Jason Berwanger:

Alright, Sal. I think we're live. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Alright. Good to see you, Jason. How are you? 

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Jason Berwanger:

Likewise. It's good. Yeah. Kids are back in school. Uh, seems like the business schedules have returned to normal. Uh, Yeah. And we've been busy, and I know you have too. So it's been it's been good. Well, I think we'll give folks a few minutes to pull in as, you know, per usual, folks need a couple minutes to get in before the event starts. And then, uh, we'll kinda cover the agenda, and then we'll get to it. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Awesome. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Uh, folks that are joining, if you wanna kinda post a quick hello in the event chat, maybe you see where you're from. And, uh, yeah, get a good chance to get to know everybody, do some networking. NYC. It will be in NYC at the end of the month for, uh, Stripe Sessions Salvatore. So I'll have to, uh, you know, take you for a coffee or something. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Absolutely. We can come hang where I am right now if you want. I'm at the, uh, my spot in Midtown at the Harvard Club, which is best. I've never been to NYC. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Always a good always a good spot to hang if you haven't been there. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Okay. Cool. Uh, let's, uh, flip slide real quick, and then we'll kinda cover housekeeping, and then we'll get into it. Yeah. So, uh, definitely, everybody's muted other than Sal and I. Uh, although we will be doing some breakout rooms at the end, and this is where everyone will be put into a, uh, you know, a different room where you'll be on mute to get a chance to network. Definitely q and a. We're gonna check the chat the whole time. So if you want, uh, to call us up for getting something wrong or curious about something, uh, definitely chat's a good option. Uh, and then, otherwise, uh, recording, if you gotta drop early or just wanna rewatch it, doubt you will, but I hope it's that good. Uh, you'll get a copy of it afterwards. Awesome. So, yeah, we'll get started. Um, you know, I I think, Salvatore, I, uh, I've been really excited about this because, um, I think you in particular have a a really interesting perspective as, uh, you know, a fractional CFO, but really a guy leading a group of fractional CFOs. So you you've seen a lot of transactions, and uh, you've really approached, I think, a lot of new organizations that are just now starting to think about finance, and you're often brought in as the expert. Um, so I think one of the first places we should start is just, uh, uh, when you approach a new organization that has a number of finance and accounting needs, uh, how do you do that? Like, what do you how do you start? How do you evaluate what to do first? And, you know, would love to share with the audience some of your expertise having seen a lot of zero to one builds for finance in in your career. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Um, I would I would kinda split it into, like, two rough groups. Um, there's the people who are entering the conversation with us, like, already from a strategic standpoint, And they may or may not have, like, fire drills underneath the covers. We sort of discover that as we're talking to them more. But they're usually slightly bigger organizations, you know, maybe, like, 20,000,000 or more revenue. Um, you know, and bigger is all relative here. But, um, and, um, they've probably got, like, a couple of people on the on the finance and accounting team. And there, it's always conversations around, we want better financial reporting. We need to get audited for the first time. They're really trying to, like, level up and professionalize themselves. And then there's another group, which is usually the easier sale, by the way. It's, um, usually, uh, a, um, an an owner operator with real concerns that keep them up at night. Usually related to, like, cash flow management, like, improving the the capitalization of the business so they can grow faster. And they've got more, um, like, strategic needs that are really related to, like, keeping the business turning on itself as opposed to, like, making more strategic improvements that are, like, for the next level of growth. So it's it's kinda those two rough buckets. I mean, there's a lot of variations in there. But so when when we're approaching the the first one, we really are which is which is the ones that are looking for more strategic help. We really do wanna dig into, like, hey. What systems do you have? You know, what, uh, third parties outside the company are your audiences for high quality financial information? 

