Business RadioX ®

Essie Escobedo, Office Angels

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North Fulton Business Radio
North Fulton Business Radio
Essie Escobedo, Office Angels
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Essie Escobedo, Office Angels

Essie Escobedo, Founder and “Chief Executive Angel” of Office Angels

Essie Escobedo, Office Angels

The mission of Office Angels is to restore joy to the life of small business owners, enabling them to focus on what they do best. At the same time, Office Angels honors and supports at-home experts who wish to continue working on an as-needed basis.

Not a temp firm or a placement service, Office Angels matches a business owner’s support needs with professionals who have the skills and experience necessary to handle work that is essential to creating and maintaining a successful small business.

For over seventeen years, Office Angels has been helping small business owners, associations, and non-profits with administrative tasks, bookkeeping, marketing support, presentation preparation, speaking engagements, business development, document formatting, database management, research, writing services, HR services, and much more.

Essie Escobedo launched Office Angels in 2000 after a 25-year career as a successful small business owner. In 2018, Essie was named a Business Person of Excellence by the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce. She was an inaugural winner of the Business Builder Award given by the Professional Women’s Information Network (ProWIN), and also a nominee for the Turknett Leadership Character Award.

For more information on Office Angels, go to https://officeangels.us or call 770-442-9246.

Decision Vision Episode 7: How to Hire a Forensic Accountant – An Interview with Randy Domigan, Brady Ware & Company

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Decision Vision
Decision Vision
Decision Vision Episode 7: How to Hire a Forensic Accountant - An Interview with Randy Domigan, Brady Ware & Company
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How to Hire a Forensic Accountant

Michael Blake, Director of Brady Ware & Company and Host of the Decision Vision podcast, interviews Randy Domigan, Director of Brady Ware & Company, on different types of fraud, why a normal financial audit doesn’t usually detect fraud, and signs your business might be a victim of fraud.

Randy Domigan, Brady Ware & Company

Randy Domigan

Randy is a Certified Fraud Examiner and can identify the warning signs and red flags that indicate evidence of fraud and fraud risk. He uses his expertise to help dealerships improve fraud prevention, detection, and deterrence. He has been trained to uncover and illuminate fraud when it occurs, and even more importantly to deter fraud before it starts. In addition to his fraud expertise, Randy has over 20 years of experience in tax and financial planning and internal control consulting.

 

Michael Blake, Brady Ware & Company

Mike Blake, Host of “Decision Vision”

Michael Blake is Host of the Decision Vision podcast series and a Director of Brady Ware & Company. Mike specializes in the valuation of intellectual property-driven firms, such as software firms, aerospace firms and professional services firms, most frequently in the capacity as a transaction advisor, helping clients obtain great outcomes from complex transaction opportunities. Mike is also a specialist in the appraisal of intellectual properties as stand-alone assets, such as software, trade secrets, and patents.

He has been a full-time business appraiser for 13 years with public accounting firms, boutique business appraisal firms, and an owner of his own firm. Prior to that, he spent 8 years in venture capital and investment banking, including transactions in the U.S., Israel, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus.

Brady Ware & Company

Brady Ware & Company is a regional full-service accounting and advisory firm which helps businesses and entrepreneurs make visions a reality. Brady Ware services clients nationally from its offices in Alpharetta, GA; Columbus and Dayton, OH; and Richmond, IN. The firm is growth minded, committed to the regions in which they operate, and most importantly, they make significant investments in their people and service offerings to meet the changing financial needs of those they are privileged to serve. The firm is dedicated to providing results that make a difference for its clients.

Decision Vision Podcast Series

Decision Vision is a podcast covering topics and issues facing small business owners and connecting them with solutions from leading experts. This series is presented by Brady Ware & Company. If you are a decision maker for a small business, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us at decisionvision@bradyware.com and make sure to listen to every Thursday to the Decision Vision podcast. Past episodes of Decision Vision can be found here. Decision Vision is produced and broadcast by Business RadioX®.

 

Visit Brady Ware & Company on social media:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brady-ware/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bradywareCPAs/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/BradyWare

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bradywarecompany/

Show Transcript:

Intro: [00:00:01] Welcome to Decision Vision Podcast, a series focusing on critical business decisions, brought to you by Brady Ware & Company. Brady Ware is a regional, full-service accounting and advisory firm that helps businesses and entrepreneurs make vision a reality.

