The landscape of finance is undergoing a radical shift as blockchain capital markets begin to redefine how lending and capital infrastructure operate. Macrina Kgil is at the forefront as CFO of Figure Technology Solutions, a company using blockchain technology to provide a capital marketplace for businesses and also for loan buyers on the other side.
She joins the show to discuss her unique path from engineering to becoming a five-time CFO, her leadership strategies at a high-growth public company and how she’s keeping pace with rapid technological change. Listen by clicking below. The Q&A, lightly trimmed and edited for clarity, follows.
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Modernizing Blockchain Capital Markets With Macrina Kgil
Welcome back to a great episode. I’m excited about this one because our guest is Macrina Kgil. Macrina is the CFO of Figure, one of the hottest companies you’re going to come across. It’s a fintech company using blockchain technology to transform home equity lending and modernize capital markets.
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Macrina, welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me.
I’m glad to. When your team reached out with the opportunity, I was genuinely excited. Figure has gotten so much attention since its IPO not so long ago. It’s a great company. Not yet at the household-name status. I’m hoping you can fill in the blanks for our readers about what you do and why it matters.
We are Figure Technology Solutions. We went public in September 2025. We use blockchain technology to provide a capital marketplace for businesses and also for loan buyers on the other side. You mentioned earlier that we offer HELOCs, home equity line of credit. We offer HELOCs in a broad range of categories.
Not just the ones that you think about in terms of a second or third line. That technology we offer to our business partners that goes through a capital marketplace infrastructure that we have custom-built. There are companies on the other side that I loan or secure ties loans that we work with. It’s a very innovative model to Fannie and Freddie and what they have been doing for close to 100 years.
Fannie and Freddie are household names. I want to explore that because the companies are fascinating but I like to talk about your own background for a moment if I may. Where did you grow up? What was your childhood like?
I mainly grew up in Seoul, Korea. I also spent some time in Sydney, Australia. My dad was working for a company called Hyundai. I’m sure you may have heard of them for the car company. That’s popular in the U.S. He lived in multiple places around Asia and Australia. I followed him around, including South Korea, where I was born.
Hyundai has done quite well in the U.S. markets. You attended Seoul National University. I think like a lot of accounting majors, you studied mineral and petroleum engineering in undergrad. A very common path for future CFOs. I’m curious what that was like. Did you and your wildest dreams anticipate you’d be a CFO for a series of companies in your career?
Not at all. As you saw, my background is in engineering, so I didn’t know what a CFO would do. Not even in my wildest dream that I ever think that I would be where I am now. I picked that path because my dad was in Hyundai and he did work on the mineral and petroleum side. I thought it would be interesting, but I quickly learned that engineering is not for me.
I have a huge amount of respect for all of the engineers out there, especially my friends from university. That was not for me. I much more enjoyed interacting in the business world than economics. I took a session on economics at school. I found that so fascinating that I switched my career that could get me there the fastest way possible, which was getting a CPA.
It’s interesting but it’s great that you realize pretty early. There are a decent number of CFOs these days with an engineering background. We’ll talk about this further, but one of the great skills of modern CFOs, it’s not financial reporting. It’s problem solving. Who better at solving problems than an engineer? It probably is a great background for future CFOs.
That’s a great point. I agree.
I’m curious now. You did a little switch. What was your first job when you went to the corporate world?
I started out at an audit firm, an accounting firm at PwC. There was a company that was affiliated with PwC in the U.S. I was out there working with many of the Samsung conglomerates. I’m sure you’ve heard of that company as well and helping them think through U.S. GAAP accounting, changing Korean GAAP to U.S. GAAP and how listing in the U.S would look like. It was a huge experience for me. I was only focused on the Korean market. I wasn’t thinking about us or the world. It was an eye-opening experience for me.
