CFO 4.0 - The Future of Finance
Welcome to CFO 4.0, where we explore the dynamic landscape of Financial Leadership in the era of Technology 4.0. I'm your host, Hannah Munro, Managing Director of itas, a pioneering Financial Transformation consultancy.
In this podcast series, we unravel the intricate connection between cutting-edge technologies and the financial domain. It's more than just adopting tools; it's about cultivating the skills necessary to navigate and spearhead the transformative journey within Finance.
CFO 4.0 embodies the archetype of the Financial Leader in the future — a fusion of strategic visionaries and tech-savvy innovators. As the CFO role swiftly evolves from a mere cost controller to a strategic influencer, each transition opens up novel possibilities. Tune in as we share valuable insights and guidance from inspirational CFOs and finance leaders every episode, empowering you to revolutionise your processes, people, and data.
Seize the opportunities, propel your business and career forward, and lead with unwavering confidence. Join us in shaping the future of Finance — this is CFO 4.0, your guide to the Future of Finance.
We’d love for you to join our community, and if you like what you hear (which I’m sure you will 😉) it would be great if you rate and share.
CFO 4.0 - The Future of Finance
244. CFO Stories: Acquisitions, Due Diligence & Building Trust with Charlotte Crowley
In this episode of the CFO 4.0 Podcast, host Hannah Munro sits down with Charlotte Crowley, CFO at Altano, to explore her journey through finance leadership, acquisitions, and the challenges of integrating companies without losing their culture.
Charlotte shares her unique career path — from starting in advertising and PR to working in boutique firms, McKinsey, and private equity-backed businesses — and reflects on what she’s learned along the way.
🔑 In this episode, you’ll discover:
- Charlotte’s journey from economics graduate to CFO at Altano
- How to balance startup agility with professionalising finance processes
- First-hand lessons from acquisitions, private equity, and integration
- The pressures of due diligence — and how to prepare for them
- Why people, trust, and communication matter more than just the numbers
- Charlotte’s top advice for new and aspiring CFOs
Links mentioned:
- Explore other CFO 4.0 Podcast episodes here.
- Subscribe to our Podcast!
Welcome to CFO 4.0, the future of finance. The CFO role is changing rapidly, moving from cost controller to strategic visionary, and with every change comes opportunity. We are here to help you take advantage of this transition to win at work, drive your career forwards and lead with confidence. To win at work, drive a career forwards and lead with confidence. Join Hannah Munro, managing Director of ITAS, a financial transformation consultancy, as she interviews key experts to give you real-world advice and guidance on how to transform your processes, people and data. Welcome to CFO 4.0, the future of finance.
Speaker 2:So hello everybody, and welcome to this episode of CFO 4.0. With me today is Charlotte Crowley, who is the CFO at Altano. So welcome, charlotte. Lovely to have you on the show. It's great to be here, Hannah. So tell us a little bit about your journey. How did you end up at CFO at Altano and how did you end up in a CFO role in the first place? What's your story?
Speaker 3:the 2008 financial crash. So I had a few options I was exploring. I studied economics and politics and a few of my friends had gone into banking, a few had gone into politics roles lobbying kind of politics roles, lobbying various extra studying and I did a master's after graduating with economics and politics in marketing, realised that I quite liked I suppose going back to the numbers and having things in their boxes is how I call it for finance and took on a part-time role, working just bookkeeping, finishing off my master's, and then came to London and found an advertising agency that was willing to sponsor me to do my ACCA and just carried on from there. Really. So, being in advertising, there are a lot of different sorts of people, not normal numbers, people, as you'd call them um. I worked there for a couple of years and then, um, they went through their own and sort of put them all together. And then I went to a very small boutique PR firm and was the number two hire in finance and I quite enjoyed bringing everything in-house. So my boss at the time was doing everything, so had a few bits outsourced and then I was the piece of the puzzle to bring the rest of it in-house. They had quite a bit of growth whilst I was there and had also set up operations in Singapore which had given me quite a good project to get my teeth into when she went on maternity leave, to get my teeth into when she went on maternity leave. I was there for about seven or eight years and again they were then acquired.