Michael Blake: [00:00:21] And welcome to Decision Vision, a podcast giving you, the listener, clear vision to make great business decisions. In each episode, we’re discussing the process of decision making on a different topic. Rather than making recommendations because everyone’s circumstances are different, we talk to subject matter experts about how they would recommend thinking about that decision.

Michael Blake: [00:00:40] My name is Mike Blake. And I’m your host for today’s program. I’m a Director at Brady Ware & Company, a full-service accounting firm based in Dayton, Ohio, with offices in Dayton; Columbus, Ohio; Richmond, Indiana; and Alpharetta, Georgia, which is where we are recording today. Brady Ware is sponsoring this podcast. If you like this podcast, please subscribe on your favorite podcast aggregator, and please consider leaving a review of the podcast as well.

Michael Blake: [00:01:05] Today, we’re going to talk about hiring a forensic accountant. And forensic accounting is always fun to talk to because in the accounting world, they always have the greatest stories, the greatest war stories. I mean, who doesn’t love a story about white collar crime? Unless you’re in it, I guess, then, it’s not so great. But if you’re sort of a third person, it makes the best cocktail story. So, pro-tip to the listeners out there, if you’re ever, sort of, at a mixer at a CPA firm, and you don’t know who to talk to, ask who the forensic accountants are because they have the best stories by none.

Michael Blake: [00:01:43] Yeah, forensic accounting is a very specialized area of the accounting profession, and it’s one of the most difficult decisions in terms of deciding whether or not you’re going to hire a forensic accountant because by definition, when you’re considering hiring a forensic accountant, you think that, potentially, there’s been, at least, a major mishap, and in many cases, you suspect that a crime has been committed often by somebody that you trust.

Michael Blake: [00:02:18] And so, I can tell you from talking to my clients who I’ve referred to forensic accountants over the years, it’s a major hurdle to, then, make that call to say, “Yeah, I need to get this checked out. I need to have somebody really come in, and look under all the rocks, and, hopefully, find nothing. That would be a great outcome. But then, if something is going to be found that we know exactly what it is and we can make it from there.”

Michael Blake: [00:02:42] And so, to talk about that with us is Brady Ware’s resident expert. Joining us today by phone from the Gem City Dayton, Ohio is Randy Domigan, one of my business partners at Brady Ware in Dayton. Randy works in a variety of accounting, auditing, and consulting engagements, as well as corporate and individual tax areas. He provides services to closely-held businesses in a variety of industries, including manufacturing, dealerships, retail, distribution, professional services, transportation, and real estate. He leads our firm’s fraud services practice and assists with recruiting and training of new team members, and serves as the head of the firm’s Insurance Services Group Technology Committee.

Michael Blake: [00:03:26] Randy is a member of the Ohio Society of Certified Public Accountants, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners. He also serves as a chair for the Better Business Bureau’s Eclipse Integrity Awards Committee and is active for the Dayton Chamber of Commerce and the Miami Valley Venture Association. Randy is a 1994 graduate of Wright State University. After working three years in another regional accounting firm in Dayton, Randy joined Brady Ware in July of 1997. Randy, thanks so much for taking your time out of tax season to join us for a little bit today.

Randy Domigan: [00:04:03] Yeah. Thank you, Mike.

Michael Blake: [00:04:05] So, I’ve kind of gone through your intro but I don’t think the intro necessarily does it justice. So, talk a little bit about your role at Brady Ware, and how much forensic accounting, and maybe chasing down white-collar criminals is a part of what you do.

Randy Domigan: [00:04:24] Yeah, absolutely. So, as Mike said, I am a director with the firm. And I do work out of our Dayton office. I do head up our fraud and forensic practice. And as part of that, I do spend a good portion of my time typically outside of our tax season, which is kind of our January through April timeframe. But outside of that timeframe, I spend a lot of time working with companies to primarily strengthen their internal controls.