I sold a company to Samsung in the 1990s. Most Americans know it’s a big company. We didn’t quite fully appreciate how big it was. It’s like 20 percent of the nation’s economy or some absurd number like that. It was crazy big, and we didn’t quite appreciate it now. I’d love to talk about your career journeys. You’ve worked for some great companies and had some great roles. Can you walk through your path to becoming a CFO for the first time? You mentioned a lot of things. In particular, maybe any mentors that you had along the way who helped shape your career path.
First of all, PwC gave me an amazing path to tap into the CFO role. From Korea, they sent me to the U.S. in New York. It was my first time ever setting foot in the U.S. back in 2004. My primary role was working with private equity firms to help them organize getting their portfolio companies to list in the U.S. as an IPO, or for their debt offerings. It was a whole new experience for me. I’ve never done that before. I had not worked with the U.S. operational company or the accounting team there. I learned a ton. One of the last companies that I helped at PwC was a company called Fortress Investment Group. It’s a private equity alternative investment manager.
It was a very tough job helping them go public in a short amount of time, but I’m very proud to say, it was the first company that ever went public in that industry. It was so fascinating for me and I was learning the whole new world of private equity and hedge funds. It’s something that I had not tapped into. After the engagement was over, I went to the corporate CFO there and asked them for a job. He is one of my mentors. He’s been very inspirational in terms of how he operated and navigated through the whole IPO process.
I could also see that it’s not easy being part of a very large company with many different smart individuals needing different sectors within Fortress. I had a huge amount of respect in what he did being able to coordinate, being able to understand what is going on in every single part of the company. I went to him and said, “Can you please give me a job here? I want to work here. Is there an opportunity for me to join this amazing company?” He said, “Yes, we can find you a job here. Let me know what you’re interested in,” and that’s how I entered into the private equity world.
That was a great opportunity for me. From there, I worked with the individuals in the front office and helped them navigate portfolio companies, their finance teams and what needed to be done from due diligence to listing a company publicly. Throughout that journey, I learned about different verticals in the industries that Fortress covered. I don’t think I would have had the opportunity to touch on so many financial services companies or leasing companies or other things that were covered under that arena. That was hugely helpful for me in the four years.
One of the companies I supported was a company that came out of AIG. This is during the great financial crisis. It tells you how old I am. Back in 2008, there was a company that broke out from AIG and Fortress acquired that company. Back then, it was called Springleaf. Now, it’s called OneMain. I was helping with the overall due diligence.
I worked with the new CEO and a lot of the new executive team that came in. The opportunity just presented itself to me, where the CEO said, “Macrina, I worked with you for over a year. I think you’re great. I know you’ve never been a CFO before, but I would love to have you join Springleaf and become our CFO.”
I had not even thought about it. It was not even on my radar to go down the path of a CFO. I was very happy with what my job was at Fortress. I enjoyed working with many different companies and working with very smart individuals who were changing a lot of what was happening in the U.S. I thought this is my opportunity to enter into the operations world because I’m not working on projects.
I’m looking at something from soup to nuts. I will be there driving how the company would grow and what the company would do. I took this opportunity to join that company as CFO. That’s where I met my other mentor, who was the CEO at that time. Even to this day, he has been a great resource and very helpful as a sounding board.
That’s fantastic. I don’t want to say accidental CFO, but it wasn’t anything that you were building towards, it doesn’t sound like. Yet, here you. You are now a five-time CFO.
Yes. I love the job.
Apparently, but like a lot of roles, more so than most other roles, the CFO role has changed during the course of our careers. When you look back, what do you think? How has the nature of financial leadership changed since you got that first CFO role?
It has evolved quite a lot. When I was first CFO, I touched on the accounting and technical accounting perspective. That was my basis and grounding. As you can tell, I came from PwC and I worked on a lot of deals from a finance angle. It was mainly on the controller ship’s side. From there on, I was absorbing FP&A and investor relations. Taxes do play a huge part as well.
Now, what is also critical is transformation and understanding AI. I have been a five-time CFO and have been in many different companies and many different industries, but what continues to follow is that every time I’m at a company, I’m absorbing new information and new industries. Now, it’s much more transformation-focused and operation-focused, is what I see.