Speaker 3:Problem when you start doing well, people start looking and want to purchase. So I went to Vivid Economics as their first financial controller hire and slightly less terrain than my previous places and within three months of being there they were sold to McKinsey and sort of. After that kind of process began the integration into the different departments. When you're part of a small organisation, the finance hand tends to pick up a little bit of insurances, operations, payroll, all the bits where numbers might touch, and so that kind of fell on my plate in terms of integrating into McKinsey. Then, once that had kind of been completed, I took on a project role there. I was due on maternity leave shortly after and kind of realised that I quite liked doing all the different bits and pieces, not just one siloed role to finance director at Zenteo and my first experience or at least a proper experience of private equity.
Speaker 3:Each time I've gone somewhere I've learned an awful lot about the industry, the people, but one thing that I think stayed with me is that the bookkeeping and the numbers part, regardless of industry and regardless of people are actually quite similar, and the biggest learning and the biggest change is the people and the environment.
Speaker 3:Um and uh, I had a family, um, so I've got three small children, so it was quite a lot of working in london doing a commute, and so I am now with Altano, who are globally based, and it allows me to have a little bit more flexibility with my hours. Don't don't get me wrong, there's still a lot to do, but when you can work that around different time zones, it's it's a lot easier to manage with with my home setup, and I think what appealed to me is that they entered the UK market last year, and so there's quite a lot to get your teeth into, not just finance, and I really love how finance touches everything. So even if you're not experienced in a certain area of the business, you know that finance is going to have to partner with it at some point.
Speaker 2:You know that finance is going to have to partner with it at some point, and so it sounds like you've been through a lot of acquisitions and investment rounds. When we're thinking back through the piece, I guess what was your experience like shifting from McKinsey into Pripepti? How did that? That must have been quite a dramatic change, or did it feel similar?
Speaker 3:I think I wasn't with McKinsey very long and I think because of when I joined Vivid, I almost had two roles because there was the you've joined Vivid to sort of professionalize the finance function.
Speaker 3:They were a very, very kind of scrappy startup that had had such growth in such a short period of time. Their founders had obviously done a very good job of developing the company and the team, and so you're on one hand, managing kind of this accelerated growth, the team where they didn't have formal processes. We had a couple of the entity accounts still on Excel, no accounting software, and then at the same time you were then seeing what the rigor and you know control environment was of a much, much larger organization. And I suppose during that period I was balancing the two the whole time because you know they needed to eventually integrate in. But equally they were successful because they were this startup that was agile and so it was a careful balance and I suppose going from that into private equity allowed you or enabled me to move quickly, which is what what you needed to do there so tell us a little bit about what.
Speaker 2:How you felt working in private equity was it? Was it different? Because there's a lot, you know, a lot of people say it is. Some people say, um, it's just normal, but in a faster pace. What was your view um?
Speaker 3:there's definitely a faster pace. I think, in particular my experience there um, the private equity house, um, had kind of really only just um formed, and so they were like their own startup, uh, if you will. So I think they were still sort of finding their feet a little bit on kind of how to run a business and so some of the, I suppose, private equity mannerisms that you would ordinarily find. I suppose they were there, but everyone was sort of new together which had fits and challenges. Um, I, so altano, also private equity, private equity owned um 70.
Speaker 3:I think the one or the two similarities between them is that they're both part owned by the people in the business and because I don't know any different, I don't know what's normal in terms of is this how it would always feel, or is it because it's, you know, part owned by the employees? And I think both sides they were both very invested in the industries that they'd kind of invested in. It wasn't just what do I do for this particular business to get the return? It's, we've invested in this business, yes, we're going to get the return, but how do I grow in this industry? So I think there was a slightly longer term objective and again. That's sort of been my experience on both sides yeah, and that's quite unusual, isn't it?
Speaker 2:for private, you can tell me.
Speaker 3:They have a three to five exactly, yeah, so I don't think I had the usual um set of experiences. And now I you know, this is two, two and counting it's.
Speaker 2:It's what I know and you mentioned, obviously and I thought that was an interesting comment you said earlier about finding the balance between, when you're taking a scrappy startup and I love that term I can just I can see an image of uh, of that um to, I guess, professionalizing it without losing the core of what's made it successful. So what does that look like from a finance perspective? How do you balance, I guess, mitigating risk with being, you know, reactive and agile enough to cope with the requirements of the business?