Randy Domigan: [00:04:53] I do get involved in cases where fraud has occurred, and I do have to go in and do investigations. What I try to do because I see the ill impacts of that on businesses and how much it can destroy a company is I really try to get out, and get in front of these things, and work with companies to help strengthen controls, reduce risk, and really find ways to to prevent fraud from happening in the first place because that’s really where you want to be. You don’t want to be on the receiving end of needing a forensic accountant, which, of course, they can do, but you want to try to be on the front end of the this and try to put preventive measures in place to keep it from happening to begin with because, unfortunately, once it happens, usually, there’s never a real good result.

Michael Blake: [00:05:40] Yeah. Once that bell gets rung, it’s very hard to unring it.

Randy Domigan: [00:05:43] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:05:44] And, I got to be candid. I did not know that about the forensic accounting role. I’ve worked in other firms as well, and all they ever talk about was finding stolen money or dealing with lost profits, and damages, and so forth. But it had not occurred to me, but it makes sense now is that the other side of that is putting in internal controls and preventative measures, so that the other side of that identity that you have is, we hope, never called upon.

Randy Domigan: [00:06:14] Absolutely. And part of that is bringing awareness to what the issue is because you don’t know you need a forensic accountant until it happens to you typically. And so, trying to educate people on the front end, and show what some of the risk factors are, and bringing awareness about it is part of the battle in trying to fight fraud, so companies can implement risk management policies ahead of something happening. And I’ve even had cases where I have gone out to do some of this consulting and looking at kind of where their business risks are in, and where their controls are, and how they’re set up where I’ve actually found fraud that has already occurred, and the company was completely oblivious to it.

Michael Blake: [00:06:59] I can imagine that led to some uncomfortable conversations.

Randy Domigan: [00:07:03] Yes. it did. Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:07:05] So, can anybody with a CPA do forensic accounting or what is their specialized training to become a specialist as you are in that particular field?

Randy Domigan: [00:07:18] Yeah. No, that’s a great question, Mike. So, in addition to being a CPA, I’m also a CFE, which stands for Certified Fraud Examiner. So, when I originally got interested in fighting fraud and getting into that aspect of my career, I had actually been involved on an engagement where some employee embezzlement had happened, and I went in and was basically just trying to figure out what happened. It’s like where the money was stolen from and the different ways that the individual was able to steal the money. And it really just fascinated me.

Randy Domigan: [00:07:52] And so, I started looking at other ways to help sharpen my skills in that area because just with my auditing background, it really wasn’t sufficient to really cover all the aspects that go into being a forensic accountant and a certified fraud examiner. You need to understand some of the laws surrounding how fraud is prosecuted. You need to understand what some of the things that lead people to commit fraud, what some of those risk indicators are. And so, I went ahead and went to an organization called the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, became an associate member, and started looking at a lot of the classes and things that they offered in order to become a certified fraud examiner. And as a result of that, there’s an examination I had to take and several classes. And I came out at the end of that and really started to make that part of my practice area.

Michael Blake: [00:08:56] And how long ago was that?

Randy Domigan: [00:08:59] I did that back about 10 years ago.

Michael Blake: [00:09:02] Okay. So, you’ve had a decade of experience in dealing with these kinds of issues. So-

Randy Domigan: [00:09:08] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:09:11] Does all fraud look alike? Is there basically one flavor of fraud, and fraud is just fraud, or does it come in different forms and shapes?

Randy Domigan: [00:09:20] Really does come in different forms and different shapes. I mean, the term fraud can mean a number of different things. You can have fraud in the medical industry where you have people submitting false claims to insurance companies. And I mean, it just covers so many different things, tax fraud and refund fraud. It’s huge.

Randy Domigan: [00:09:47] The area that I tend to focus on a little bit more tends to deal with occupational fraud, which is one of the most common occurrences of fraud. Occupational fraud, basically, deals with employees, directors, just individuals within a company that commit fraud. And it can be fraud from any direction. Typically, it relates to like something around a cash disbursement or something like that. It could be related to payroll. There’s just a number of different things where fraud can be committed against an organization, but it’s typically asset misappropriation, and that can take a number of different forms.

Randy Domigan: [00:10:36] So, what are a couple of different forms? What are, kind of, the flavors of asset misappropriation? And, I guess, to the simple mind like mine, asset appropriation means stealing stuff, right?

