FP&A Career Path for Finance Professionals to Become Strategic CFOs with Rey Del Valle
In this episode of FP&A Unlocked, host Paul Barnhurst sits down with Rey del Valle to discuss what it really takes to move from reporting the business to steering it. Rey shares lessons from more than 25 years across media, entertainment, ecommerce, and fintech, explaining why curiosity, collaboration, and driver-based modeling are essential to effective finance leadership.
Rey del Valle is a strategic CFO with deep roots in FP&A, having built his career at organizations such as FedEx, Norwegian Cruise Line, MTV Networks, and The Walt Disney Company. He has since served as CFO and advisor for companies including Ticketmaster, AXS, Guitar Center, OpenX, and several entertainment-focused fintech platforms.
Expect to Learn:
What great FP&A looks like beyond spreadsheets and reporting
The biggest mindset shift required when moving from FP&A to CFO
Why curiosity and operational understanding matter in finance
How collaboration plays a key role in successful turnarounds
How benchmarks and driver-based models uncover opportunities
Here are a few relevant quotes from the episode:
“FP&A is about taking data and turning it into actionable insight so the business can actually do something with it.” - Rey del Valle
“Our role in finance is not to look at numbers for their own sake, it is to help the company make better decisions.” - Rey del Valle
Rey shares practical insights on how FP&A teams can become stronger strategic partners by understanding business drivers, building models that support decision-making, and working closely with operations. He emphasizes that finance leaders create the most value when they listen first, stay curious, and help teams translate strategy into execution, especially during periods of change.
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Explore Campfire today: https://campfire.ai/?utm_source=fpaguy_podcast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=100225_fpaguy
Follow Rey:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/reydelvalle/
Company - https://www.linkedin.com/company/everestadvisorsllc/
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
[03:12] - What Great FP&A Really Means
[04:56] - Choosing the CFO Path
[07:49] - CFO of the Year Nomination
[10:00] - Architect vs Engineer in Finance
[13:38] - Execution and Overcommunication
[16:41] - Understanding Business Drivers
[21:26] - From Reporting to Steering
[29:03] - Finance Inside Operations
[33:25] - Turning Around a Business
Full Show Transcript
Host: Paul Barnhurst (00:00):
Welcome to another episode of FP&A Unlocked. Are you tired of being seen as just a spreadsheet person? Will 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 FP&A professionals from great ones, helping you elevate your career and drive strategic impact. Speaking of impact, our title sponsor for FP&A Unlocked 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 Rey Del Valle to the show. Rey, welcome to the show.
Guest: Rey del Valle (00:55):
Thank you. I'm very happy to be here.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (00:58):
Excited to chat. I'm really looking forward to this. So a little bit about Rey and his background before we get into the questions. Rey is a strategic CFO with over 25 years of experience scaling financial infrastructure across the creative economy ranging from premium content production to high-volume marketplace technology. Unlike many CFOs who rise through the traditional controllership path, Rey's Foundation is rooted deeply in FP&A. I like it. He honed this expertise through years of FP&A leadership at Norwegian Cruise Lines, FedEx, MTV Networks, and the Walt Disney Company. Rey's FP&A first approach has since guided a diverse range of organisations, including e-commerce and ticketing giants like Ticketmaster, AXS, and Guitar Center, production powerhouses such as the Lyft and Firelight films, and specialised entertainment FinTech platforms like Revolution. And GaN as an intern, CFO Rey focuses on professionalising the finance function by building the rigorous forecasting models and KPI driven frameworks necessary for scale. He's an advocate for the FP&A to the CFO track. Proving that strategic modelling is the ultimate blueprint for modern financial leadership. Love the background.
Guest: Rey del Valle (02:20):
Well, I'm so happy to be here and share some of my experience and my thoughts with the audience. It's been a fantastic journey. Not always the easiest way to climb through the ranks, but very rewarding. Nevertheless,
Host: Paul Barnhurst (02:31):
I'm glad it's rewarding. That's what we want. We want to be able to look back and say we enjoyed our career. Right?
Guest: Rey del Valle (02:37):
Absolutely. Again, one of the greatest things, and we can certainly get into this later, is getting that seat at the table and being heard and appreciated and really being part of guiding the company through either good times or bad because it's not always all fun all the time, but definitely enjoy being able to help the company guide the company through good times of bad.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (03:01):
Yeah, no, I hear you. Speaking of good and bad, one of the first questions we always like to ask from your experience is, what does great FP&A look like? What does that look like inside a company?