You’ve experienced so many different roles. Does it help you create what some people refer to as a differentiated mindset that impacts how you take on your role today at Figure?
It does. I heard about blockchain technology way back at Springleaf/OneMain. Back then, I was thinking, “This is amazing technology, but how do you even commercialize this technology into the day-to-day business?” How do you make people all adopt the same technology so that they are all following the same rule sets? Where I find that fascinating at Figure, I think of it as my full circle. I started out as a CFO at Springleaf, but then I’m realizing what I heard about for the first time and doing that on a day-to-day basis at Figure. Which is pretty coincidental or what do you think about it.
It is amazing that I’m here. I’m very passionate about blockchain technology and how we can make all of your transactions so much more efficient and also transparent. Which is very important in this day and age with all of the data that’s available. The other part that I’m very passionate about is consumer lending, which is my bread and butter. I came from Springleaf and OneMain. That is also the other equation that we have at this company, which makes my day-to-day job. I’ve been grooming for this for all of my CFO jobs to get here.
I’m allowed to ask three stupid questions. I’m about to ask the first of them. What is it that drew you to Figure Technology? What was it that made it an attractive opportunity?
The most important attraction for me is that it was the first company that I ever saw that commercialized blockchain technology in the sense that it was profitable and it was also growing at a fast clip. The best thing about what Figure is doing is that the users, whether it’s businesses or borrowers or partners that we have. They don’t know blockchain technologies behind the scenes. They just know that it’s fast, efficient and transparent. Which is how cloud technology was adopted in the beginning.
People didn’t think about, “Is this on the cloud?” We just use it. It’s just very convenient. It can be on my phone and on my laptop at the same time. How we have developed blockchain technology for all of the users and partners that we have was done in a really conventional smart way. I saw that point. The reason I wanted to join Figure using blockchain technology to be able to offer a capital marketplace that works on blockchain rails. We have consumer loan lending as well. That’s why I joined.
The second part, I would say, is the management team is phenomenal. Our co-founders have done this before. They founded another company. This is their second one. The knowledge, depth, and the vision of what they bring in addition to the management team who are able to execute this and who have executed this even before I joined, was exceptional. Which is why I wanted to join Figure.
You’re found to be legendary in space. That’s probably thrown around too easily, but in this case, it’s probably pretty accurate. I’d love to chat with you about your relationship with Michael Tannenbaum, the CEO. What struck me is, I think about the dates exactly. He was hired about six months before you. The company was developing a brand and not having met you and only being superficially aware of your company. They’re building a world-class leadership team to take this company public. That’s what happened, but what is your relationship with Michael like? I’m wondering about the fact that he himself is a world-class CFO. Does that change the dynamic a little bit?
It helps with the dynamic that he understands how the CFO function works. In certain cases I’ve worked in the past, it’s hard to understand what the CFO does. I don’t think there is a job description. Every CFO at every company has a different job description in my mind. What’s helpful with Michael is he knows that this is a flexible role. It can change and it needs to change with how the business is developing. I enjoy that relationship with Michael. The other one I would mention is that he is a great listener.
He listens to your opinions. He thinks about what is the best way to execute this going forward. I enjoy my time and my conversations with Michael. It’s been one of the better CEO-CFO relationships. I don’t want to offend any of my other CEOs in the past, but it has been a great relationship working with Michael.
For the record, you’re saying your prior CEOs were incompetent.
Not at all.
That’s fine, but you went through one of the biggest events an executive can go through. A lot of it does fall on the CEO-CFO, which is the IPO. I’m wondering if you could share a little bit about what that process was like because it wasn’t that long after you joined that the company went public.
That’s right. I knew I was selected to join this company to take it public. Michael has been very public and vocal about that even before I joined. I did not know that the time frame to get there would be so short and nobody controls the market. We wanted to go when the market was open. We were one of the last companies that went public in 2025. We found the right time to do that. The overall journey was tough. I have to be very honest. It’s tough for anybody going through that journey because you are learning a new company as I’m looking to take this company public. Both Michael and I were new to the company. For me, I wasn’t even here a year before we went to the NASDAQ and rang the bell. Learning about the company, the team and the culture in what we do, at the same time, trying to speak with all of our investors, the bankers and all the important people like shareholders that come into play, was a new experience for me. At the end of the day, we all pulled through. We had a great team. We had a great culture and the numbers supported what we were doing. We’re profitable. We’re doing well.