Randy Domigan: [00:10:51] Correct. So, one thing would be cash disbursements fraud. So, if somebody were to write a check to themselves or to a fictitious organization that they controlled that was an unauthorized disbursement, that would be an example of a cash disbursement fraud. Another way, another example that would be if somebody paid themselves through payroll, either an extra paycheck, they modified their pay rate, where they could be paid more money than what they were entitled to or what had been authorized and approved, again, that’s an asset misappropriation because they’re taking funds that have not been authorized to be taken.

Randy Domigan: [00:11:39] Another way could be inventory theft. They just, actually, just go in and take something right off the shelf at a store or within the organization. There could be equipment. Anything like that would relate to an asset misappropriation. And that’s, again, probably, the most common type of fraud that I tend to get involved with.

Michael Blake: [00:12:00] I was talking to somebody who does inventory tracking for hospitals not long ago, and they’ve got a company that facilitates that. And, apparently, one of the biggest — I don’t know if you’re doing medical work or not, but if one of the things that I learned is that for a given hospital, hundreds of thousands of dollars of stuff just walks out of the hospital. It’s not like bottles of aspirin either or stethoscopes. It’s like significant equipment that just sort of goes missing. Have you experienced that or heard of cases like that?

Randy Domigan: [00:12:35] Yeah. It does tend to happen in large medical facilities. I don’t typically get involved with those as much. Most of them have been focused around companies where they’ve had an employee just internally, well, a lot of times, involved with the accounting area where they’ve got access to those funds in some way, shape, or form. It could be that they are one of the authorized check signers. It could be that they are or they have access to online banking, and they wire money out of the account. And so, a lot of it is stuff that they can turn quickly into something that they can use. I don’t see as much inventory theft, but it does happen because there is a market for those things. And most of those things can be easily sold and turned into cash.

Michael Blake: [00:13:29] So, if these people that that that commit fraud, I think, the psychology here is interesting. I’ve had some experience with it just observing forensic accountants, kind of, across the hall and in valuation of other places. What’s the profile of the person who commits fraud? Are they somebody that’s they’ve already been out of jail three and four times, already kind of a known risk, or is it more somebody that that maybe the first crime they’d ever committed, at least, on record?

Randy Domigan: [00:14:00] Well, it can be both. That’s why if companies are hiring individuals into a position of trust, it’s really important to go through a very formalized and very detailed background check to make sure that somebody that you’ve got coming in hasn’t already served jail time, hasn’t been arrested, or anything else for one of these other crimes. So, to answer your question, on the other end, yes, it can happen to just about anybody unfortunately.

Randy Domigan: [00:14:35] Different circumstances come up in people’s lives that can give them the motivation that they would need to commit fraud. There’s what’s called a fraud triangle that has the different aspects of fraud that lead somebody into committing fraud. And the first thing is motivation. And there’s a number of things that can lead to motivating somebody to commit fraud.

Randy Domigan: [00:15:01] It could be that they’re living beyond their means, and they need additional money to help support what they’re spending. Might have had a medical incident, or a loved one that was hurt in a car accident, or they developed some disease where the medical bills just keep coming, and they have to find a way to cover those bills.

Randy Domigan: [00:15:20] It could be just bad credit. They might have had a bankruptcy. They might have been divorced that just really threw their finances into turmoil. There’s also things like alcohol and drug abuse or gambling. Just things like that where people have this additional need for funds that they’re not able to get just from what they’re earning in their paychecks every week. So, those types of things can motivate people to commit fraud initially.

Randy Domigan: [00:15:50] The second step is you know for them to justify it. People will justify it in their head by feeling that they are worth more than maybe what they’re getting paid. They see maybe somebody else in the company that’s making more money, and there’s maybe some jealousy there. They say, “Hey, wait a second. This person is making this much. I contribute more than what they do. I should be making more money.” So, that’s how they kind of justify it in their head.

Randy Domigan: [00:16:17] And the other thing is the opportunity. The opportunity presents itself. It could be that there’s a weakness in the control system that allows them to do it without it being detected. And that’s usually a big thing. And most people know their jobs very, very well, so they know what what’s looked at, and they know if they try something whether or not they would get caught or not. And so, it might start out as, “Hey, I just took a little bit here or there, and nobody said anything. Nothing ever comes up about it.” And so, it starts going further, and it gets bigger, and bigger, and bigger, and it can just snowball into something very, very large.