Guest: Rey del Valle (03:12):
So what great FP&A is all about, and I preach this often, is it's about taking data, whether it's financial data put together by our accounting team or some KPIs and being able to drive some insights from that. And when I say insight, it's not just a conceptual thing, it's be able to then guide the company. So if there's the numbers seem to indicate there are some slowdowns in the business, then we need to be able to dig in and investigate that. Or there are opportunities we have things that are selling well or there's opportunities there. So really what you want to do is be able to take all the data and turn it into actionable insight, which means work with your sales teams, work with your product teams, work with everybody at the company to then make decisions of what do we do with this information.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (04:06):
I really like that of helping the company make those decisions, bringing it forward of what do we do with this information? Because at the end of the day, our job is to help the business make better decisions, and we do that in part by surfacing the things we're seeing and understanding 'em well enough to say, Hey, there may be an opportunity or a risk here, or whatever it might be.
Guest: Rey del Valle (04:26):
Absolutely. Really our role, say whether it's FP&A or further along the road into becoming A CFO, is taking that information and not just looking at it for its own sake, but doing something about it.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (04:43):
Totally agree. I know your background, you didn't come up through the traditional ranks for A CFO. What led to you becoming A CFO? I know you're very operationally focused, so what kind of led to wanting to be A CFO?
Guest: Rey del Valle (04:56):
The wanting to be A CFO was really about having impact because I've always felt that I could see the full picture and been very blessed with having a broader perspective. So part of that was just coming up through the FP&A ranks, working a lot of times more on the strategic side of things. So at Federal Express, for example, we were looking at where do we put aeroplanes , how do we route those aeroplanes , which required a lot of thinking. So we would have to then take our models. I would have to build models and be able to then turn those models into actionable insight, which is, okay, we ran the models and if the aeroplane goes counterclockwise in South America, we'll save on fuel. We can move more product and make more money. So it's using that data to then come up with some insights
Host: Paul Barnhurst (05:49):
That makes a lot of sense, wanting that seat at the table. Yeah. As a CFO, you definitely have a bigger role where you have that opportunity to have those conversations with the C-E-C-E-O and the leadership team.
Guest: Rey del Valle (05:58):
Absolutely. And one of the most important things though, in that role, and we can probably talk about this a little bit later, is it's important to be humble and not just sit there and shout out your opinions, but it's actually spending more of your time listening to what others are looking for, to then be able to guide them. And I'm still learning this every day. We have to continually improve ourselves and listen more and talk less.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (06:26):
Yeah, great advice there. I find myself sometimes talking too much and have to remind myself to listen more. So I think it's something we could all learn from.
Guest: Rey del Valle (06:35):
Absolutely. Again, the important thing is we are here to guide the business. One of the things I'll coach folks in finance is, look, we are not a profit centre per se. We don't sell any products. We don't design any products. Our role is to serve the company, and the only way you can serve is if you're understanding the needs of the business.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (07:00):
Very well said. I've seen it on LinkedIn from time to time people saying finance can be a revenue centre. No, no, we can't. Can we be a value centre if you want to call that? Sure. Can we generate value, but we don't sell. We're not creating revenue. So I'm totally with you. I think we create value above our expense by helping the business be better at what they do.
Guest: Rey del Valle (07:21):
And you've seen it yourself. You're an FP&A , you're the FP&A guy. So I'm sure that you've seen it yourself in your past roles where it's important to understand how can we make this business better and make more money.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (07:33):
Yeah, for sure. So I'd love to ask a question of what the experience was like. I saw on LinkedIn, I know you were recently nominated for A CFO of the Year, I believe, for Los Angeles, for the Los Angeles, by the Los Angeles Business Journal. Talk about that experience. What was that like for you?
Guest: Rey del Valle (07:49):
It was extremely humbling, and I can just say it was truly an exciting experience. Being part of that process, unfortunately did not win. There were a lot of super qualified people, but what was really enjoyable about the experience is just seeing other like-minded people call it. It's the Oscars for CFOs and with multiple categories. And interestingly enough, a lot of the folks in la, CFOs in LA are friends of mine too. So it was very nice working in a room and appreciating and cheering on our peers when they win their award. So it was all in all, it was a fantastic experience and what I would just recommend is that anybody else who would like to be part of that is to keep your profile high, make sure that the world is aware of what you're doing. LinkedIn helps make sure that if you've been to an interesting event or conference and you have some insights, share those with your peers and it's a good way to get noticed.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (08:57):
Great advice there. Yes, those type of awards, you have to be visible, and so if you're looking for something, that's a great way to help get on the radar. I do have to chuckle a little bit that you called it the Oscars being in Los Angeles, that was very fitting.