We’re growing 100 percent year over year. That was the benefit of what we could do as a team. That got us closer together as a team much faster, too. It would have taken me a longer time to onboard and understand what we were doing if I wasn’t just thrown into the fire. I’m used to being thrown into the fire and very much enjoy that.
You mentioned the team. One thing about the IPO is it’s an event. There’s a reality of life after the IPO. You built this great company, which I’m sure the reason for certainly success was this entrepreneurial culture within the company. The risk-taking mentality and that we can do anything type of thing and then you go public. You’re a heavily scrutinized company for a number of reasons, but just being a public company anyway brings a lot of visibility. How do you, as the leader of the company, keep that entrepreneurial spirit? At the same time, deal with the realities that are like, “The eyes of the world are upon us. We have to do certain things a certain way now?”
That’s always tough. I go back to Springleaf/OneMain. I have that experience there where we were a 5,000-person company. The company had been around for almost 100 years under AIG in different buyers and owners. What we saw was separating what we needed to do on a day-to-day basis and doing that well. Versus a few folks who focused on making sure that we were nimble and flexible.
Looking at new products, new R&D areas, new focuses was something that worked very well at that company. I see that also here at Figure. We have individuals who are very passionate and efficient. Blockchain technology lets us do that automatically. We have the day-to-day that runs very well with that foundation. In addition to that, we have our visionary founder who is thinking about how to innovate and disrupt the capital marketplace.
That also is helping where we are nimble in those areas, but then we continue to build out the foundation. We communicate to our investors on what the unity economics look like. Make it as simple and easy to understand as possible, so that we’re working with the investors and our shareholders, and the team at the company to move it in the right direction.
That’s fantastic. I want to ask you a little about AI. I was corrected, but it’s the biggest game-changer for CFOs of my lifetime. Somebody told me the spreadsheets were not AI. We’ll see. It was an interesting take on it. I’m old enough to have worked in accounting before spreadsheets, so I understand that argument a little bit. What’s your take on it? Everybody’s using it. I would assume a company like us, but how do you make sure that you’re getting real long-term value from your investments around AI?
I don’t want to call it a shiny new toy, but everyone is jumping into AI, experimenting in your personal life and also work life as well. The important part is, you want to make sure that you are asking the questions. Also, at the same time, taking a step back and validating. Using AI just for the sake of using AI and being a cookie cutter across the board doesn’t make sense. You need to be able to see that it’s a tool and use it effectively, efficiently and wisely.
Understand that it’s one of your advisors. For me, it’s very nice to see that AI is one of my advisors rather than the person who’s going to give me all of the answers to the universe. It’s how I think about AI. It has made our job so much easier, especially in the finance department. I’m sure it’s the same with any other department within the company. It has made it much easier and more efficient. Especially for standard roles and standard jobs that can be done. I can take people out to be able to think about what they’re doing on a day-to-day basis and analyze the information.
When I was preparing for this, I came across an adapter, which I understand it’s an agent-to-agent onboarding feature. Tell us a little about that because I don’t want to say it was based on my understanding but it was certainly beyond my ability to articulate intelligently, but fascinating.
As I mentioned earlier, Figure is a capital marketplace. Primarily, what we’re doing is we’re using our systems. Our loan underwriting system. Our data goes through the overall capital marketplace. What we want to do in the future is to be able to work with any type of lender and have them go through our overall capital marketplace. In order to do that, we can use humans and spreadsheets, as you mentioned, to analyze the information that comes over from third parties.