Michael Blake: [00:16:56] So, all right. So, now, I’m listening to this podcast. As a listener now, I’m afraid someone is stealing money, somebody is taking money out of the till, writing fake invoices, walking our laptops, whatever it is. As a business owner, how can I keep my eye out for warning signs that fraud might be going on? Are there any kind of telltale symptoms that you can share?

Randy Domigan: [00:17:24] Yeah, absolutely. So, one of the things business owners definitely need to be in tune with is what their employees have access to and looking for changes in their employees’ behavior, lifestyle, things like that. So, if I’m a business owner, and I know that I am paying my accounts payable person just, say, $50,000 a year, and they drive up in a $100,000 Mercedes car, that might be a red light that goes on to say, “You know what, something doesn’t look right there.”.

Randy Domigan: [00:18:05] And there could be a very good reason for that. However, it’s those kinds of things that you just need to be aware of and aware of changes to your employees. If you see a behavior change or you see physical symptoms of something that don’t look right, that should be something that you would look at and maybe say, “You know what, I should probably look a little bit more into that.”

Randy Domigan: [00:18:29] Another sign would be if you are having unexpected cash flow issues that just don’t make sense. I mean, your sales are up from what they were last year, and you would think your profitability is up, but you can’t meet payroll for some reason. You’re like, “Wait a second. Why don’t we have enough money in the bank to make payroll?” or “Why can’t we pay our vendors on time?” And it just doesn’t make sense to you, or you see just unexpected financial trends in your financial statements that don’t make a lot of sense. That’s when you know there could be a sign there that something’s going on, and you need to look into it and investigate it.

Randy Domigan: [00:19:08] When you when you described that, it sounds to me like financial fraud looks an awful a lot like data breaches in that the data breach is rarely, if ever, a one-time occurrence, and the one you hear about or by the time you hear about it, it’s really not one incident, but it’s likely something that has gone on, sort of, in a low-key, hard-to-detect way over an extended period of time. Does fraud often act like that as well? You wind up being the boiling frog, and you don’t realize it until you’re not a live frog anymore>

Randy Domigan: [00:19:49] Absolutely. And the sad part is, a lot of times, when fraud occurs, it’s people who the owners trust in it and, a lot of times, have been with the company for a long time. And, again, it starts out small. It’s, “Hey, I did a little bit here and a little bit there, and nobody noticed. Nobody said anything. And I figured out, hey, I can exploit this a little bit more. And I find different ways to do it.” And it starts getting bigger, and bigger, and bigger by the time you get to it.

Randy Domigan: [00:20:21] And, sometimes, it goes, “I had one case that had gone on for 20 years and I had no clue what was going on. And on an annual basis, if you look at it, it’s like, okay, well, it wasn’t enough to really damage the company in any way.” But in the aggregate, if you look at, say, at 100,000 over 20 years, that’s a lot of money that the company has lost to fraud. And it was all because it was this person that was in a trusted position of authority within the organization that exploited our weakness that was there.

Michael Blake: [00:20:54] Yeah. Yes, you’re right. And then, you think on top of that, if that $100,000 had been reinvested in the company or reinvested elsewhere, there’s a multiplier effect too of lost returns.

Randy Domigan: [00:21:08] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:21:09] So, in your experience, is fraud more likely to come from the top part of the organization, say, at the CFO controller level, or in middle management, or kind of down in the shop floor cash register level, rank and files, more places where it’s more likely to occur, or does it kind of occur all over the place?

Randy Domigan: [00:21:31] It can really happen anywhere. The larger frauds tend to happen at the higher levels of the organization. So, if you have like, say, a chief financial officer that has access in the ability to cover up a fraud for an extended period of time, those can get very, very large, unfortunately. If you have somebody on the shop floor that’s stealing from you, and they’re stealing scrap metal, or parts, or something, and they’re selling them in the black market, yeah. I mean, you’re probably not going to notice any major financial impacts from that, but it’s still going to be impactful because you’re missing inventory, you’re not getting the money back from that scrap, and things like that. So, yeah, but it can happen all over.