Guest: Rey del Valle (09:15):
It certainly was, and we weren't that far away from where the actual Oscars are presented, so it was a lot of fun. There was a lot of, we were in downtown LA in a beautiful venue and it was just a great crowd and everybody looked great. Everybody was dressed to the knights. So wonderful to be part of that experience.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (09:34):
Well, great. Well, thank you for sharing. Congratulations on being nominated. I mean, that's quite an accomplishment in and of itself, so congratulations on that.
Guest: Rey del Valle (09:41):
Thank you very much.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (09:43):
So there's an analogy you shared. We had some conversation before we met, something you talked about, and one of the analogies that you shared is something called the architect, and that's something that relates to how you analyse financial statements. Can you share that analogy with our audience, how you came up with that, what that's all about?
Guest: Rey del Valle (10:00):
One of the things that was really important to me is to be able to, as you're explaining, come up with an analogy that explains our role and the differences between an architect and an engineer. So think about your engineers when it comes to time to check out your architect's plans. Your architect comes up with a design and then the engineers need to make sure that it works. So think about your engineers being your CPAs, your accountants on staff to make sure that from a finance perspective, all of the information is booked in the proper way that we're following policy and all of that. But the architect is the one that works with the client to understand their vision, where they want to go, and then it's up to us to execute. So that's the analogy, which is you have to understand leadership, what the leadership team is looking for, what ownership is looking for. Ownership can be if it's a private company, obviously the owners of the building, or if it's a public company, then it would be shareholders. So you have to understand what those goals are and then be able to translate it into a design. So our design as an architect in this case would be the plants. How are we going to take where we are today and help realise the vision of our clients, call it the board, your shareholders and your leadership.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (11:30):
I like that. Helping put that into a plan that can be achieved. What's the biggest challenge of putting that into a plan? What do you typically find the hardest part of that?
Guest: Rey del Valle (11:40):
To be quite honest with you, a lot of times execution is difficult. If you don't have alignment, if you have the folks that have to execute on that, don't really understand the mission and the goals, then that's where you can fall down. So what's really important is to be as transparent as possible and be very clear about what we're trying to accomplish. And sometimes you have to over communicate, if you will, to make sure that the individuals that are responsible for execution know what they're doing.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (12:15):
I think you hit on something there that I've definitely found to be true is over communicate. I think often we think we've communicated when we probably haven't.
Guest: Rey del Valle (12:25):
Yeah, and sorry to cut you off there, but one of the things that in my career, I've had the great fortune of having great mentors and leaders that I've worked with, and I can remember back in my days at MTV Networks, one of our ad salespeople talked about frequency and reach. So how are you effective when you're selling ads? So to make an ad effective, well, frequency is important. So sometimes the way that it was explained to me, and I've seen this in real life, is you have to hear that message seven times in order for it to actually get through. And so the goal here is from an organisational standpoint is you have to repeat yourself a few times, and especially if it's a brand new concept, you have to then put the message out there and they continue to follow up, give folks an opportunity to ask questions and just it'll get through. So don't expect that we all know a lot of bright people, but it takes time for the message to get through. So frequency is a very important part. So that's part of overcommunication. Overcommunication doesn't mean droning on. It means put the message out there, give people an opportunity to absorb it and then follow up. There's
Host: Paul Barnhurst (13:41):
A reason. There's a rule of three in a presentation. Tell 'em what they need to know. Tell 'em again, and then at the end tell 'em what you told them.
Guest: Rey del Valle (13:50):
Absolutely, Ken, I totally agree with you.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (13:52):
We as humans need to hear it a few times. Just the reality. It's why marketers always say like, well, it's hard to do attribution because first thing came to us, we don't know exactly from where, and they heard about us 15 times, but they came to us.
Guest: Rey del Valle (14:04):
That's right. And attribution, and that's been part of my e-commerce experience is you want to know which ad made the difference or which contact point made the difference, and that's the hardest thing. So we'll talk about that offline and we'll figure out how to make some money at that because there's a huge opportunity in that world is attribution.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (14:25):
I totally agree. I actually have coming on here in the near future, I just scheduled a guy who he does marketing attribution. He runs a company with a service helping businesses figure out how to attribute it as a platform around that. So I'm excited to see what he has to say. I think that is one of the more challenging areas in business is trying to figure out how to allocate it and really understand the return on the different parts of your campaign. Some are easy, some are not too bad, and some are really hard.
Guest: Rey del Valle (14:53):
And this may not be for this show, but I could tell you my son is in digital marketing, digital sales, and he will tell me over and over again is when you have somebody out there crowing about their return on investment on their platform, he is like, oh, that was just, they have their own attribution model and basically it says whatever they want it to say, there is a huge opportunity out there for us.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (15:21):
We all know you can make numbers be whatever you want. We've all seen it. You see some of those returns on investment and you're like, all right, let me understand the math behind this.