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Do you have a lender? Do you have equity investors? Um, and then we look at what the tech stack looks like and try to figure out, you know, how those different pieces fit in with their, you know, overall objectives. In the in the second example where they've got more, you know, immediate kinda tactical needs, um, we first wanna address, like, hey. What's really got you up at night? And then, invariably, that's always connected into some version of the systems. It's not all about the systems, but, you know, it's like, you know, I I don't know. You know, I can't, you know, figure out, like, you know, where my receivables are gonna be in the next, you know, ninety days or, you know, my invoicing system is just takes me way too long to get, uh, invoices out or I can't match my, you know, my contracted subscription revenues to, you know, what I'm seeing come through my my bank accounts. And it causes them a lot of other underlying issues because, generally, what what's happening is they'll have some cash expectation that they're not realizing, and then they they're fumbling around trying to figure out how to make ends meet. And so, um, so in that situation, we'll dig dig into those issues first and then try to figure out how much of it is coming from just, you know, improvements in planning or improvements in systems and and so on down the the list of things that you could look at. And then there's also, you have to look at people too because sometimes they're just relying on people who are just, like, on over over matched for, like, what's actually needed at that point in time for the business. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. So you really it's a tale of two worlds. One's very much like a greenfield finance, which is that's that you're working with the owner operator slash founder, and it's really like a high risk operational lever where it's cash flow to run the business. Uh, and, typically, there's not staff there, it sounds like, in that example, which makes sense. You're typically coming in to assess and fill those gaps to figure out where they might need staff. Um, and then, conversely, it's more of the round field where you have an existing team. Uh, you have existing sets of operational systems, but they you need to get financial maturity. But then, you know, depending on the level of expertise with the team, uh, that sounds like it, uh, impacts how you might make a recommendation to a team, if I'm understanding that right. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. That's right. And, also, we don't wanna create a long tail solution. Right? We wanna look at how to get them, you know, quick wins in in any of the scenarios that they're in. Um, so efficiency and modularity, like and and and cost are always, you know, the big factors that you wanna look at. You can't kinda go in and think like, oh, I'm gonna redo this thing with a whole monolithic approach. I've I at least have never really encountered a situation where I felt like that was the direction we needed to go. It's always like, what do we have around the table that generally works, and how do we make it better? Because that that that gets the results more quickly. And that that goes also for the people that are around the table. You know? I mean, you can even say, like, the whole fractional CFO thing is a version of getting quick wins. Right? You don't have to, you know, you don't have to commit. You're not thinking about long term compensation issues. Um, we just kinda fit in, and we deliver, like, professional results very quickly. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. Hyper focused on solving that specific problem in front of your nose, but not overinvesting or overcommitting. Yeah. Why why would someone try that first? 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Right. Yeah. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Um, maybe help me help help me compare and contrast. So, uh, you know, I I think you talked about this a little bit, but particularly in maybe this, uh, brownfield or this, like, $25,000,000 business. Mhmm. Maybe in that scenario, how do you weigh those trade offs between, you know, more monolithic type of solutions? So the the platform that does everything all in one, maybe not necessarily the ERP, but something like that, versus, like, the, uh, best of breed solution for that specific problem? Like, how do you you know, I understand the way the Yeah. Understand the problem, weigh the trade offs, weigh the people. Now you're left, though, with how to make an investment decision. You know, curious curious how you go about that. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

