Today’s CFOs are faced with three challenges: maintaining differentiation, attracting strategic partners, and managing capital.
And with annual budget season in the rearview mirror these days, finance teams are prioritizing the importance of focusing on initiatives that create the most value.
“The key is to stay focused, support it through analytics, identify what brings you the most value quickly, and make decisions based on that.” Anna BrunelMay Mobility’s CFO told the series PYMNTS:A day in the life of a CFO”
“In a crowded market, it’s important to hit the mark first in terms of leveraging resources,” Brunel says.
“Everyone in the department, including the executive team, middle management and finance team, is constantly striving to be as efficient as possible and find ways to leverage resources to achieve our focused goals,” she added. Ta.
The autonomous driving industry, where May Mobility is based, is going through a period of consolidation, with many companies struggling to bring their technology to life, leading to closures and acquisitions.
Against this backdrop of an ecosystem, Brunel emphasized the importance of having differentiated technology and ultimately delivering products that are critical to customers’ businesses.
She noted that May Mobility stands out in the autonomous driving space due to its microtransit approach within autonomous vehicles (AVs).
“While other companies are spending billions, we have raised $300 million to date, driven by our decision to invest in multi-policy decision technology rather than a monolithic stack. I think it’s because we can develop better technology with fewer resources,” Brunel said.
Accelerate growth with advanced technology
One of the key roles of the finance team is to drive efficiency and support other departments.
Digital solutions are becoming one of the tools of choice for data-savvy CFOs.
“Joining a very technology-forward company that understands the value of data was a real blessing for me compared to joining a younger company that might not have enough of that kind of investment. ” explained Brunel.
She believes in moving from data management to providing predictive insights, especially when it comes to helping other organizational units run scenarios, make informed decisions, and achieve goals more effectively. I pointed out the importance.
“I believe that in our lifetime, not just cars, but every moving machine on the planet will be automated. And the smart infrastructure that oversees and supports it will also be automated.” Brunel added.
Especially in finance, “putting the wheels on the bus is the most important part,” she said. “As a CFO, making the most of today’s technology is structurally critical to many areas of the business.”
“Once the basic balance sheet obstacles and remedies are covered, we can look elsewhere and use data to make better decisions and figure out the best ways to spend our money most effectively. We can,” Brunel said, underscoring that by going beyond the data. By leveraging management and insight-driven analysis, companies can make predictions about both performance and investment.
The vital and dynamic role of the CFO
Navigating a company in a dynamic macro environment like the one we currently find ourselves in should never be done alone or in silos.
Reflecting on the evolution of the CFO’s role, Brunel said he believes driving value and helping other teams succeed is a CFO’s core responsibility.
The CFO is a truth teller internally, ensuring transparency, and externally a storyteller, communicating the company’s vision and potential to investors, and playing a key role in strategic decision-making.
“The CFO’s role has always been the same: to drive value and to make the other teams as successful as possible toward the goal of driving value,” Brunel said. “Everything we do must be done to achieve our goal of advancing shareholder returns, regardless of internal and external pressures or the tools available to us to achieve our goals. Regardless, the same formula always applies.”
Regarding the potential of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in the finance sector, Brunel highlighted the role AI can play in improving productivity.
“We want leaders to leverage that to increase productivity across the company,” she said, cautioning against creating unnecessary work.
Emphasizing that AI has the potential to significantly improve individual productivity, Brunel said he believes there are opportunities to deploy AI both internally and externally.
“If you win in technology, you win in the marketplace,” she said.
