No good waiting until the quarter is gone. I use weekly reporting and monthly a management accounts to track performance vs plan inside the quarter.
If something comes off, I’m onto my Business Unit CFO to ensure there’s a recovery plan.
How does a CFO prep for an earnings call?
Short answer … it’s a shit ton of work.
Here’s what I do 👇🏼
No good waiting until the quarter is gone. I use weekly reporting and monthly a management accounts to track performance vs plan inside the quarter.
If something comes off, I’m onto my Business Unit CFO to ensure there’s a recovery plan.
If something falters I’ll keep digging (through monthly management reviews) to ensure we understand the root issue and got the right plan.
Ensure accountability is in right place, and monitor relentlessly
And accordingly fix the root problem…
AND even more importantly, to already be doing it by the time the call comes round.
Every CFOs worst nightmare. Going back to the market and telling them you got the numbers wrong.
I’ve had literal nightmares about this 😂😎
It’s never happened to me (touch wood). So going above and beyond to make sure the quarter is clean is a must.
I’ll review with all of my BU CFOs.
I’ll use my internal audit function if Im ever worried about integrity (can be an issue early in a new CFO role).
Reporting integrity cannot be compromised.
Now the books are clean and closed we now finalise the key reporting KPIs
- LFL Revenue growth (volume, mix, price split)
- EBITDA and EBIT margins
- Working cap
- Free cash Flow 😍
- Net Debt and Leverage
- Any relevant ops KPIs
This helps with immersion in how the release will be received
From there myself, CEO and IRD spend a couple of hours together to work out what the narrative is for the quarter.
What do we want to say? Are we able to say it? How do we bring it together in a way that is lucid, and consistent.
We need to make sure that the narrative flows from one episode to the next.
It can take unexpected twists and turns, that’s normal, but it needs explaining very clearly.
Lots of finetuning to get it right.
Making sure that the narrative is consistent with the published strategy (or well explained if not) is also important.
Once the published material is locked down (normally 7 days before call), I get into deep prep.
Prepping the script, prepping the faq, evaluating every angle of challenge. I’ll spend 2-3 solid days doing this in the week before a call.
The releases go out to the market first thing. And the analyst call is normally later that day.
My IRD will be working overtime to gauge market reaction and question themes.
A good IRD will know the questions that are coming before they are asked
This is followed with a few of the team firing some questions at the CEO and myself. This helps gets us on our toes
It’s just a case of executing against the prep.
Making sure you don’t give any rooms for bears to push a thesis after the call is important.
So tying up loose ends from the Q&A is important
This is really important.
What commitments have we made to our investors?
How do we take this back to the organisation to make sure our management teams feel the same accountability for delivery we do.
Then we are back to step 1!
CFO Earnings Call Prep:
1. Drive Performance
2. Clean Close
3. Establish Facts
4. Build the story
5. Prep hard
6. Deliver call
7. Debrief
Rinse and repeat.
