better modeler, you make simpler things. It then can go in the deck and be like the whole page and it's perfect. So that's what I found is just like a structured way of thinking. When I say modeling, I guess.
[00:44:09] Speaker7: Yeah.
[00:44:09] Host: Paul Barnhurst: You know, I think there's something to be said for that in Schnur, who's the executive director of FMI, says far and away. The number one problem with models is design. It almost always comes back to design. Learning how to design financial models can also help in other areas because, you know, there's structure there, frameworks to be able to design a good PowerPoint or design a good whatever it might be. So I hear you. What about that soft skill?
[00:44:36] Guest: Alex Fabry: I think it's mixed. The mix of inspiring versus monitoring direct reports.
[00:44:43] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Elaborate a little bit on that. I want to if you could.
[00:44:46] Guest: Alex Fabry: So I mean management is hard. We'll go too much into that. But like you have to get people excited about the work while also like making sure they're doing the right thing and not slacking off. And that part of the inspiring part is that but, you know, if you're just an inspirational leader, it can make everybody happy, but you might not, um, nobody's gonna get anything done if you can't really like there's no incentives. And those kind of the carrot, the stick there versus if you're just a jerk monitoring like, hey, slack me everything you did today, every day. And yet put it in there. Like, probably going to leave that company, right?
[00:45:19] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah. Nobody likes a micromanager.
[00:45:22] Guest: Alex Fabry: Exactly. So.
[00:45:24] Host: Paul Barnhurst: All right. Thank you. So if Excel removed one feature tomorrow, which one would cause you the most panic?
[00:45:32] Guest: Alex Fabry: Well, I kind of already said it, and I can give you another one if this doesn't work. But the ability to have add-ins, like whenever I touch Excel without Mac abacus it, I can't hit the keys. Nothing happens. Like my format's just not cycling. Um, so I would do that one. Is that fair to say or I have, I have a fair.
[00:45:49] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So your biggest thing is the add in. Got it. No, that works for me.
[00:45:53] Guest: Alex Fabry: I know, big formatting. Um, I don't know the right word for this. Like formatting jerks. Like, if you give me an unformatted spreadsheet, I'm going to tell you to format it.
[00:46:01] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Which Excel mistake taught you the biggest lesson that you've made over your career? How do you avoid it now?
[00:46:07] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. So that was when I was managing travel and incidental expenses in my first year. This is an attention to detail thing I left in a plug for two months. The plug was supposed to take travel expenses down one month, and then I forgot. I did the model for the next month so stayed in. So then we were like double! And I had the oops and I had to tell my manager about it, who then had to tell the, you know, VP about it. And I was crushed. Like, obviously it killed me. Everybody. Life went on. It wasn't really that big of a deal in the grand scheme of anything. But, um, what I learned was I gotta check things like six times. And for me, that's. I literally need six now. I needed six until I automated, until I had checks, better checks in place that I didn't need to check it six times. And that was for me. That was the big unlock, in fact, for everything.
[00:46:53] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Learning to build automated checks.
[00:46:55] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, because I, I'm not OCD but I like I'll, I'll come back three times checking my garage doors closed kind of thing. Like I just that's just me a little bit. I get nervous, you know, I'm human, I guess.
[00:47:06] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Well, I'm glad you're human. I was hoping we weren't interviewing an alien or AI. Although if you were an alien, I could really advertise this episode differently. All right, let's move into the get to know you section. What do you do in your free time? What's a hobby or passion you have?
[00:47:20] Guest: Alex Fabry: So pickleball probably is a top bucket in my life. I've gotten really into it. I was a basketball player, but I don't do that as much. But I think the most surprising one is actually I love, uh, producing music and playing the piano. That's really one of my favorites, like, just stress relieving things of just doing it. Got into it in college and kept it going, so.
[00:47:42] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Cool. So we got piano and pickleball. I like it. All right. If you could only speak of music, if you could only listen to one song for the rest of your life, what song would you pick and why?
[00:47:56] Guest: Alex Fabry: So I almost want to ask you first what song you think I would pick?
[00:47:59] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I'm not sure. Honestly. When you said piano, I'm like, would you go with something classical? Because then it kind of you can, you know, manage it in almost any background versus some really loud song that certain spots you'd be like, alright, right. That's driving me crazy. So I'm going to go with something classical.
[00:48:16] Guest: Alex Fabry: Okay? Yeah. You're not right there. It would be Lucid Dreams by Juice World. So a rap song, but it's actually a sample of sting. There's this, like, shape of your heart. I think about my sting back in the day.