Guest: Rey del Valle (15:32):
And that's one of the important things as an FP&A person is you have to really dig deep and really understand the mechanics. So I think one of the things that for me has been really helpful as a FP&A person and later CFO is you need to understand the mechanics of the business. And this is sometimes used as, sometimes the term might be drivers or other things, but if you really understand how the business works, then you can model it effectively and then you can share with your leadership team, if we do this, this is our expected outcome. So then you can start to do modelling and then figure out and then make your recommendations. Because what's really important is there is science to this and there is a lot of also pseudoscience, but ultimately the most important thing is to be able to then explain, these are our inputs. Here's our model, which is based on how the business works, and then here's our outputs. And then based on these different scenarios, I recommend option B. So that's the important thing to do.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (16:41):
And you mentioned something there, you really have to get to know the drivers of the business. So obviously you work with a lot of businesses, the fractional CFO. When you go into a new business, how do you get to know the drivers and the operations? What do you do in those first few weeks or months to really help you get comfortable with how that business operates?
Guest: Rey del Valle (17:00):
There's an art and a science to it, but the art of it is be curious, really want to understand how this thing works. And the science is, a lot of times it's working backwards. It starts with what is the result? How do we get there? And then you start to peel, it's like an onion, right? You start to peel the layers and then you see how the thing works. So you have to have some curiosity, and then you have to then be able to connect the dots, right link. So for example, we were using the ad sales analogy. What is it that drives ad sales, right? It's two things. It's the audience and then your rate. So then if you start to understand your audience mechanics and the rates that you get, then you can start to make decisions about how to invest. And then now in this digital world, there's a lot of measurement for outcomes.
(17:55):
So I've worked in e-commerce a lot. So a lot of it is understand we're going to buy these keywords and this keyword is $5 and we get a certain click-through rate and it turns into a sale, and then we have a thousand dollars margin, and you do the math and then it works out. So what's really important again, is just to understand the mechanisms of what are the basic units and how that turns into your result. But there's some curiosity and you have to really want to be able to understand how these things work. So
Host: Paul Barnhurst (18:30):
You've mentioned that a couple times, the whole curiosity, and it's so important to have that desire to learn and be curious. I've had multiple people tell me that is one of the number one things you can do to be a better business partner is curiosity. Just that desire to learn without it, it's hard to get to know the business. Well,
Guest: Rey del Valle (18:53):
Absolutely, and I preach that a lot. It is just you really have to want to know how these things work because if you just want to do a rote job, then being an FP&A may not be for you. The important thing is to be effective in this role, you have to really want to understand and also take that understanding and be able to communicate it and then be helpful in making these decisions. So it's important to be collaborative. And again, it goes back to what we were talking about earlier is you have to listen and listen actively and striving to develop an understanding so that then you can make those decisions.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (19:31):
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(20:38):
Obviously you bridged that gap and we're seeing more and more of that. I think Jack McCullough, who runs CFO Leadership Council, he came on my podcast about two years ago, and I think he originally said within two years, majority of CFOs will come from FP&A . And then he changed it to 2027 because it wasn't quite there yet. But just that idea because there's a strategic aspect to it of FP&A . But what I want to ask about a little different is what is the single biggest mindset shift, the biggest change you need when you go from a role that yes, you're strategic, but FP&A is also a lot about reporting the business generally. You're not steering the business in many FP&A roles unless you're operating as a mini CFO over at a division or something. So how do you make that shift from that reporting to steering?
Guest: Rey del Valle (21:26):
So the reporting to steering, a lot of it is some of those themes that we've touched on, which is to then be able to just go beyond just reporting the information, reporting the results, reporting the KPIs, and being able to say, this is what the information is telling us. So it's not just we earned a million dollars, it's we earned a hundred thousand on this product line, that this margin has a 40% margin. Some of the other products only have a 20% margin, and we think that there's still a lot of opportunity to increase sales through the high margin channel. So let's focus on that. So what that means is you have to, beyond reporting is to then dig in and then determine, find the information that helps you make those determinations. So like byproduct profitability. So some of the things may be depending on your organisation, is profitability by salesperson, profitability by channel.
(22:22):
You have to be able to then slice and dice the business to find those areas of opportunity and also look at where the channels are because you may be spending a lot of time on a business that generates no margin. And then once you get that information, then you look back and say, well, why are we doing this? Right? Let's focus our efforts on the high margin businesses. So it's really that, which is again, as we talked about it before, be curious and help use the information and the data to drive insights and to make recommendations for the business.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (22:55):
I like that. Thank you. I'm curious, what was the hardest part making that transition from FP&A to CFO? Was it kind of what you talked about in the steering there? Was it something around the leadership, the relationships and managing them in a different way, or what was the hardest adjustment?