Speaker 3:I think kind of go forward, principles are quite important, that you can sort of flex up and down. So it's sort of what processes you create, having the flexibility within that. But, um, for me it was always kind of what's a need to have and what's a want to have, and the need to have everyone needs to be on board with, because it's compliance, it's legislation. You sort of can't really change that, regardless of who you're dealing with and what people like and dislike. And then the want to have how is it that you can build that education and engagement piece? Because usually it's sort of people on the finance side of the fence understanding why that's a problem operationally.
Speaker 3:And then operationally it's understanding, okay, what's going to be the consequence of of this? You know something as simple as expenses. Why can't we spend 100 pounds on that? Well, you're going to pay tax on that. So this is going to be a bigger cost to your business and therefore your return is going to be lower. Okay, so if we set it at this, yes, and then on the other side we might have clients where we will just have to spend because we're in a sales process we're going to. You know, perception is important. Okay, let's include discretion for so many directors to enable this to go through, and I think it's finding the common ground.
Speaker 2:When you look back on your time, what's been your biggest challenge when you've been in those leadership roles?
Speaker 3:It's definitely the people roles, it's definitely the people. I think, um, you're gonna have worked with people that have founded their businesses that have been very, very successful, and getting them to open up to kind of a new and changed mindset is quite challenging, and it's really about building that trust and that openness which sometimes they haven't always had. I think At least sort of my experience as well is you've got quite a few superstars and then trying to get them to kind of be on a team of superstars as opposed to just doing things in their own kind of way and balancing that a little bit, has definitely probably been the most challenging.
Speaker 2:It's the people management side of of things in in the room, getting them all on the same page yeah, and I guess a lot of especially smaller business will have a like, if they're lucky, one or two A players versus a team of A players. So how did you manage that? Because that doesn't sound like an easy scenario to deal with.
Speaker 3:I'm not sure I would say that every time it was successful.
Speaker 3:I think some challenge is good and actually it's okay sometimes that people don't agree and you know they move forward with their own objectives. But it's really, just as I say, about finding that common ground and so the education piece and the kind of building that relationship where you're listening to them. I think it's quite hard to stop and actually listen and I think sort of doing that to everyone and then encouraging that back is probably the hardest bit. But you just need to find one thing that they kind of haven't seen and that they can appreciate and then slowly you can build up the trust, and it might be two or can appreciate. And then slowly you can build up the trust and it might be two or three things. And don't underestimate the importance of their whole team. You know, don't just speak to them. Go all the way through to the EA or whoever they're working with, because they might be equally important. You might not get their EA ear, but someone else might it sounds like there was that.
Speaker 2:That's a, that's a lesson learned there. Um, in terms of this, there's particular, I guess, challenging scenarios that you had and you had to kind of work your way through exactly, exactly so.
Speaker 2:So tell me a little bit. I guess it sounds like there's a quite a big element of stakeholder management in the roles that you've picked up. So if you look back, you know because I think one of the best ways is to learn it through experience and sharing other people's experiences could you talk us through maybe a challenging scenario that you've had and almost how you use the stakeholders around that person or that, that situation, to try and get to where you wanted to be?
Speaker 3:um, I think integrating a smaller startup, where entrepreneurial spirit was vital for the success, into a kind of a larger machine like McKinsey was definitely, definitely challenging. And I think particularly where you had different isolated departments at McKinsey where they would be responsible for that one piece and they themselves probably didn't have quite the understanding of the crossover between tax risk you know, commercial, because they had such a big job just doing the risk or just such a big job doing the pricing or whatever it may be that they were doing and the types of contracts that we had at Vivid some of them were kind of with, you know, smaller charities even and trying to manage that individual whose sole objective was to deliver work for that charity. And these are important, important pieces, right, you can't argue that that's not what the sole objective should be, but you now have to comply with risk, so you have to set up the project or set up the client in a particular way that protects both the firm, the individual, um, but also the charity in the long run. And getting the buy-in from those individuals to then support that work was was quite challenging and I, as I said, it goes back to the we need to have this. This is the non-negotiables we'd like to have this. Let's work on a scaling approach so it doesn't feel too uncomfortable. It just gradually goes to the direction that we want it to go to.
