The Best of 2009: Three CFOs Share Career Wisdom

From Steve Player’s 2009 interview with Randy Guba, executive vice president and chief financial and administrative officer with Integrated Electrical Services (IES).

SP: On a personal note, take us back to the beginning and walk us through your career. How did you become CFO of IES?
Guba: I started out in public accounting. I spent three years there and got my CPA. I decided that I wanted to go into a business and not take the public accounting route. I joined General Electric in Aircraft Engines and joined their Financial Management Program (FMP). It was a great development program. I was able to supplement my technical CPA background with financial management skills. This is a two-year program that's really well run by GE. I also had the benefit of several leadership development courses at their Crotonville training center during my time with GE.
I took on several roles in audit and commercial finance at Aircraft Engines. That's of course a global business that has a large share of the aircraft engine market. After about five years in that business I transferred to become controller at a GE Capital company called Genstar Container Corporation, a global marine container leasing company. Every good CPA wants to be a controller at some point in their career, and I operated in that role for a couple of years. From there I went to corporate headquarters as one of three financial analysts that covered the business units. My role was to analyze the performance of GE Capital, Aircraft Engines, GE Information Services, and NBC.
That was a great job because I worked for the vice president of financial planning and analysis, who was Jack Welch's financial planning person. I had exposure to GE's CFO, treasurer, and controller, and I learned how the leaders of the business operated.
I spent a couple of years there and then went out to my first CFO role at a division of the GE Capital Auto Leasing business, which had recently been acquired in Japan. This gave me a terrific international assignment experience, which was tremendously rewarding. We had just bought the company and needed to integrate it into GE, so I gained firsthand experience in how to integrate a business.
Following that assignment, I moved to GE Energy, as CFO of a division that does installation and field services of power generation equipment. This is a $2.5 billion global business that installs, maintains, and refurbishes power generation equipment in over 100 countries. After a number of years in that role, I left GE to move to a specialty chemical company in Houston where I was CFO prior to joining IES.

From Steve Player’s 2009 interview with Tim Carmack, CFO, Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford

SP: As you look back, what would you like to share about your career for people coming up in finance? What would be the key advice that you would give them?
Carmack: A couple of things. One is to surround yourself with the best people you can and then support and listen to them. Don't be afraid to hire people who are smarter, more experienced, or better than you. They will make you a hero and you'll have fun working together. Work together to craft a vision with them, but then let them run with it and support them when they fall down. When all is said and done, good people are what make good things happen.
The other thing would be to get out of your office and walk around, and read widely as well. I've learned so much from other industries; for example, things like Beyond Budgeting. This didn't come out of hospitals or healthcare. If you go to a Beyond Budgeting Round Table, Southwest Airlines is sitting there and all of these other big organizations from countless industries. It's just like when I was working at Coopers and Lybrand; in the three years that I worked there, I probably saw as many ways of doing things in accounting as a lot of people see in an entire career. Most people do not have the opportunity to get around like you do at a big CPA firm; they go to work as an accountant at Disney and they know Disney cold after several years, but they have no idea what a mortgage banker does. I did. I learned from service firms and manufacturers -- everything from the real estate industry to the people who build fuel nozzles for F-16 fighters. Never stop learning. Learn from others widely and copy them. Strive to adapt and improve upon what they did.
Another great one, which I've had in my personal life much more so than in my work life, is to find mentors -- people whom you respect. I have done a lot of informational interviewing in my life. Buy someone lunch and ask them questions. People like to talk about themselves and their experiences, and you will learn a ton if you listen. Often they will open doors for you that you could never have opened yourself or that you never would have known even existed.

From Steve Player’s2009 interview with Patricia Cochran, CFO of vision benefits provider Vision Service Plan
SP: What advice would you have for people coming into finance in terms of how they can advance their career?
Cochran: If they come with a finance background, that's very, very powerful, because they understand about growing the business. When they see a financial statement, they understand what it's trying to tell them -- and so many people working in businesses don't really understand that. They can translate the results of the business and communicate with the rest of the management team. They can explain what the economic outputs are from all the work that's been done. This is something that's sought after and appreciated.
To the degree that they can get exposure to other parts of the business --participate in teams that are working on projects, provide some advice and expertise -- they'll be quite valued. My advice to everyone on my team is: When an opportunity comes, take it. If somebody asks you to work on a project, always say yes, because it will lead to other opportunities. It will help you to grow, help you stretch and learn new things.
Another thing that's important is keeping up with what's new in management skill sets and business philosophies. You don't have to wait for somebody else to bring it to the organization; you can bring it in yourself. A good example is activity-based management. We jumped on that bandwagon fairly early. We jumped on the bandwagon of enterprise risk management early, and the same with corporate performance, dashboards, and scorecards. If something new is coming, don't be afraid to introduce it to your colleagues and your leadership team and ask about it, because doing so will help the business.
SP: Is there a rotation policy at VSP? An internal audit group?
Cochran: We do have an internal audit group, and we also rotate people among the four business lines so that they become more well-rounded and understand the rest of the business. The folks who work for us in accounting and finance can learn a lot of things, as I have in 30 years. My career has been more challenging than I ever dreamed possible, and this is because we have such a variety of business functions.
I'm very fortunate to have worked for three great CEOs in my tenure here. They've all been very supportive. They've all been willing to let me learn on the job, instead of saying, "Oh, well, you don't have that skill, so we'd better go hire somebody who has it." They've been willing to say, "Why don't you get some training? Why don't you talk to others? Why don't you try it out and advance your own skill set?" This is what I try to do with my team as well.
SP: Are you ever tempted to leave?
Cochran: No! I always say that I've never woken up on a Monday, or any day, and said, "Gosh, it's going to be so boring today; I don't want to go to work." It's always been fascinating and challenging.