I think I think the big thing is, like, how many things do they need to do on a daily, weekly, monthly basis just to keep the train on the tracks, and how much resources do they have. Like, that that always makes me very concerned in these types of businesses is that they don't have enough human resources around the table to really be able to do a few things at once extremely well. And the problem with the monolithic answer where, let's say, you wanna just bring in, like, um, you know, um, a a NetSuite in over the top that in you know, has, like, all these all these modules and different ways of doing things. The problem with that is that that just becomes, like, a huge burdensome project in and of itself. And keeping that type of thing on track when you're also thinking about maybe doing your audit for the first time or you brought in some new investors and you're try really trying to perfect your board packages. You know, there's only so many things that you can be good at at one time. So I always look at who do they have around the table. And um, in the in the in the systems part of the problems, can those be broken down into into smaller problems so that you can even also get away from thinking about, like, a monolithic approach and say, oh, you know, revenue recognition is, like, the biggest problem right now, so we're we should prioritize that and find a best of breed solution for that, or it's, you know, payments and collections. Let's go look at that one. So it's it's it's it's breaking down the problem and then also looking at who's around the table and what's the experience of this company gonna be like if you try to make these changes. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Got it. So it's really, like, what's the value in solving very specific parts of the problem? And then what are the trade offs given the staff or these internal resources to be able to actually deliver the solution? Uh, that that gives you a pretty clear picture of then how to recommend the next step there. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I can I can give you a real example if you if you care to hear? I have a client right now that is on an ERP system that, um, is called GreenTree, which I had never heard of before. It comes out of the MYOB, um, ecosystem, and it's server based. And, um, um, they've got one part of their business running on that that has ASC six zero six revenue recognition issues, etcetera. The platform itself actually does a reasonably good job of consolidating multiple entities, entities, and it's got very good export features to Excel. It's slow. It's clunky. It it does the job. But then they've got this other side of the business that is ecommerce related. And there, it's like integrated, you know, Shopify, um, since seven core is the inventory platform that they use. And that's really, like, a fully functional, pretty modernized way that ecommerce businesses trade in the market these days. Right? You know, how do you merge those two things together? You know? Um, and who's around the table and what are the other needs that they have? And the the team is relatively thin, you know, you could go into that situation and say, I'm just gonna bring a NetSuite in over the top and bring everything in. And I know, like, Shopify and since seven core play well with NetSuite. And then I need to transition all my other GLs from Gumtree over to NetSuite. But that's a big project, you know, and it's a big it's a lot of work for a small team that's also, you know, getting the financials out, you know, you know, reviewing contracts, doing projections, you know, you know, doing staffing, planning, etcetera. And so in that case, you know, we really are we don't really have a full answer there yet, but, um, um, kinda sticking with GreenTree as the consolidation platform and, you know, doing a monthly upload from QuickBooks doesn't sound like such a bad idea. And then you could plan out when you're gonna make the full on change later on. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. Super interesting because the, uh, the way you frame that, it's it's pretty clear that it would have to be a tremendous value prop to not only the accounting and finance team, but also the efficiency of the business to be able to make some of those, you know, ledger and ERP level consolidations. And that investment could almost never make sense for that organization. Right? Because, like you said, it's it's not like you're going from zero to one. You're like, hey. We got 80% of what we need, and 10% of that can potentially be solved with, you know, a best in breed type of solution without ripping it out for a fraction of the cost and change. And and, like, I in some sense, it answers question around, like, why we've seen, you know, so little investment, I think, in success rates with ERPs, and that's why. It's it's like a it's a really heavy trade off. And even the more modern ERPs, if you're moving to QuickBooks or, you know, some of the other folks that are competing in the market, uh, there's still a trade off there because QuickBooks still has a general ledger, and, you know, these other folks are really a general ledger and maybe some consolidations. But to your point, what's the trade off of your team's time and the cost of of transitioning? How does it actually help the business? And I think the not so sexy answer is is it often doesn't add any incremental value. If anything, it probably cost the business more than it's worth. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Exactly. And and if you can deal with the data extraction for reporting purposes and you've got good templates and ways for handling that, it's it can be sort of not that bad, you know, um, or I should say good enough, you know. And, um, that's really kind of one of the main drivers of, like, trying to do these improvements in the core financial systems is to get better information out more smoothly. But if you're, um, if you have a process in place that generally works, um, and you're not really trying to squeeze out every last bit of time efficiency out of the finance group, you can live with it for a while, you know, and then come up with a different, you know, uh, uh, metric that you're gonna use for measuring. Like, when when is it when is it not gonna be good enough anymore? And you can be you can afford to be somewhat patient. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Exactly. Everybody has something. And, yeah, it's it's yeah. Maybe you could have a process where, like, yes. Some your reconciliations could be 99% automated instead of 80%, but, you know, it's not like you're you're compromising on the compliance aspect. You're still gonna get to the right answer. It just might be 20% less efficient out of a fraction of someone's job. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Mhmm. 

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Jason Berwanger:

And if that's the case, may not make sense to make an investment there, which, you know, I think a lot of if not most folks fall in that camp because that particular, uh, solution is pretty heavy handed in comparison to the you know, unless it's a very specific blocker like you mentioned, like the the consolidated reporting or the rev rec or, like, a bigger bite at an apple that really unblocks, you know, both a management value prop and a compliance value prop, often not gonna be worth it for folks to make the investment. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yep. Yep. Interesting. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Uh, okay. Well, let's pivot a little bit. Let's talk a little bit about, like you know, you we have a lot of subscription led growth, uh, and and, you know, it sounded like you're the customer that you gave an example on, they've got a little bit of ecom, but also, like, some contract and and subscription or media revenue over time. So that's, like, I think, a good example. But, like, how do you how do you think or how you have to help a customer think differently when you're dealing with more at least high volume in, like, subscription based business models, particularly in con in contrast of their their tech stack in supporting them? So I think that's you know, we talk a lot about, like, verticals, but, you know, when when you think about it, a disproportionate amount of modern businesses sound a lot like what you mentioned, which is you have a sales led motion, which is maybe these larger, uh, uh, with, uh, may let's say, a depth of complexity. Um, you know, maybe a breadth is a better way to say it, I should say. And then you have a depth of transactions because you have the high volume side. And that sounds like a lot of these subscription based business models. So I'd be curious, like, how do you how do you think those problems are different, and how do how do you think you need to think differently to solve those problems versus the, you know, the legacy b two b type of business model? 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. I I think, you know, subscription oriented businesses, um, there's a real you know, there's a lot of asset value and and equity value creation that's kind of inherent in sort of the nature of that business. And the reporting side of it can be a a very strategic aspect of how you're actually gonna try to grow that business when you start getting into, like, customer acquisition optimization of of customer acquisition cost, lifetime customer value, and that kind of stuff. And so and and those are, um, data points that are extremely valuable and useful if you can get your hands on them. And so and and they're they're so readily obvious to the operators about how they're gonna use them in a lot of instances that my view is then you wanna make sure that the tech stack is able to deliver on that so that the business can go faster with with better information. And, um, you know, what I find is, you know, there's a variety of different solutions out there for how subscription oriented businesses, um, you know, process their transactions and track their, um, their contracted revenues, etcetera. Um, and for me, if it's on the on the b to b side, things tend to be more manageable. But I have, you know, encountered certain situations where there's a subscription oriented business that's on the you know, maybe it's like call it like a a very lightweight high volume b to b product or a a b to c product. Yeah. And the transaction volumes there, um, cause a lot of confusion with the entrepreneurs who have built these businesses in terms of how they're gonna take that those transactions and then handle them inside of their, um, their systems. And some and a lot and what I've seen at least in a couple of instances is there's confusion about, like, oh, the transactions are, like is the recurring revenue data, but that's really not actually that's really not actually what's happening. And, you know, I have one instance where before they hired us, they decided to do use this general ledger and actually put all the transactions into the general ledger, and they're doing, you know, 45,000, 50,000 transactions a month, you know, that are between, you know, 19 and $100. And the GL doesn't need all that information. It doesn't really help you with anything. But the there was a confusion there that, oh, we need this transaction data in the GL. And, um, what I well, in that instance and other instances like that, I say, no. What we need to do is we need to get you as an understanding of, like, what is your recurring revenue? What are your upsells and downsells? What's your cancellation rate, AKA, churn rate? Um, and what's your expectations for loading new contracts on. That's what's gonna drive the business. Now if we go back from the forecasting piece of it and, like, the metrics piece where you're looking at the KPIs and you wanna look at the system, we're gonna say to them, yeah. All this transaction stuff really isn't all that important. We need to go to the source of, you know, the actual list of contracts that are supposed to be, uh, making payments each month, and we need to figure out whether they made payments or not and develop data around that so that we can come up with, like, expectations of, like, what's good in this business. And then, you know, you layer in with that issues like, well, also, how are we gonna do revenue recognition? You know, it's one thing to be doing it all cash based, um, which is one of the reasons why, you know, sometimes the transactions become like a proxy for the recurring revenue because they're just thinking about it on a cash basis. But when you get more sophisticated and you're a larger business, you wanna raise some capital or you, you know, you need to raise some debt. You've you've gotta have gap oriented financials at least to some extent, and then that is gonna push you into having to deal with revenue recognition issues, and that's not in the GL. Right? It's, you know, you can maybe find some systems that allow you to do that. But if you're in one of these high volume, high transaction businesses, it it gets pretty hairy to figure that stuff out. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. Because the the data is not in the ERP. So trying to customize the ERP to ingest all the, you know, payment processors like the Stripe, the Adyen, the Paypals, or the CRM like Salesforce is and, you know, all of a sudden, it that's how you get that example on your hands, which you mentioned, which is now somewhat customized their ERP and their GL to ingest all these microtransactions. And your question is why? To what end would you do that? Now you just probably made a lot harder to answer the first question you set out to answer. Uh, so it sucks because they make an investment. They think they need the ERP and the GL customization, uh, but it actually just inhibits them from answering the question that really actually mattered, which was, what's my actual compliant rev rec that I get paid for my revenue, etcetera, which is 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. 

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Jason Berwanger:

You know, for a subscription business, you know, you acquire upfront and you got revenue over time. Did you get paid for that revenue, and how are we recognizing it? Those are really the top couple questions to your point you have to answer. And, oftentimes, you know, folks can't answer them even if they are that $25,000,000 plus range. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Yeah. So we hit some of these questions that are coming up. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Oh, I didn't see that we had questions. I'm sorry. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

There's a there's a couple. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Alright. Alright. Yeah. Good call out, Sal. Thanks. Yeah. Let's pause there. So for a fractional CFO, do you have to go, uh, to the tech stack? Or 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Do I have a go to tech stack? 