Michael Blake: [00:22:18] Now, a lot of companies, of course, are subject to formal financial statement audits according to GAP. Is it reasonable to expect that over the course of the audit that fraud will just be detected over the due course of a well-performed financial audit?

Randy Domigan: [00:22:39] Yeah. Unfortunately, it’s not likely that a normal financial statement audit is going to detect most types of fraud. Audits are just not designed to detect fraud. I mean, there are aspects of the audit that will get an understanding of how the controls and things are set up. And if they see a glaring weakness in the control system, they should be designing their audit procedures around that to detect something.

Randy Domigan: [00:23:06] However, some of these things are so well hidden, and they’re not large enough to really be caught in the financial audit. Most of them aren’t. I mean, you have a very small percentage of them that would potentially get caught by a financial statement audit, but a forensic accounting engagement or audit really will dive deep into the specific areas where there is risk after an analysis is done. And so, yeah, just unfortunately doesn’t. And a lot of people think that because, “Hey, I have an audit done. I should be really good, and I don’t have to worry about fraud occurring.” That’s just not the case.

Michael Blake: [00:23:45] Yeah, I think that’s right. And my recollection is if you carefully read a standard financial audit engagement letter, there’s typically language that says, “We’re not necessarily going to detect fraud. That’s a separate exercise. If we stumble upon it, great. But don’t rely upon this exclusively to find that kind of issue.”

Randy Domigan: [00:24:06] That is correct.

Michael Blake: [00:24:09] So, okay. So, let’s say now that I’m a business owner, I commission a fraud engagement, and I find something. What typically happens then? Do you call the cops, and they just sort of cuff the person, they walk him out of the store, or what happens then?

Randy Domigan: [00:24:31] Yeah. I mean, I think, it’s going to vary depending on what type of fraud it is. I mean, obviously, if it’s something very egregious, and somebody is continuing to do it, and if you don’t get them removed immediately, further damage is going to occur to the company, then, yeah, you’re going to want to take some immediate steps to get that person out of their ability to do that.

Randy Domigan: [00:24:54] However, most cases, if you hired somebody to come in and kind of do a fraud checkup – that’s kind of what I’ll call it – and they happen to discover a fraud, first thing you should really do is get an attorney involved that has got experience in dealing with this kind of matters. And you need to look specifically for an attorney that has experience dealing with fraud situations because there are various federal and state laws that cover fraud.

Randy Domigan: [00:25:25] Now, again, if it’s somebody that you found stealing money out of the till, obviously, you get them out of there immediately because you don’t want to continue to incur losses as a result of them taking that, or stealing inventory out of the back room, or something like that. But this is really more for having somebody that’s in a position of trust that might be stealing through the payroll system, or the cash disbursements, and things like that that I described a little bit ago.

Randy Domigan: [00:25:55] You really want to have somebody get involved that knows the different areas that they can be attacked to try to recover the funds because, obviously, the end result is you want to try to recover as much as you possibly can. Unfortunately, with most fraud, the people spent the money already. And so, you have to have other ways to try to collect, and attorneys know how to go about doing that. And so, you definitely want to get them involved on the front end.

Michael Blake: [00:26:21] Yeah, I’ve noticed that. That’s very unfortunate about the people that commit fraud, they’re not very good savers and investors.

Randy Domigan: [00:26:29] No, they aren’t, unfortunately.

Michael Blake: [00:26:30] They never invested into a wise portfolio, diversify stock and bonds, and have real estate, and stuff. They’ve bought a Tesla, or they paid for a cruise to Easter Island, or they bought like a solid gold trailer, or something like that. It’s rarely something you can just say, “Well, I’ll just write you a check, and pay you back, and off you go.”

Randy Domigan: [00:26:53] Yeah, first class plane tickets for a trip to Europe. I mean, those are the kind of things that typically the money is spent on.

Michael Blake: [00:27:00] Yeah, you kind of mentioned the psychology. So, I would imagine that attorney that you call, or maybe it’s more than one attorney because I got to imagine there’s employment issue too, if you accuse somebody of fraud, and then you’re going to fire somebody for cause, you better be right, or you’re in a world that will hurt yourself, right?