They’re on writing systems. It’s so much more efficient using AI because the underlying box is not like a Pandora’s Box and nobody knows what’s in there. It’s more standard. You can use AI to say, “Here are the rule sets. Make sure all of this information can transform into what Figure can digest through their marketplace.” AI is a perfect fit in that instance and cuts down on so much time where it could have taken months. This can be instantaneous.
I want to shift gears a little bit. You recently announced the acquisition of a company called Kiavi. As a CFO, what was the thinking? What’s the strategic value that the acquisition brought? What are some of the exciting opportunities that emerge once the two companies are one?
We are a public company. M&A is something that we’ve been thinking about for a long time. We are sought out for opportunities. We do see different types of companies and the strategic vision of whether that would be a good fit overall with what we do on a day-to-day basis. For Kiavi, it was unique in the fact that it was a very data-driven company. It also used a lot of AI. There were a lot of complementary areas with the two products that we offer primarily and what Kiavi offers primarily. That would be an amazing fit.
The other thing that I would mention is, we made this more of an acquisition across three parties. Figure is taking the technology and the platform and the employees. Our partner is taking the balance sheet and the origination. We continue to keep our market infrastructure that we are known for and what we do well. We have the first partner onboard that is able to work with us similarly to any of the other partners within our capital market infrastructure.
We’re very excited for the overall Kiavi team to join us. We think our DNA is very similar. We’re excited to have another loan product that joins the forces of what Figure is able to do. We don’t get to use the adapter as much in this instance, but we’re going to utilize it as part of the overall process for Kiavi and Figure in the future.
It sounds like this might be potentially at least the first of a handful of acquisitions you’ll be doing. Who knows? Maybe even more than that.
We’ll take it one by one.
Fair enough. Public company CFO’s wise answer. I’d like to look into the future a little bit. What does success look like for your company when you look two years or three years or five years out?
We want to be recognized and known as a capital marketplace where all sorts of loans, whether it’s mortgage-based like a HELOC, or if it’s small business loan-based or fix-and-flip loans like Kiavi, which is called residential transition loans. We want to be able to be a marketplace for all of these different types of loans and work with many different companies that come onto our marketplace infrastructure from a longer-term capital perspective.
We’re providing liquidity to these companies or a shorter-term perspective. We’re providing financing to these companies but this isn’t all Figure’s balance sheet. I want to make sure that I’m very clear. We are here to make sure there is a platform for distributions. Capital distribution partners are there and originators are coming in and working with Figure and making the overall process so much faster and so much easier.
At the end of the day, it benefits borrowers because they now have access to a loan that they were not able to have before that is cheaper than what you regularly see because their home is the base of the lending. We are able to help businesses and individuals. It’s what we ultimately want to do in the two-five years in the future.
I like to say that evolution is now a revolution. That the pace of change is phenomenal in many areas, including the intersection of capital markets and technology. What steps are you doing to future-proof the company to make sure, “We’re still the one you want to go to in the future?”
This is even before my time. What Figure has been able to do is, it’s thought through the tech and product using blockchain technology and being able to build a lot of the products and the infrastructure internally on a future vision of what Figure would look like. Being ready from the get-go on day one has been immensely helpful and efficient for all of us who are working here. That’s the one thing I would mention. The other part of blockchain technology is it makes all of the information standard.
The data is standard. It looks the same. In order to be on the blockchain technology for assets, you need that homogeneity as well. AI works so well with that. With AI, you’re not trying to customize. What we’re using AI the most, even in finance, is if it’s a standard information that can be pulled through, we can create a skill that tells AI what to do. Figure naturally is a great company that’s future-proofing for blockchain, technology, and AI. We continue to innovate.
By reputation, you’re able to move quickly in a hyper-competitive environment. A lot of that is operational. A lot of it is cultural as well. What is the secret sauce to keeping the fast and flexible organization in such a competitive space?
My experience and that’s the DNA of who we are at Figure. It’s bringing on people who have a mission, who are mission-driven to innovate, to disrupt and to change is number one. If you believe in the North Star, you understand where the company is going, and the vision, it gives you the innate energy every day to come to work because you know that you’re changing something and it’s going to be a different place.