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Jason Berwanger:

Go to tech stack. Thank you. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

So, um, I'll answer that kinda how I usually explain it to my prospective clients is, um, you know, if you're on QuickBooks or, uh, Xero, There's a large ecosystem of ancillary plug in technologies that can enhance how that whole ERP works. And what I try to do is not force somebody into that if they're not on that on one of those two platforms. But, um, if they are on one of those platforms, we'll really look at, okay. Well, what are the problems around QuickBooks or Xero, and what are the third party applications that we can plug in to it to enhance it and make their life easier and not have to go through some large ERP, um, upgrade. Um, if they're not on one of those two platforms, um, we try to figure out, like, what it what can they live with and for how how long can they live with it. And my sense is always that, um, the businesses that have these, um, more complex or antiquated ERPs tend to be slightly larger and have more history to them. And so I I get back to that whole point of, like, how many resources around the table, and is this a disruption that we really wanna go through, or are there improvements that we can make around the edges? You know, like, one example of, like, a a a tool that, you know, is very useful for, you know, fixing things around the edges. Like, if you wanna do let's say you got a couple of old ERPs in one company and you wanna be able to do consolidations, you know, you know, not necessarily down to the transaction level, but just at the trial balance level. You know, there are third party applications that'll ingest trial balances and give you a lot of flexibility for doing consolidations so that you don't have to worry about, like, the capabilities of each of the ERPs. You know, we'll look at solutions like that, but we don't go in with, like, a specific tech stack. I mean, my preference is to see people who are on QuickBooks or Xero, but, um, you know, our clients are kind of all over the place. Um, and then we'll we'll work with what they have. Um, I haven't had a situation yet where we wanna just blow the whole thing up. That just doesn't doesn't really happen. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. I love to hear it, and I I, uh, frankly, it's refreshing because I think when we we look at LinkedIn and even some of these AI generated comments on folks asking questions, and it's really just, like, fractional groups shilling for, like, yeah. Use NetSuite or use Rillit or use and your answer is I haven't come across a trade off that it actually made sense to rip this out. And I'm gonna work with what the client has because the cost of ripping it out is disproportionately higher than just, uh, addressing what problems they do have in their current stack. And I I just think that's a very realistic, uh, you know, direct value prop to the customer first approach that is is frankly pretty refreshing because, uh, I think the opposite's happening in the market where there's just, like, this obsession with new tools and AI. And there's a mandate, I think, that, uh, you need to look at what new tech is out there, and I do think we should understand the art of possible. But you're doing the math out there, and you're saying, yeah, it hasn't yet made sense across my customers to rip out everything because the trade off just is not in favor of actual business value. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yep. So 

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Jason Berwanger:

Alright. We'll take one more question, and then we'll we'll kinda go back to the agenda. Uh, when do you customize your ERP versus, uh, add tools for agility? How does that change the lift for finance team slash organization as a whole? Uh, I think you addressed part of this with the, um, you know, but I think part of the answer was don't customize your ERP because oftentimes you're doing the you're basically forcing records into the ERP that don't belong, and they don't help you with any means to an end. But curious if you have any other insights. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

I would say, you know, um, I think I already answered, like, on the on the when if your ERP is QuickBooks or Xero, definitely look at the marketplace for the plugins that will enhance what's needed there. If this question is really focused more on, like, a larger ERP, um, you know, like or, you know, one of the ones that are, you know, maybe older, you know, you may not have a choice but to customize. That may be your your only path. Alternatively, depending on what the issues are that you're trying to resolve, you can also think about, you know, in this day and age, like, the IT teams in these larger companies are generally gonna have some version of a data lake somewhere that you might be able to access or be able to dump information into. And then you can maybe have a sidecar to the ERP, which is another application that's doing some of the, uh, the value added work that you need outside of the ERP. So think about it as, like, I can't find a plug in that goes directly in. Is there a way for me to do this in, like, a business intelligence tool or some other third party application that sits outside and is just gonna look at the data and then give me give me what I need? So, I mean, I've seen situations where, you know, people have done consolidations using Power BI, you know, so that the e r ERP pushes the data out into a data lake. They've got, like, two or three different ERPs, and then they just overlay a business intelligence tool. And, you know, listen, Power BI resources are pretty easy to find. You know? And if they really know what they're doing, they can stand up if the data's available. Um, and most of these people are pretty good at data cleaning too and and just QCing data. So, you know, you bring them in and then, like, you know, a week and a half, they can actually have, like, a straw man, uh, consolidation for you to look at. And then you didn't even need to spend any money on it because if you're a Microsoft shop, you already have the the Power BI licenses pretty much embedded in in what you're paying Microsoft for. So 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. Exactly. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

But I I would say get creative. Don't think only one way. Think, you know, a little bit more broadly. 