Guest: Rey del Valle (23:12):
Well, the hardest adjustment is having been in corporate FP&A at some rather big companies like Federal Express and even Norwegian Cruise Line, is to then get into literally the accounting close and understanding the accounting cycle, especially at a public company where there's very tight timelines for reporting. So it's understanding the clock, if you will, and timeline for when things need to get done and the processes, because for anyone to be successful in their role, even if you don't do the job, you need to understand it. So there's parts where you have to deal with tax, right? Tax is a super complicated area with a lot of specialisation. You need to understand those roles as a CFO in order to manage these different functional areas. You have to really understand them. Yes, it's important to have good people that you trust, but you own it.
(24:10):
So you need to make sure that if you're owning treasury tax audit, you owe it to yourself and to your company to really dig into the details and understand those so that then you can help the company get the audit done on time. Because a lot of it is going to be, Hey, we need more resources because we're falling behind in our audit schedule. You need to reallocate resources, you need to be able to manage this stuff and without a lot of drama, you need to understand these areas and be able to be helpful and then anticipate where there may be an issue.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (24:46):
I heard when you said you have to be able to do it without a lot of drama. I had to laugh. I'm guessing you've dealt with some drama over the years. That part comes with leadership. Sometimes
Guest: Rey del Valle (24:55):
There's always drama because at the end of the day, there's a lot of finger pointing that goes on. So what's really important is as the leader is just to cut through the noise and just make sure that sometimes you have to, again, it goes back to your curiosity is where there's smoke, there's fire. So if some folks are surfacing issues that we have a problem here, we have a leadership issue in that department, is to really dig in and help out. So it's a process.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (25:29):
It is for sure. And yes, there's definitely finger pointing and there's politics that go on and all those types of things. So I really like how you said having that ability to cut through the noise and get to the heart of what's going on.
Guest: Rey del Valle (25:43):
Well, what's really important is if you're trying to make your timelines, you can't sit there and hope that it goes away. You really need to roll up the sleeves and be able to dig in. And one of the things I'd say across the board is to be successful, no job is too small. You have to be able to get into the trenches and be helpful to your team. You can't always just tell people what to do. Sometimes you need to be able to then jump in and help them. And I think the team will appreciate that.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (26:15):
The best CFOs, I still remember one C ffo I had, he was the only one in the company. His business had hit their target like five years in a row and nobody else had come close. It was a company where we all struggled to hit target. Someone's like, how do you do it? He goes, one of the biggest things is I'm a member of the team. I do what's ever needed. We need, this needs to be done. I do it. That needs to be done. And I really appreciated that mentality. You could tell he was sincere and it's like we just all have our different roles as long as we do well. And part of my role is to help make everybody successful.
Guest: Rey del Valle (26:43):
You're absolutely right because only as good, at the end of the day, you're only as good as your weakest link. And so what's really important is to then provide the support to help them be better. And honestly, one of the things that you have to do in this job as well is sometimes you have to change people. They may not be the right person for the job. So you can try to train them up. And sometimes that doesn't work. Maybe there are better places for them. It could be within your organisation or another organisation, but it's important to have a team that functions well and also important to make sure that there's no drama as we were talking about, so that everybody's working together well, but you need to be in touch and you need to understand what's happening on your team. It's not rocket science, but you really have to have some empathy and understand what's happening. And people skills,
Host: Paul Barnhurst (27:35):
A hundred percent agree. And I sure remember I had a hiring manager when you mentioned you have to sometimes train people up or make a change. And we had hired somebody and I tried forever to help the person get there, and they just weren't getting there. And my boss goes, oh, I just kept telling him about, I'll give me a little longer. And then finally one day I said, look, we need to make a change. I remember he said to me, he goes, hiring is hard. Nothing wrong with getting a hire wrong, but it's on you. If you let the problem just compound, like saying you have a responsibility that could be training, that could be moving 'em to a different role, and you may in some places be displacing someone. But I really liked the way he said that of, look, we're all going to make mistakes in hiring, but just don't compound it by trying to fix something that may not be fixable.
Guest: Rey del Valle (28:20):
We should talk after this. I definitely would like to get connected with some of the folks that you're referencing because it feels like we share a lot of the same philosophies, so we should do that offline. Yeah,
Host: Paul Barnhurst (28:32):
Yeah, definitely. So one of the things you talked about in this podcast and we've talked about before is just being a good operational partner, you really have to get into the guts of operations. So how does FP&A do that or how does finance do that? What does it mean to really get into the guts of operations? Obviously there's the financial statements and understanding those and understanding the drivers and the business, but what are the ways we get into the details of the operation so we can really benefit the business? Any thoughts there?
