How Elite Finance Teams Create Value

If you follow tech you know two topics are front and center: the future of work and the rapid shift to profitability and strong unit economics. Individually these priorities are challenging to execute, but the unique reality for Finance teams is they’re at complete odds with each other. How do you empower employees as a gatekeeper?

While the problem is complex, the solution is simple. Treat your employees like customers. This is the essence of Service-Oriented Finance which is how people experience working with your finance team. These teams inspire financial discipline and make employees happy while doing it.    

Microsoft’s CFO Amy Hood embodies this approach:

“I define my role as making Microsoft a place our customers, partners, and employees want to pick every day.”

Ask any employee and they’ll tell you they dread working with Finance. Processes are overwhelming and rigid. Have you ever seen a purchase request form? Who knows what to do with that? The challenge is back-office tools like ERP or Financial Planning Systems aren’t built for collaboration.

Trace was created to change how people experience working with Finance. We set out to build simple experiences to bring people and information together. At the end of the day, financial performance is the scorecard for all the decisions made across the business. Finance is doing their job when they influence decisions with data and information. The top priority is driving smart, disciplined, and efficient decisions. This is where a finance team creates real business value.

For us it’s not just business. We’re dedicated practitioners of corporate finance and technology. We’ve scaled Finance through hyper-growth and led $100M+ restructurings. We’ve built and sold companies, and built leading products at today’s top enterprise companies. Together, we can build the future of finance.

We’d love to hear from future customers or team members who share our passion!