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Jason Berwanger:

I think that's on on. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Explore your options. Yeah. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. One one thing you mentioned too, I think that the daily comment, uh, that resonates. That's often how we end up helping customers where they they have a legacy ERP that's really a general ledger. And all of their other data is in third party systems, but they've routed and centralized that to a data lake. Uh, and that's where, like, we'll we'll play that sidecar that you mentioned, which is really that accounting automation tool to say, hey. We're gonna connect to all of these sources of truth for revenue and contracts and, you know, payments, and then be the tool that helps route that into a legacy ERP. Like, that's a great way to say, hey. Yeah. We're not ripping out the whole ERP. We've already centralized the data. Uh, let's go ahead and take advantage of that with the right tool for the job, and I know you and I have collaborated on a few of those examples together. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. For sure. For sure. I mean, it makes a lot of sense the way that you guys have approached it to, you know, be a, you know, high value specialized solution and be able to be flexible across, like, all types of environments and situations. It just makes the client's use case easier for them to to tackle. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. Meet meet the customer where they are and then solve the problem that actually matters to them. I think that's where your your your approach is a fractional on ours from a technology perspective is, I think 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

A 100%. 

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Jason Berwanger:

It's kinda why we get along. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Yep. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Probably should have figured it out before the call, but it's it's a good light bulb moment. Cool. Um, well, let's pivot, um, and and we'll kinda finish our our last bit line of questioning. But, um, you know, I'd be curious as to to your take, and and I've got some takes on it too. But, um, what what do you think, you know, from a pitfall perspective, what are the most common pitfalls that an organization runs into when they're implementing some of this new GL or ERP tech? I'm gonna be curious as to your take. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

I think a big pitfall is just project management. Being able to manage a project and keep it on time is very challenging when people have other, um, priorities. Um, so I think if you're gonna go down that path, you know, maybe take somebody on your team and remove a bunch of their responsibilities and just focus them in on getting a certain project over the finish lines. Um, also figure out, like, how high on the priority list for the whole company is is this change. Because the higher level you get the visibility into other parts of the organization about how important it is, the more that you can get those, um, departments or areas of the business to, you know, respect the fact that this needs to get over the finish line because they're gonna get some value out of it. I think if you don't have that type of communication structure across the org, it'll it it could be problematic for you. So that's, you know, another pitfall. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Wanna dive into that a little bit because, like, I think there's really two points. One is, like, project management is a high risk because it's really a coordinated effort across multiple departments and groups of people and keeping everybody beating to the same drum and, you know, the dependencies. That's a problem. I also heard a distinct other problem, and, uh, I think this is a good call out, which is, like, you almost have to have someone give up their day job to then have this be their day job because with any one of these ERP, uh, you know, transformation type of projects, you end up having this, like, dedicated internal individual or group of individuals, which is, like, your your NetSuite admins or your Salesforce admins that's you know, to to reap the quote, unquote value, you end up having to have a full time staff in addition to your, uh, your subscription costs for the actual platform just to get the project to the point where you can get it live and then maintain it over time. And I think that speaks to your point earlier as to why the trade off of it doesn't make sense to rip that out is because you're probably talking about at least one headcount or a combination of headcount pieces from your existing staff plus the incremental SaaS, and then you're gonna realize value at, hopefully, at the end of the project and into the future. And I think, uh, your comment there really highlights that where I I you know, I think we've never heard of a project like that where you didn't have that dedicated system person, particularly for those larger organizations that doesn't own the the finance tech, and they have to own it to just maintain it to make sure you're getting value out of it. But then the ROI line moves out because now you're having to invest more direct costs in it, which was your point earlier. And I I don't think that's a small point or of, you know, something that folks should miss is that if you invest in these things, you probably also have to hire some folks to help you run it. So you're not just making the software investment. You're also making a people investment to help you maintain it for those that ERP model. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. I think another pitfall is, um, and this is probably more often happening with using inter systems integrators to do the implementation for you, is, um, what are really the use cases that you're trying to get out of it, um, this this big change and and then you end up with, you know, saw an instance of somebody implementing Business Central, which is Microsoft's ERP, which is a very capable platform because it's, like, a pretty open canvas. But, you know, they ended up with, you know, kinda just like a replacement for their GL when they were all said and done. And it it was meant to be much more than that. And then all of a sudden, the onus was on the accounting and finance team to figure out, well, how are we actually gonna use this thing to its fullest capability? And now you're asking people to, you know, spin up new ideas for how they're gonna improve things, and then you always need to go back to kind of the integrator to help you make improvements and changes. And that just kinda slows down the overall progress of being able to stand up the system and have it work for you. So, you know, if you're gonna do an upgrade and you've got, like, really clear objectives of what you wanna get out of it, you know, make sure that that doesn't get lost in the capabilities of the integrator who's doing the work for you or your own internal team and that you really know, like, hey. We're we're not just replacing the general ledger here. We're gonna have a new, you know, like, I don't know, PO process that's gonna be tied into this and that this is what this is gonna look like, and here's how it's gonna fundamentally change things and, you know, make sure you have a clear understanding of what good looks like for that new aspect or if it's like a payroll integration or something like that. You know? These are all the reasons that you would wanna upgrade to a bigger and better system. You just gotta make sure that you get get those things. Because, otherwise, you could just have, like, a really expensive, uh, general ledger, which, you know, is not what anybody wants to go through all this pain for. And I've seen that happen. 