Guest: Rey del Valle (29:03):
Oh, definitely. A lot of it is you need to have benchmarks. You need to understand, so to, we talked about it before, you have to understand the mechanics, but understanding mechanics of your business doesn't really help you unless you know what the greater context is. So some examples I will give you is I was starting at OpenX, which is an ad exchange, programmatic ad exchange, billions of transactions every day. And there's still a lot of basics. So I was going through the financial statements with one of our analysts that was explaining to me how Adaptive Insights works, a great fp a tools, and then she showed me professional services. So we went through the general ledger at a high level and I thought, wow, that seems like a lot of professional services for this size business. So we clicked in and then as we did, a couple of clicks found that audit and tax was a really big number, especially for that size business.
(30:03):
So the benchmark was, I had worked at other companies and thought, okay, audit and tax should be this. This is three times that number. So even if this is a more complicated business, it should not be three times as big. So with that information, we put together an RFP for audit and tax ended up going out to Big four and cut the annual cost by over half a million dollars a year. So it's all a process of having these benchmarks. So that's being operational. You understand how this thing works, you have a benchmark and then you get the result you need. Conversely, I had worked at a ticketing company, A XS and I had come from Ticketmaster. We had done reporting on our, there was a ticket insurance product and we noticed that in the back of my head, I knew what we should be getting per ticket sold.
(30:55):
We weren't getting the same result at Axis. And when we dug in, talked to some of the engineers and they said, oh, we just found that the signal wasn't being sent to the ticket insurance provider and therefore we weren't closing that transaction. The loop was not closed. So once we fixed, that turned into a million dollars a year of free money, if you will. So it's having these metrics, but not metrics for their own sake. It's look for comps for benchmarks that then will guide you in terms of what results you should be having. So that's operational.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (31:31):
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(32:42):
You can see it for yourself. Sign up for a live demo of l@campfire.ai, that's campfire.ai. Thank you, I appreciate that. One other, I want to go before we move into our standard fp a section where we ask every guest some similar questions and a get to know you section is turnarounds. You've worked in several turnaround projects including a, B, c, family when you're at Disney. And from your perspective, what is the key to turning around a business? So often we think about cost is often where people go first, but it's about a lot more than that. So maybe share some of your thoughts on turnarounds.
Guest: Rey del Valle (33:25):
So one of my common themes will be collaboration because you can be curious, you can understand benchmarks, but at the end of the day, you need to be able to work with your team because they know more about their particular areas than you'll ever know. So the turnaround at a b, C family was Disney had acquired the channel, it was Fox Family Worldwide was the business, spent a lot of money to get it. The results were not great. I was hired to help as a strategic CFO for the business, help put together a plan that was actionable. So what I did is worked with our various teams. So in the media business you have different parts. You have your affiliates, which are your cable operators, your satellite operators, you get fees per subscriber, you have your ad revenue, which is based on your audience and your rates.
(34:23):
So one of the things we did collaboratively is with our different teams was look at, we had a programming team, which shows are available and what kind of ratings they may have. And then we had our executive leadership talk about the strategy, where do we want to go with this channel? So pulling all those elements together, we were able to then fine tune our strategy and determine this type of programming will generate this kind of rating which we'll be able to sell to our affiliates that would maximise revenue. And we ended up going from a $20 million annual operating profit to over $200 million in about 44 years, which is all based on collaboration and working together and being able to take all those different inputs and put it into a plan. And the plan had to be actionable, which was to say, we're going to buy these shows, we're going to go to these advertisers with this demographic based on what we're doing. So the turnarounds are, there's no hero in that process. Everybody has to just work well together and be able to communicate and be able to do the work of iterating because it's not like one shot and done. You have to say, okay, this is what we're going to try. This is what the result's going to be. No, we can't spend that much money on programming. It's going through and coming up iterating enough times that you've come up with a product that works for your ownership, for your leadership team, for your stakeholders throughout the business.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (36:01):
I really liked the part you mentioned about collaboration. Nowhere in there did you mention focusing on cost cutting. I noticed
Guest: Rey del Valle (36:06):
It's an old rule that you can't cost cut your way to profitability. You need to be able to grow your business. And sure you need to be efficient, and that's a separate process. But a turnaround, at least in my experience, has been as much about where are the growth opportunities from a revenue perspective. And you must keep your cost aligned, there's no doubt about that. But what's more important is how do we drive business? How do we drive growth?
