Ask finance leaders what they want more time for and "strategy" is usually near the top of the list. The harder part is creating the conditions that make it possible.
That was one of the themes from the recent UK FLAC workshop, where senior finance leaders from the CFO Techstack community came together to share their insights and experiences.
During the workshop, David Tuck spoke with guest speaker Aaron Markowitz-Shulman, CFO at PawaPay. Aaron leads finance, treasury, tax and legal across 20 African countries, giving him a front-row seat to the realities of scaling finance.
Aaron's point was simple: you don't become strategic by spending more time in leadership meetings. You become strategic by building enough control that you're ready when the business needs an answer.
Strategy starts earlier than you think
Many finance teams think of operational excellence and strategic finance as two separate stages. First you improve the close, tighten controls and make reporting more reliable. Then you can focus on becoming more strategic.
Aaron challenged that thinking.
When a founder decides the business needs to reduce burn, a reactive finance team starts gathering data and building a model.
A finance team with control has already thought through the scenarios. It understands where costs can move, which investments can be delayed and what the consequences of each option are. Instead of spending the first week finding answers, it spends the conversation helping the business make decisions.
The difference is that one team has done the work before the question was asked.
Control creates capacity
Control isn't just about producing accurate numbers. It's confidence in the processes behind them: knowing where the risks are, trusting the data and understanding what your team can deliver without constantly checking whether yesterday's figures were right.
That work rarely gets described as strategic. Improving processes isn't glamorous. Neither is making month end more reliable or reducing manual work. It gives finance something that's often in short supply: time.
When finance isn't consumed by fixing yesterday's problems, it has more capacity to explore different scenarios, challenge assumptions and prepare for the decisions leadership is likely to face next.
Influence comes from being prepared
The finance teams with the greatest influence aren't the ones with the biggest budgets or the most sophisticated models. They're the ones that are prepared before they're asked.
When leadership wants to understand the impact of slower growth, a hiring freeze or a new investment, finance isn't disappearing for three days to build a spreadsheet. It's already worked through the scenarios and can explain the trade-offs. Finance can contribute to the discussion instead of simply responding to it.
The conversation with Aaron was a reminder that strategic finance isn't about being invited into the conversation. It's about being ready when it happens.
Strong operational control gives finance the confidence, capacity and credibility to make that contribution.
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