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Jason Berwanger:

That's that's well said. Yeah. And that that feels like a the summarization of the ERP category end to end. It's not just a Microsoft problem. That's just the new ERPs, the old ERPs. It's at the end of the day, how much is a better general ledger worth? And I think the question is a good one, and the answer is if it's just that, not enough to probably take on the project and the risk. And Yeah. Not a sexy thing to say, but I I think the math and the experience there backs it up. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Totally agree. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Alright. We had a question come in as well. I'll take it. They create buy in on your team and the overall org when shifting your systems. People hate change. Uh, a lot of people do, which that's right. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. I would say that, um, you ultimately want to tie the, um, the the change to specific value that each audience is gonna get out of it. And you need to be able to quantify that and get the information that you need to quantify that directly from the audience that you're trying to influence. There's nothing better than telling them a story that specifically caters to something that is gonna be better for them. And that in and of itself is like a process that you need to put some time and effort into. And you also wanna do it in a relatively compressed amount of time because if there's a lot of stakeholders around the table, you don't want them to forget about the pain points that they told you about. Because I could see situations where you get you gather your information. You you're you've developed a really good story to tell to the broader audience about how it impacts them directly. And then, you know, you invariably have got people in the org who, like, two weeks later, they don't care about that anymore. You know? And then then then what do you do? You know? It's like when they were in the moment and having the conversation with you, this seemed really important. But now it it that specific issue doesn't really resonate with them as well. And I think if you let too much time pass, you have more risk of, like, the convenient forgetfulness happening, and you wanna try to avoid that with with the team that you're trying to influence. But you wanna show them value that directly, um, is, you know, directly attributable to to their department or a group. And find the groups that have the most pain and are gonna get the most benefit. I mean, if you're doing an ERP, it's probably, you know, HR is your friend. You know, you know, maybe IT or if there's, like, a compliance team. You know, those are the groups that may get and and definitely your data and analytics team. You know? Those are the people who can really get the most value out of, uh, an ERP system change. Um, and they may have a lot of ideas about, you know, how you can enhance even enhance the offering that they're gonna try to get out of it. Yeah. So you're not just telling them what they need. Yeah. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Sorry to interrupt. Yeah. No. I I I love the call out, and the what I heard you say throughout that is you're collaborating with teams to assess the value based on the problem that's causing the organization as the way to get buy in. And I I think that's the best possible advice that you could give folks because then it will become clear if folks take the time to do the assessment. Well, what's the what's the pain point and what's the value in solving pain point for the team or the org? When you add all that up, you figure out, well, is this really worth it, and and what can we expect if we actually do this project? That project is arguably the most important part of the project. And I think the part that a lot of folks skip, which is how should we value solving this? And, uh, I think more often than not, it sounds like, yeah, when when you've done that math in the past, you're like, no. It's it's not worth it. Um, do a larger full enterprise end to end so so that way we have a better ledger. And I I think that's, yeah, great advice to to the audience and, um, you know, folks, I think, don't hate change if they know exactly why we're doing the change and how to evaluate. The folks that hate change or the type of change of, like, you have the McKinsey style PowerPoint of how you're gonna ERP is gonna change our entire business, and then, you know, eighteen months later, uh, and, uh, quite a bit of money and ain't nobody happy. And, uh, that's a story we've all heard and seen before. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Right. What's, um, what's an ERP disaster you can share? 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. I I think similar to yours. So I I've done, uh, five NetSuite implementations, And oftentimes, what you shared earlier around trying to customize the ERP ends up being, I think, the, uh, almost worse than, um, you know, implementing a more simple ERP version. Uh, so there there was a, uh, a project that I worked on where, you know, they had all of the all of the systems were decentralized. So they had, uh, uh, expenses were in a third party system. They had payroll on a third party system. They had subscriptions in a third party system, the and which included billing, and then they had several payment processors. And, you know, prior to me stepping on board to that project, you know, they kinda thought they were alive on that suite. But then when you talk to the accounting folks, it was similar to what you said, which is, yeah, they're they're trying to figure out what to do with all this because they don't have any of the data they need to actually get any benefit even on the ledger portion of the ERP. 