Speaker 3:And, as I say, I think, the listening and understanding. What do they want out of this situation? Well, they want to deliver to the client and they don't want a load of extra work, because they want to put all of that energy into delivering for the client. And so how can you balance a that work, not going somewhere else, because that's just going to upset someone else in the team and be kind of changing that mindset, and I think it's important. That's why you have a plan right that's over a period of time, not just today we're going from a, tomorrow we're going to be at b. It's important that there's a journey and I think it's important that people go on that journey and how you bring them along was there anything?
Speaker 2:because obviously you think that mckinsey, being who they are would have, would be very good at acquisitions and onboarding? Was anything that they did particularly well when they onboarded their smaller entity to help them integrate?
Speaker 3:um, they were, they were great and actually I've never been at a place that has got so much opportunity for training, development for their colleagues, I think because they went through quite a spate of acquisitions there was. You know there's a formalized process, but equally, each acquisition would be different. And I think that's where the challenges lay, because you've done it once. So you know that the headlines are going to be these, but to how important those headlines are are going to be different in the different organizations. And I think most people would have their day jobs and it's good having a kind of a transformation lead and someone managing the transformation, but you've also got two people on either side that does the day job and actually the most important thing is that they're connecting to make sure that going from a to b, that the day job isn't interrupted.
Speaker 3:And I don't think, regardless of having project managers all over the place, unless they're on the same page, which you can't control, you can support, you can get set up, you can do everything in your power to do, then it's not going to work and you're going to have friction.
Speaker 3:So I think actually it would be specific to the acquisitions and specific to the people in those roles and, as I say for myself, most of the people weren't doing those roles. Really. Everyone was sort of picking up when they had a spare five minutes because they weren't big enough to have those roles. And so the importance is actually having someone oversee that, so that you haven't got your HR person that's looking after IT, hr, you know, or finance being completely bombarded, because in a much larger organization, you will have someone in charge of IT, you will have someone in charge of it, you will have someone in charge of hr and finance and they're able to kind of cut off and isolate part of their day to support with that, whereas if you're getting that on the same day at the same time from everyone, someone would explode yeah.
Speaker 2:So I guess, whether you're being acquired or doing the acquiring, being aware, I guess, of the multiple roles of the individuals on that side and thinking through, I guess, how you approach the integration in a way that may be staggering, some of the integration components, based on the roles that people have components based on the roles that people have.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and, as I say, they have a template. Of course they have a template, they know what they're doing, right, but it doesn't mean that when you get to there that the template then you're speaking to the same person for about eight pieces. You have to pivot and yeah.
Speaker 2:And looking back, you know, having been acquired a few times, it sounds like is there anything that you would do as a finance leader before you actually went into that process to make it a better transition? Because when the, the research shows that you know the actual acquisitions, it's the, the. In some ways, the easy bit is doing the commercials. The harder bit is the actual integration of that organization and seeing the value. So you know, when you look back on your past experience, if you had to give some advice to people about to be acquired to make that process as smooth as possible, what, what would you do differently?
Speaker 3:So I think it's even before the commercial piece. Actually, I think you can't underestimate the pressure of due diligence to a company that hasn't operated in that way before, and often whenever you go into an organisation there's likely a bit of tidying up around the understanding to those going through it that you know it's not going to be a great time. But don't take it personally just yes, no answers, what can and can you not achieve. Communicate what is going to be very difficult and see if there's a way around it. I think when you've got the commercial piece on the line it's quite difficult because those selling want to achieve what they're being asked so they get their price. But actually if you're missing something and it could be replaced with something else and have the same results and it causes less stress to everyone involved, maybe those questions should be asked and I think encouraging that confidence in that process would make things a little bit easier, at least from my side. On experience, everyone's a bit shellcked after the due diligence happened and the price has been agreed and finally the documents are signed and there's almost there needs to be a bit of recovery time, I think before you start integrating and different integration approaches as well, all of the organizations I've been in have integrated completely differently and at different times and I don't think there's a rule book for what you should or shouldn't do. I think it's just being mindful and having an understanding of those particular businesses.