It’s going to be in a different place a year from now or two years from now. That’s the culture that we have. The second part I would say is we take a step back and say, “How can we make this easier? How can we do this in the right way that will survive different types of regulatory regimes?” We thought about that for a very long time since 2018 when we were founded. That has worked for Figure because a lot of the products that we bring out are going to be old-weather products. Regardless of what type of regulation is out there. We’re following the traditional regulations that were set out.
That makes sense. There are many reasons you’re intriguing as a guest. You’ve done so many different things, and even educationally, starting with the engineering background. I like to ask about KPIs. You will probably have some interesting KPIs. When you think about measuring and reporting your company’s performance, what are some of the KPIs that you look towards that are a little out of the mainstream?
I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I do look at the KPIs as well. We do look at volume, partners and how people are being boarded. We also look at the adoption of additional partners and blockchain technology where we are able to bring on different types of capital providers into our ecosystem. Which is something that normally most CFOs won’t be thinking about. Since we are looking at our marketplace, we want to be making sure that there is additional supply coming through and we are working with different types of partners. It’s something that we do keep track of.
That makes sense. I want to ask your opinion for CFOs both in public and private markets. I know you’ve recently been in both. What should they be thinking about in terms of long-term growth investments within their organization, whether it be technology people or whatever it might be?
People are always something that every company or every CFO thinks about. The other part I would mention is how are you thinking about your overall technology and text stack and transformation to be ready for three years down the line or five years down the line. My experience in the past early days as a CFO, I always try to hire people or use technology for what’s right in front of me. I would realize, because I usually work at very high-growth companies that, after 18 months, I made a mistake. I should have thought about where we are going to be in three years’ time and how we are going to be building for the future.
That was a valuable lesson learned from me. When about working at a company and thinking about who I need to hire or what type of technology I need to use. I always try to think about where we are going to be in three years’ time or five years’ time. I want to make sure that the people can grow with the company and also that the technology is going to stay as a foundation. I don’t have to continue to do reintegration as something that I learned.
I want to go back to your relationship with your CEO because it sounds like you have a great relationship with Michael but you were a CFO at four different companies. You’ve also worked for at least four different CEOs along the way or perhaps more. What are some of the secrets that you’ve learned along the way that people who are maybe entering their first ever CFO role can use to build that relationship with the CEO?
My advice would be as honest and direct as possible. Also, people have a tendency not to want to talk about bad news or things that could go bad. Bad news does not age well. Being up front about what needs to be solved for and having that open discussion and debate. There’s not always one way to do things. It’s invaluable that something I learned over time. It’s hard to do. It’s hard to do from the beginning, but it’s something that you have to do. It’s your job to be able to do that well and make sure that we can all execute and be effective.
A great answer because it’s the biggest thing for CFOs. The first time, it’s like, “It’s my boss but the boss is expecting me to be a strategic partner as well. How do I learn that skill?” Thank you so much for sharing that. I’d like to ask you. Do you do anything aside from being a very busy CFO? Are you on any boards? Are you supporting any philanthropic activities outside of work at this point?
Not at this time. In the past, I had worked for a local charity. Even just to go in and help them with bookkeeping. I try to use my skill sets. I would like to have more time to be able to do that and give back to the community. The part I enjoy outside of work is working with folks that I have worked with in the past. I’m so proud to see many of them as CFOs. Some of them come to me for discussions on how can we do this better. Can you be our advisor so that we can move things forward and think about the corners that we have in thought about? That is also a role that I love to play. It’s also a great opportunity for me to see my old colleagues, which is excellent.
It’s tough because when you leave a job, everybody says we’ll stay in touch and they mean it. It’s so different to do. It sounds like you’ve found a way to do that. One thing I noticed from your LinkedIn profile is you’re a financial advisor for a company that Michael is on the board of directors of. Are you mentoring the CFO in that capacity or what does that like?
Yes, the CFO and I go way back. We knew each other when I was CFO at Springleaf. He reached out and we have been keeping touch. He’s a great friend.
