This episode features CJ Gustafson, the CFO of PartsTech and founder of the popular finance blog Mostly Metrics. He started his career in PE eventually wanting a bigger challenge, helping him land a role at a startup. Now as CFO, he describes the day to day and what it means to be the right hand person to the CEO.

In this episode, we cover topics such as:

- The role of a CFO

- Common financial mistakes made by startups

- Forecasting in a hypergrowth company

- The world of vanity metrics

00:03:00 Path to tech00:07:52 The CFO role has evolved significantly.00:10:49 Managing expectations in unpredictable startups.00:16:37 Choose companies with growth potential.00:20:02 Transparency and trust drive success.00:24:06 Personalize and forecast for success.00:30:20 Importance of cash flow forecasting00:36:08 Metrics should be understandable, comparative, and be behavior-changing.00:41:59 Avoid relying on vanity metrics.00:46:02 Hiring within finance00:51:32 Control of time equals happiness.00:55:41 Stack your talents for success.