Speaker 3:You know in the UK at the moment're planning on and hoping for for more acquisitions, and for me it's important that we don't have a rule book. We have a framework so people have an understanding on what's coming, but if it doesn't fit them for that time, then we'll do it later when it fits, or tweak it so that it works for them. Because at least for our organization, the kind of the medical side isn't for us to touch. The idea is that we can make those kind of synergies through collaboration and having a larger group for procurement or, you know, finance functions, hr functions, but even that you don't know where they're touching on the organization. So it's important not to, as I say, have a rule book. It's what does, what needs to be the same and what needs to happen and what's a want. And the want piece is how do you kind of build trust and have something that you can both find agreement in?
Speaker 2:So, for those of you that don't know what we do here at ITAS, so we are a financial transformation consultancy that specializes in sage technologies. Whether that is looking at a new solution, evaluating your current solution or just helping you to get the most out of your current setup, we can help. But rather than me tell you all the reasons that you should consider working with us as a Sage partner or a transformation consultancy partner, I'm going to let our customers do the talking for us. Our tasks were there from the get-go helping us, you know, talking through what the process was going to involve, setting expectations, you know, making it clear that how much work we were going to have to put in to make sure that the project was a success at the end. And then talking us through all our different options, looking through our current processes, making us re-evaluate what was important, which elements we wanted to move across to the new system, how we wanted to configure our new system, and also kind of making us sit back and really think about what is the success of this project. When we get to the other end, when we finish the implementation and we're in the system, what's success going to look like? And actually, you know, putting that question back to us and really making us sit down and think about what is it that we, that we are looking to gain from?
Speaker 2:This whole process was really useful internally, making us really think about the key objectives and which areas to maybe prioritise over others.
Speaker 2:It was also really helpful sitting down and thinking about it rather than one big, huge project actually splitting it down into different phases, sort of smaller, bike-sized chunks, which made it seem a little bit more achievable within the time. And then, thankfully, itas have been super flexible with us during this process because it all it happened to coincide our implementation with our first ever financial audit, which just took up huge amounts of our time that we didn't expect. So we did have to slightly push back some of our go live dates and thankfully, itas were accommodating and actually helped us navigate through through that process and like to say that thankfully we're out the other side of our first days of go live and, uh, yeah, loving the move to intact. And you and you mentioned that obviously the different organizations that you um went through the acquisitions with all had slightly different approaches. Tell us a little bit about approaches and, I guess, the pros and cons that you saw to each approach yeah.
Speaker 3:So one it was kind of and I won't go into who because, uh, obvious reasons but one um they very much kind of integrated, where there was a set plan on how the people were um, kind of viewed in terms of what type of colleague they were, whether they were independent or whether they were part of um, the, the company that was acquiring. And then there was kind of a staged approach where it was quite obvious, I suppose, that they would eventually become like colleague from company B as opposed to colleague from company A. We had another where there was kind of a period where they were operating completely independently, so operational decision-making, and then at a juncture in time you could look at is this successful to be operating or should we start including as part of the wider offering? And One there were key folks that were kind of I call it the carrot and stick, but you were obviously encouraged to stay, otherwise there'd have been a penalty. And then another where they had sort of more carrot actually, but it ran through the organization, so everyone was rewarded, you know a transaction bonus or something like that.
Speaker 3:And then there's another where you have kind of reward for commitment and success of the independent, and I think, again, it's one of those that you can't pick, one that would be right for every organization, but I think it's important to get those key personnel locked in, and so certainly you need carrot and stick, but I wouldn't underestimate that running through more than your kind of more senior layers, because if everything falls at the bottom, it's going to make the top more challenging, and people nowadays will have more than just financial incentive to to stay at an organisation. So I think it's future-proofing that as well. So how you've locked someone in for a couple of years, but how do you make them want to stay beyond that point? And I think that's how you look at the organisation as a whole. But also, what can you offer down the line that isn't financial actually, because that's more likely going to get that longer term buy-in?