[00:48:26] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, I know that I'm a big sting fan, so I know that song.
[00:48:29] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah, he lost, like probably two thirds of his publishing just by sampling that, because sting always is super stingy on that. But I don't know. 2019 was a very transformative year for me, just personally, and that song kind of got me through it. I'd probably listened to it, I don't know, a couple hundred dozen times. And then Juice World, that rapper died at the end of 2019. He overdosed. So to me, it was almost in a weird way like that. Chapter closed 2019. It's been like my future since then. So that's why that song kind of stays with me.
[00:48:58] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, definitely not the song, I would have guessed, but hey, you know.
[00:49:02] Guest: Alex Fabry: R.i.p. Juice World I got, I always shout that out. He was an amazing talent. Gone too.
[00:49:06] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Soon. All right, there we go. Never thought I'd get a rapper R.I.P on the show, but hey, we cover everything here. All right. If you could have dinner with one person in the world today, who are you taking to dinner?
[00:49:19] Guest: Alex Fabry: They have to be alive.
[00:49:20] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I assume could be dead. Go either way. Live or dead. I'll let you pick.
[00:49:24] Guest: Alex Fabry: I read that a lot. I think I'm going with Howard Marks. The Oak tree founder.
[00:49:29] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Why?
[00:49:30] Guest: Alex Fabry: So he does these letters. If you ever read Howard Marks' letter.
[00:49:34] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I have not.
[00:49:36] Guest: Alex Fabry: They. Yeah, he published them, I think either quarterly or maybe monthly. He's a big writer, and he just. He's really fascinating the way he looks at finance and like the macro economy and worldview. And he's one of the few people that Warren Buffett says whenever he publishes something, I read it immediately. So to me, that's even a step above Warren. If you can do.
[00:49:56] Host: Paul Barnhurst: That and you're gonna make me feel guilty. If Warren says to read it and I, I know nothing shows me I'm uneducated. Thanks a lot.
[00:50:03] Guest: Alex Fabry: Maybe it's good you have an oak tree. Does a lot of distress debt. They're not always the best people in the world. Oak trees is a firm.
[00:50:10] Host: Paul Barnhurst: So distressed debt can be a very tough situation, and you can have very onerous terms in those environments when you're helping people survive. No question about that. But no, that would be fascinating. I'll have to go read one of his letters. If you could offer one piece of advice to our audience, kind of a parting advice to be a better business partner, what would you give him?
[00:50:33] Guest: Alex Fabry: Yeah. And I think I would call this my overall advice to anybody in FP&A as well is like, you got to find your edge. And in the context of being a business partner, find your edge where you can help them the most, where they're not helping themselves or they're not looking at things like where you can really provide value to them. And like for me, that was like modeling was an edge I had. Automation was an edge I had. So I did that to speed up things so I could have more time to be a better business partner and just, just really figure that out. I mean, I think I said this before too, it's about them being business partners. It's not about you. And that's. I think we have to think.
[00:51:12] Host: Paul Barnhurst: I think those are two great biases. One is finding your edge, finding your superpower, so to speak. Whatever it is that allows you to be better, do things faster, and then remembering it's about them. Makes sense. All right. So if someone wants to learn more about you, potentially get in touch after listening to this, maybe they want to listen to some music or something. You know, rap songs. How should they get in touch with you?
[00:51:35] Guest: Alex Fabry: Well, just to be clear, all the rap music I've ever.
[00:51:38] Guest: Alex Fabry: Made has been purged from the internet. You cannot find it. There's nowhere. And if you do, I will talk to you for I'll pay you money. I don't even know if you can find it for me where it still is. But that's locked up in my safe at my house. But yeah, LinkedIn's a good spot. It's Alex Fabry, at LinkedIn or Alex at https://www.linkedin.com/in/alex-fabry/ So, yeah, I love having a link on my LinkedIn page. Book an appointment. I have all my morning slots open. Anyone wants it, they can have it. Uh, I love chatting with new random people, so please feel free to reach out. I love FP&A and Big Paul fans too, so.
[00:52:13] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Yeah, well thank you and thank you Alex, I appreciate it. You can go to LinkedIn and find him there. Thank you for carving out some time today and excited to share this with my audience. So thanks again for spending an hour with me here.
[00:52:26] Host: Paul Barnhurst: Thanks for listening. 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.