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Jason Berwanger:

And I think the answer is, like, yeah. We, you know, we run into a lot of these business models, and we say ERP because it's a software category. But it's really a general ledger is the need for most folks because most of the time, your sales operations and where your contracts and billing and invoices and payments are, they're not in the ERP anymore. And Mhmm. If you try to stream that data back in and keep the rigidity of the ERP, but then keep these best in breed tools, that's a great way to blow hundreds of thousands of dollars in a project plan. And, uh, that was one of my worst experiences is having to unwind that and then rego live with a more simple, you know, the NetSuite, you know, financial organizational tools that they needed without all of the extra transactional level info that they never needed because they had an upstream system admitting that. And then you need the middle layer to translate that, though. You still need something like a a Hubify or an automation tool or, like you said, there's a BI tool. There has to be something in between those third party systems because they're not admitting accounting records. So you need to get something to convert that operational data over. Um, and so that ended up being a three part project. You guys unwind the bad implementation, reimplement the actual ledger they needed in the first place, and then figure out the translation from the third party tools into the ERP to actually get automated accounting. So you had to do it just to undo it and then actually get the data that you needed in, but not at a detail level. Just the automated journal entries for reconcile. Like you said, don't push at all. So Yeah. That was the story that I ran into that I was, uh, you know, on my end on this. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

You made, um, an an interesting point there that I just it was it was kind of embedded in what you're saying, which is that if you and I'll and I'll I'll I'll I'll say this like a couple of ways. But in many companies that made technological advance advancements, Where have they done that? They've done that in systems that they think are gonna drive revenues and growth. So the CRM, maybe the, um, human resources systems. And I think if you're in a situation where you're evaluating the ERP, respect the quality of the investments that have been made in the CRM and other systems, and don't try to force your way to take the value that those systems are creating by embedding them into the ERP. Just avoid that because where we are technologically in the market is that everybody's API ing into everything else. And so if the four systems in other areas of the business are best of breed and they're relatively new, just take advantage of those. Don't try to, like, replicate their data or do do anything associated with that, um, because there are there are really good systems around and good ways to kind of grab data and integrate them into, you know, your ERP or into some sort of reporting tool that you've got, um, so that you don't have to own everything in one place. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Nailed it. Yeah. I think it comes down to we, uh, we started with ERP, which was full on the control side, and then we, for twenty, thirty years, had a debate around customer innovation versus control. Customer innovation won. And I think your advice is, like, you did those innovations on behalf of your businesses and customers. Mhmm. To try to go back to the ERP model would be chasing ghosts, and it would also impact the customer innovation because you probably made those decisions for a good reason. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

That's all. 

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Jason Berwanger:

The right answer is is to figure out a way to work with the operation of the business to get what you need for finance and accounting, which is why, you know, I think your approach is sound because it it gets the outcome for finance and accounting In the new world where you don't have everything centralized because we're never going back to that world because, again, customer innovation won out. Now we just need better better ways to assess solving what problems are left. Uh, and, yeah, I think that's a good summation of where the world is right now from from that finance tech stack perspective. Cool. Sal, this has been great. Anything else that you wanna chat about before we wrap and and do some, uh, breakout rules? 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

No. I mean, we covered a lot of territory. So, um, hopefully, hopefully, we get to hear some examples of, uh, of some situations where we can provide some good insights. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Yeah. For sure. That sounds great. Um, well, we're we're gonna stick around for a few minutes since breakout for networking. Uh, if you'd like to stick around, uh, there will be a prompt here as we end this. You have to accept the prompt, and then you'll basically go on a breakout where you're gonna be in the same place just talking to us plus and probably some other folks. So, uh, we'll go ahead and close out. Uh, Sal, thank you for, uh, showing up, giving some really great, I think, unpopular, but exactly right advice in 2025 on how to make these investments and and how to build a finance tech stack that works with the business. So, um, grateful for you and your experience and and all the things that you shared today with the audience. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Yeah. Likewise. Thanks for having me. Questions were great, and I hope the audience got got a lot out of it. 

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Jason Berwanger:

Awesome. Thanks, all. 

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Salvatore Tirabassi:

Alright. See you.

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