It’s great that you’re able to support them in that role. Are there any other things you do to maintain a work-life balance that’s healthy? Any CFO role is inherently stressful, and a public company CFO turns it up to eleven, as the movie said. What are some of the secrets you do to maintain your sanity and overall health?
A few things. One is I like to go swimming. I’m very fortunate that we do have a few pool options around my neighborhood and I love the silence. I don’t know if you appreciate that as well, but the silence of where it’s just you and the water. You’re just trying to breathe the whole time. For me, it’s my way of making sure that I keep sane and happy.
Also, not think about work all the time. The other part would be, we have a son. He is a travel soccer player. I was telling my colleagues here that I was somewhere in New Jersey that is not close to any facilities, but we had an amazing soccer weekend. Watching 10-year-old boys play and they’re fierce. I learned a lot from them. Their tenacity is pretty amazing.
What’s your son’s name?
His name is Eno.
He loves soccer and you love being a soccer mom.
Yes. I scream too much, so sometimes I get the warning. I need to quiet down for my son.
There’s a lot of that. Did you play sports at the collegiate level? It might have been swimming.
I played women’s softball on the engineering team. It was a lot of fun. Nobody has any money in college, so we wanted to rent a room in the engineering department. We played softball for the money.
Whatever it is. I often ask questions about hobbies and stuff. It seems like 90 percent of the CFOs played at least high school if not college-level sports, and I didn’t. I’m beginning to think that’s why I was a mediocre CFO when I was one of those years ago. My lack of athletic skills somehow impacted my ability to function as a successful CFO.
Not at all I’m sure. You’ve even sold a company.
That’s true. I’m probably a better CEO than I was a CFO, I think. Anyway, one thing I’d like to wrap this up a little bit. We discussed how the role is changing but when you look ahead a little bit, five to 10 years, what do you think the nature of the CFO role will be? I don’t know what it is but I know it’s going to be very different than it is now.
In my personal opinion, the CFO needs to understand the operations and product of the company and the vision of where things are going. If you don’t have that part of your job, it’s going to be very difficult. This is regardless of whether you’re private or public. The second part is, the world is becoming so much more complex, and trying to understand what some of the companies are doing for regular folks is getting harder and harder. It’s my experience. The CFO and the CEO are both voices for the company to explain to external parties what they do. Understanding your audience and being able to articulate that as well as you can and getting them excited as well as you are. It’s going to be critical for this role.
You share that you have a real passion for growing high-performing teams. Even helping people reach the CFO office. You feel like that’s an important thing you can do is have your team become CFOs late in the career. I’m curious what spurred this passion for you. How do you make that happen for them because it’s wonderful?
I was one of the folks that my mentors and other people gave me the opportunity to be able to take this role. I was not ready for the CFO role when I first got it. I’ve never been a CFO before and I was there to take it public. I want to be able to continue to develop and nurture people to be able to do that. A lot of people don’t know their full potential. When you roll out the carpet for them and give them the opportunity. Many of the folks that I know have that inertia and they’re able to do that for themselves and become an amazing CFO.
That’s fantastic. The timing worked out pretty good because people will read this episode, a lot know that I usually conclude with the question of, what is your advice for the next generation of CFOs? I’m sure they love to learn it given all you’ve accomplished.
One, please don’t be afraid of hard work. The CFO job is not for the faint of heart. There is a lot of work to do. You do need to be thinking about strategy and the whole company. Not just the finance department. That would be my advice. I know that it’s going to be tough, but it is so invaluable at the end of the day. I love doing my job every day.
Macrina, this has been a lot of fun. More importantly, I know our readers are going to love your insight. Thank you so much for your time. With that, I’d like to give you the final words to share a spot with our readers.
The CFO role is ever evolving. New technologies and new things are coming up for the CFO role. Figure is one of them. Please don’t shy away from something that is completely foreign to you. Whether that’s blockchain technology or AI. Being in front of it, adopting it, digesting it and making it your own is critical for new CFOs.