Speaker 2:yeah, and I think we, you know, I've seen a lot of financial incentives with acquisitions and buyouts and actually I think people forget that part of the culture shift is appreciating the new culture that you're coming into and making sure there's some wins on that side as much as there is a financial, because financial goes so far to the driving behavior, but it isn't especially in the, I think things, especially since covid, have changed quite a bit that there's a yes, there's a ask around.
Speaker 2:You know, um, I wouldn't say just, not just work-life balance, but other things. You know, like you mentioned the education and the development side and all those kind of things can really play a part in people's willingness to get involved in something I think as well, and not just for covid but there's been a real shift in people's mindset about staying in organizations as well.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so you know there are less golden handcuffs because actually it's easier to move um and so you can't solely rely on financial gain or loss to um kind of keep people in positions and do you know what's interesting?
Speaker 2:so I've been working, I've been implementing finance software for what? 15 years and when I first came in, people had been in that specific role that they were in or with that company for like seven years plus. You'd go in and they knew everything about that organization. Now, the, the amount of turnover, what you see in finance specifically because I think finance is always quite a stable role you get people move, but it was normally for good reasons, whereas now there seems to be a lot more shift in movement, in what and how people and the. I guess, like you say, the freedom for people to move, but also the attitude, I think, to people. They're less to put up with bad processes, intense pressure.
Speaker 3:They want, they want you know different things potentially from their organization yeah, absolutely, and I think even with finance every industry I've gone into there seems to be a talent shortage of them being able to recruit, so, and I feel like it's shifted somewhat, but it was very much over the last sort of five to ten years, uh, employees market.
Speaker 2:So yes, absolutely, um, and and even when there is um, I would say talent out there, I think people are more willing to take risk to find that perfect role, the one that gives them what they want in life at that time as well. So, absolutely so. We talked a lot about obviously being on the the acquisition side, and your it sounds like you, you know you guys are going on that journey from the opposite angle, which will be really exciting and interesting. So you know, when now you're thinking about that, having been so much on the acquired side, what, how is that changing, I guess, how you think about going and acquiring others it's very true.
Speaker 3:And, um, we have done one acquisition since I've I've been um part of Altano and it is rather odd being on the other side of the table, um, I, I do think it helps a little bit though, because I've been there, I've I've seen what pressure they're going through, and that's why I made the comment about the due diligence. Yeah, I think you can't underestimate the kind of pressure that people feel, um, and them just needing kind of a thank you once it's it's been done, um, but also that kind of relief moment. And I think, certainly for myself and the team that are responsible for kind of integrating the guys in, you know, we've both been through it for different, different reasons and, um, I think we're a lot more mindful on how to communicate what's coming. Not that it's going to change, but like okay, well, let's do like a page because you're not going to digest this yet, like we'll just do the summary, then we're going to meet up again and we'll discuss more, and I think it's that level of appreciation from an integration side that's helpful. And then I think for myself in the finance role, it's understanding, like what are the real pain points. You know you'll always find something in due diligence that they're paid to, to find all the things that they should, exactly, exactly, and I think it's how you respond to those that's quite important to build that longer term relationship. You know, as I say, you could go into any organization and you'll find something to tidy up, and I think it's important that you build that relationship from a trust. Not well, you've had X, y and Z that weren't done correctly.
Speaker 3:We found through the due diligence that there might need to be a couple of updates. Can we look at how we best do that, that um, and I keep going back to the what needs to, what? What do we want to? Because I think the needs to are the bits that obviously you, you have to solve first, and then the wants to is a conversation as opposed to it being kind of brought across, um, and then I, I think as well, for even that, that pricing, which I don't get we have a mergers and acquisitions side.
Speaker 3:Mine is very much to build the relationship for the future of their business as part of our organization for the last year or so, with the intention of kind of, I suppose, showing how successful the organisation could be to. How do we then build that for business plans and future plans with the organisation, everyone's going to bill a little bit more before they're sold. Then you know there's going to be a big push right and it's kind of also managing expectations with with the team on. Is this been a comfortable push? It's great that we can achieve it. But are we going to be able to achieve it with your current, you know, staffing model?