Host: Paul Barnhurst (36:34):
I mean, if you're growing profitably, nobody has a problem spending more. As long as you keep it in line,
Guest: Rey del Valle (36:39):
You're absolutely right. Again, but there are times, for example, we had the perfect storm of, at one of my companies that I was at a perfect storm of strikes by, this was the entertainment industry. We were providing payroll services to production companies. And when there's a strike, your business really nearly shuts down. So we were very fortunate that we did have some businesses that were producing that were not affected by the strikes because they were not screenwriters or guild or the SAG aftra. So what we were able to get some business, but we still took a huge hit. So my role is how do we stay afloat? So one trick a lot of people might do is say, let's do 20% cost cuts across the board because the number we needed to hit in order to be profitable or to stay afloat, our approach was to come up with a nice detailed 13 week cash flow. And this is true of almost any type of turnaround group or anybody, is to come up with a 13 week cashflow based on drivers and determine where should we cut versus leave things alone. Because some of those areas, if you cut them, that's going to kill your ability to drive business. So you need to be selective, and we were able to do that very successfully at this entertainment payroll company.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (38:11):
Nice. Well, thank you for sharing that. I appreciate that. And agree, you got to be strategic in that. So the FP&A section, how this works is I got four questions here and I'm going to go ahead and ask you that. Our ones similar that we ask every guest, some are the exact same, some are slightly different, but first one that we pretty much ask every week, what is the number one technical skill that FP&A professionals should master?
Guest: Rey del Valle (38:35):
I think you'll get it from some of the responses, is be able to build financial models that are based on drivers so that then you can determine outcomes so that then you can make recommendations. So financial modelling is going to be super important. And it doesn't mean Excel. I mean there are great other system tools that are out there as I mentioned previously, but it's really about being able to then create financial models that you can make decisions with.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (39:06):
I like how you said Model Z can make decisions with and driver based, the goal. Next one, how about soft skills? What's the number one soft skill we should master?
Guest: Rey del Valle (39:15):
As we had mentioned before, one of the really important things is to be a very good listener, be empathetic, be able to then really take that understanding to then be able to do your modelling, if you will. Got
Host: Paul Barnhurst (39:27):
It. So I think I heard kind of two main ones in there is the active listening, the empathy, but then that third thing, which I kind of think bridges the gap between the two skills is being able to take what you heard and convert it back to the model, be able to take that modelling and action, what you're getting in that communication.
Guest: Rey del Valle (39:45):
Absolutely. Well said.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (39:46):
All right, perfect. Alright, so this is a fun one. I asked this from time to time. If you could snap your fingers, wave a wand, what's the one thing if you could change one thing about FP&A that you would change
Guest: Rey del Valle (39:58):
Having been an FP&A person for a long time? I think it's for me is making sure that we don't get shoved into the back room somewhere and continue to have the seat at the table to be appreciated for insight. And so I think what's most important is to make sure that we are in a situation to be heard. And some of that is we have to take responsibility for that as well, is to be able to provide again, actionable insights.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (40:33):
Got it. Alright. So the last one is around Excel, because we all use Excel. If we work in finance, if Excel removed one feature tomorrow, which one would cause you the most panic?
Guest: Rey del Valle (40:44):
Subtotal nine. So
Host: Paul Barnhurst (40:48):
Haven't got that answer before, but I know exactly what you're talking about. Keep going.
Guest: Rey del Valle (40:53):
So one of the things I like to do is just take tonnes of data and then start filtering if you will. So it's filtering along with Subtotaling because what I'll do is I'll filter on certain numbers to understand relationships. So I may be looking at a dump of products and I'll have revenue and cost of goods and I'll be looking at margins. So I may just say, how's my line A doing, boom, how's my line B doing? And it's one of these things that for me, I can very rapidly develop some insights by doing the subtotal function partnered with of course filtering, right?
Host: Paul Barnhurst (41:36):
All right. So if a subtotal goes away, raise in trouble. I like it. Alright, next we have the get to know you section. First question, if you could change places with any one person for a week, you could do their job or just live their life, who would you change places with and why?
Guest: Rey del Valle (41:53):
Great question. I actually had a heads up on this and I couldn't actually think of anybody in particular, but let's just say for now, one of my favourite podcasts is acquired other than your podcast, but acquired. And these gentlemen have been given tremendous access to some really important folks throughout industries and they have conversations with Charlie Munger with it goes on, they had Zuckerberg on there, Jamie Diamond, these folks have access and that would be a really cool place. So it's not one person, it's a duo. The acquired host,
Host: Paul Barnhurst (42:35):
I'll have to check out an episode, I don't think I've listened to them.
Guest: Rey del Valle (42:39):
They're brilliant and the episodes are long. They go three and four hours and sometimes they'll do, for example, they'll tell the Google story over three or four different episodes, but you come away from there with just incredible insight. Cool.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (42:58):
Well thank you. I appreciate that. So what does Rey like to do in his spare time? What do you do when you're not working?
