Metrics, Predictive Analytics, and Revenue Growth

By The Center Team on January 28, 2020

This month’s news roundup includes topics ranging from AI and shareholder value to vision talks and data visualization.

News and insights to keep you up to date and on track—from AI and shareholder value to vision talks and data visualization.

Break the Bad Habit of Overreacting to Metrics

Mark Graban for CFO | @cfo

Are quarter-to-quarter fluctuations keeping you up at night? These insider tips can help you better assess your metrics and ride out the inevitable variations in data.

“Much too often, finance shares financial and operational metrics in overly detailed tables, even though it’s difficult (if not impossible) for people to separate routine variation (a.k.a. “noise”) from exceptional variation (a “signal” in the metric) when it’s displayed this way.”

What’s Keeping CFOs Up at Night?

 

Ramona Dzinkowski for Strategic Finance | @SFMagazineIMA

Amid growing economic uncertainty, CFOs are struggling to find talent and to navigate the new world of robotic process automation (RPA) and AI.

“For finance, it’s not that we only need to report on what happened last month. We also need to predict what’s going to happen for the future. Predictive analytic technology is allowing us to understand data…as it happens.”

How to Create and Deliver a Motivating Vision Talk

Nancy Duarte for Duarte | @Duarte

Duarte Founder Nancy Duarte has been giving vision talks for more than two and a half decades. She shares her top four tips to help inspire your team.

“If done well, vision talks can be the ticket to get buy-in from your team when you want to steer your company in a new direction. Your team feels like they’re a part of building something great or heading somewhere exciting. If your talk falls flat, it can leave people feeling a bit bleak. This creates an environment of frustration or hopelessness and can result in a reluctance to work hard for any new idea.”

How To Achieve 2,475% Revenue Growth: 5 Lessons from Paddle’s Ed Fry

Courtney Chuang and Dee Reddy for Inside Intercom | @intercom

Tips for unlocking gangbuster growth, from adopting the five stars of growth and optimizing for a global market to maintaining focused collaboration.

“But with five different strategies all competing for attention, each hand must know what the other is doing – or risk misalignment. It’s a danger that can quickly send your company careening off track. Just as companies scale, so does misalignment.”

Airbnb’s New Approach: Turning Stakeholder Value Into Shareholder Value​

Maureen Kline for Inc. | @inc

Why Airbnb is on a mission to create value for all its stakeholders—not just shareholders, but also employees, customers, suppliers, and local communities.

“A stakeholder approach attempts to address major risks that can upend a business and detract from its bottom line. Getting ahead of those risks means being serious about engaging with stakeholder expectations.”

Data Visualization and Storytelling in FP&A

Carl Seidman for FP&A Trends | @carlseidman

As we enter the era of big data, it’s critical that FP&A pros learn how to present meaningful visuals that help non-financial leaders make smarter, more impactful decisions.

“The purpose of financial planning and analysis is not to build perfect forecasts and financial solutions. The purpose is simply to make better business decisions. Numbers themselves can support decision-making but the story is what convinces people to make the right decision.”

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