Speaker 2:and I think that there's an interesting piece in there is that I think sometimes in that m&a process, especially in due diligence, that you can kind of forget that you want to work with these people on the other side and and yeah, and that, like you said, you know you can it's so important to retain not just top level talent but potentially the wider organization, so being, I guess, proportionate and careful in how you approach those challenging points to ensure that you have a decent dynamic on the other side to build on, because otherwise you could effectively damage that relationship before you've even got them completely, um, and I feel quite lucky with the current organization that they see that and, as I say, I think part of it's this longer term investment in the industry, not just this three to five year buyout.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I guess that's something to be very mindful of. If you're in an organization either being acquired or doing the acquiring, or in an organization either being acquired or doing the acquiring is to think about. Like you know, I guess the, the motivation behind the acquisition is key. Yes, yes, absolutely, and you mentioned that due diligence is particularly challenging. I think everybody that I've spoke to has said their first one was always horrendous. Um, but you know, if you had to give some advice to somebody that's about to be acquired, about to go through due diligence, what, what would you say to them?
Speaker 3:you know how would you prepare them first of all, I'd say, if you're thinking about it in about three years time, start tidying up your books now, because I think I think there's something to be said about there's not much additional effort if you do it over a slightly longer period of time.
Speaker 3:Yeah, start improving the processes, start improving the reporting. You know, maybe get an external accountant to come in and do a little bit of a deep dive, see where there might be some gaps in the paperwork and get that tidied up ahead of that process. But I think, if you didn't have the luxury of having that time, I think it's just being what's the needs, what's the wants and, as I say, because there are needs to have, there is wants to have and asking the questions. Be open with the questions. What's the material impact of not having this piece of information? Because some of them are tick boxes and some of them are likely to impact what the guys are negotiating on. And I think having a little bit more of an understanding on those items would be helpful, because you'd have an order of prioritization instead of a huge list.
Speaker 2:And I guess, especially if the other side has done a few acquisitions asking that before you even go into the deals cycle because if they're asking for something that's an essential that perhaps you don't have access to, you need to have a serious conversation with those involved in the commercial side to say, okay, I can't do it, awesome. Well, that is some brilliant tips for those thinking of going through acquisitions. And you know, if you know, just to finish this up, if you had to look back over your time in you know and your, your experience so far as a financial leader, what is the one learning that you've had that you'd want to pass on to a new cfo?
Speaker 3:I think I suppose the couple of tips would be to look beyond the numbers. Actually, they're probably least important. If you've got a good finance team, because the numbers are going to be the same in each of the organisations Understand the people, because if you understand the people, people, it'll give you a lot better understanding of the business. And if you've got a better understanding of the business, you're going to be able to do your job a lot easier. And then I think, particularly for the acquisitions, it's just communication is key, and be mindful that people are going to come to the table with different levels of understanding of what you're talking about and it's important to set the tone so that everyone is comfortable having those conversations absolutely some fantastic tips there.
Speaker 2:And and charlotte, if people want to learn more about yourself or the organization, where is the best place to find you?
Speaker 3:LinkedIn or the company website For myself and more of the finance pieces. Definitely LinkedIn For Altano and what they're doing and they're doing great stuff. Their company website.
Speaker 2:Brilliant what they're doing and they're doing great stuff um their company website brilliant, and, for anybody that um would like to, that, as always, we'll pop those links in the show notes, uh, so that you can uh have a have a look and see what um charlotte and altano are doing. So thank you so much for joining me today. It's been an absolute pleasure having you on the podcast.
Speaker 3:Thanks very much for having me.
Speaker 2:And to all of our listeners. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please, please, please, do share it on your social media of choice. Do leave us a review, because that helps us. If there's any questions you feel like I should have interrogated Charlotte on that I missed then please do reach out. I'm always looking for inspiration for my next podcast. As always, you can find me on LinkedIn or at the email at the website, wwwifastetutionscouk. Thanks again to Charlotte, thank you to our listeners and we'll see you next time on the CFO for Quinto podcast.
Speaker 4:Hey Google, what's the best accounting software for my business? Give it a couple of years and I'll bet you she'll be able to answer you pretty accurately. But for now it's still one of the few questions Google can't give you an answer for. But we can Take our free quiz and find out which Sage product is the right fit for your business.