Guest: Rey del Valle (43:04):
When I'm not working and I have a few minutes, I love to bike. I live in Southern California in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, which gives me a lot of opportunities to get out and either mountain bike or road bike and getting some cardio exercise helps clear the mind. So I enjoyed that quite a bit.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (43:26):
Nice. And I think I know the answer to this one. Based on where you live, we'll ask the question, are you a beaches or mountain person?
Guest: Rey del Valle (43:34):
I love both, but if I had to pick one, they would be the mountains because as we were just talking before the show, I just came back from a four day ski trip and I just love the rush that you get from going down the hill, whether it's on a bike or skis. That's a fantastic feeling.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (43:52):
It's a little bit of an adrenaline junkie there.
Guest: Rey del Valle (43:55):
Oh for sure.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (43:56):
See, I would've guessed beaches given you were in southern Cal, but since you mentioned the skiing and mount biking totally makes sense. I get it.
Guest: Rey del Valle (44:03):
And by the way, I grew up in Miami too, so we spent a lot of time at the beaches in the sun. But given that I'm out here, I'm so happy to be able just to spend my time in the mountains with the fresh air and sunshine. But that said, one of the really cool things about living here is we can do triathlons if you will. We have some ski resorts about two hours away. You can ski in the morning mountain bike in midday and then go for a swim in the ocean in the late afternoon. So we have it all.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (44:35):
I know what you mean. Having lived in Southern California. Alright, do you have a favourite book you can share with our audience?
Guest: Rey del Valle (44:41):
My favourite book is the latest one that I'm reading. I just finished one, which was The Trader and the Spy, and a similar one that I'm reading now is a Friend among Spies. I may not have those titles exactly right, but these are spy books, true Stories. And I tend to read nonfiction because I find that fact is a lot of times stranger than fiction and more enjoyable.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (45:11):
A lot of truth to that, I think it's why people loved the Dilbert comic strip so much is he tapped into the things that were stranger than fiction, but we all look at him and go, yeah, I dealt with that. I can relate to that in Cubicle Land. He had that innate ability to kind of tap into and exaggerate all the different situations. We actually deal with
Guest: Rey del Valle (45:35):
One of my favourite Dilberts and I'll hopefully would not butcher it, which I've actually shared multiple times, which we talk about financial modelling, which is the theme was I know that this model is full of errors, but all that matters is that management gets the result that they want.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (45:51):
I can relate, I know what you're talking about. I might just have to do an episode, bring a couple of people on round table and we'll just go through Dilbert strips and comment on 'em and tell stories that relate to our work related to the different ones. That might be a fun episode.
Guest: Rey del Valle (46:06):
Yeah, I forget Scott and I forget his last name, but Adam Scott Adams was brilliant, man. Unfortunately he passed May rest in peace, but brilliant insights and all those characters with the pointy haired boss and the rat bur and all those other characters love them.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (46:23):
Yeah, I know it was a great comic strip. Alright, so as we wrap up here, we'd love to just give you an opportunity to share anything you want about your business and best ways for people to get in touch with you if they listen to the episode and would like to reach out.
Guest: Rey del Valle (46:36):
Well, I appreciate that opportunity. So best way to reach out is I'm on LinkedIn, pretty active on LinkedIn, and it's just Redel val, R-E-Y-D-E-L-V-A-L-L-E. You can find me that way. On LinkedIn, I work as part of a CFO collective. It's called Everest Advisors. I also have my own consulting company, which is RDV Consultants, which stands for Val. And always happy to collaborate with anyone that would like to understand more about what I've done and what I do. And Paul, I've really enjoyed this session with you and I look forward to staying in touch. Definitely would like to hear more about some of your past bosses. They sound like really cool and interesting people.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (47:22):
Well thank you, appreciate that, Rey. I do look forward to keeping in touch and loved you coming on the show. I'm glad you had answered that email that was sent out about different guests and we're able to carve out an hour here. Really enjoyed it and I'm sure our audience will appreciate it as well. So thank you for chatting with me today, Rey,
Guest: Rey del Valle (47:39):
And thank you for your time. It's been a thrill. I really have enjoyed it.
Host: Paul Barnhurst (47:43):
Thanks, everyone. That's it for today's episode of FP&A Unlocked. If you enjoy FP&A Unlocked, please take a moment to leave a five-star rating and review. It's the best way to support the FP&A guy and help more FP&A professionals discover the show. Remember, you can earn CPE credit for this episode by visiting earmarkcpe.com. Downloading the app and completing the quiz. If you need continuing education credits for the FPAC certification, complete the quiz and reach out to me directly. Thanks for listening. I'm Paul Barnhurst, the FP&A guy, and I'll see you next time.