Randy Domigan: [00:27:21] Yeah, absolutely. That’s why you really want to try to get those attorneys involved quickly to mitigate risk to the company in any potential additional losses.

Michael Blake: [00:27:30] Now. what if I suspect fraud, I bring you in, and you come back, and you say, “You know what, all this stuff is explainable. I mean, yeah, you ought to improve some processes and some transparency, but doesn’t look like anybody stole anything.” Is there a risk of fallout within the organization after you’ve done that, if you kind of hit the nuclear button, and then you’ve got other organizational problems to solve, or can you do that in a way that’s discreetly, so you can kind of get in and out, and very few people know you’re even ever doing that or suspecting anybody of fraud?

Randy Domigan: [00:28:11] Yeah. No, Mike, that’s a great question, and it’s something that we run into a lot, especially when the owner wants to just kind of have a checkup done. Come in, and kick the tires, and see how the controls are set up. And if you find something, let’s talk about it. That’s how a lot of the engagements go.

Randy Domigan: [00:28:28] So, if you’ve got somebody that’s good at working with employees, and the narrative comes out as to why somebody is there, and somebody is asking questions, and looking at some different things, you can definitely get around some of those concerns of having the organization just have major shakeup because somebody’s been here investigating a fraud or something like that. So, there are definite ways that you can go about that to mitigate that with employees and personnel within your organization. You just have to make sure that you have the right person that kind of talk through what your narrative is around it.

Randy Domigan: [00:29:11] So, a lot of times, it can be, “Hey, we’re looking to redo our insurance policy, and they want us to look at some of our controls, and policies, and things like that.” It could be that, “Hey, this is done in conjunction with our year-end audit, and they’re doing some other steps to look at some different things.” I mean, there’s a number of ways you can go about it to help mitigate any of that fallout.

Michael Blake: [00:29:36] Now, are there certain kinds of businesses that are more vulnerable or less vulnerable to fraud than others?

Randy Domigan: [00:29:48] Mike, just about every business could be susceptible to fraud. Now, if you do everything in your company, and you write all your checks, you take care of all the accounting, you ship all your merchandise out, you have nobody else involved in it, and you’re kind of a one-man shop, you probably don’t have to worry about too much fraud occurring within your organization. But as soon as you bring on somebody else, even if you’re a pretty small company, you have susceptibility.

Randy Domigan: [00:30:15] And, unfortunately, for smaller companies, they tend to have larger frauds occur because they do have maybe one person doing a lot of the different jobs that, typically, in larger organizations, they can move around to different people to help increase the controls around a lot of those key areas to try to mitigate fraud risk. But even with a small company, there are some very, very practical things that business owners can do to help mitigate the risk. And there’s a couple more things that might have to be added to their plate or even other employees’ plates, but it’s very easy to do without adding additional cost or headcount into even small organizations to help really mitigate fraud risk.

Michael Blake: [00:31:05] Well, that’s a great entrée then because I’m sure our listeners would like to understand, is there a short, kind of, punch list of things that owners can do fairly easily to reduce their exposure to fraud?

Randy Domigan: [00:31:23] Yeah, I would say that there’s definitely some things that they can do. I mean, where you see fraud that has gone rampant, it’s typically because there is very little oversight by the owner on any of the financial records. And it does happen a lot in small businesses. You have a business owner that is out trying to do sales, is out trying to make sure that if it’s a manufacturing that all the products are getting where it needs to go, the methods of distribution that they’re managing, shipping, and all those other different things. And the last thing that they want to have to worry about is, “Okay, who’s paying the bill? Then, did we get all the money collected from our customers?” and things like that.

Randy Domigan: [00:32:04] But when there’s no oversight there at all, that’s where the risk exponentially increases. And so, yes, there are definite things that business owners can do that would help mitigate that risk. And, again, it’s not a lot of additional time that they would have to spend in it, but some very simple things that you could go through. And, really, it just depends on each business. So, it can’t just be some blanket saying that, “Okay. Well, yeah, if everybody does this, that’s going to reduce your risk for fraud.” Yeah, there probably are a couple general things that you could do, but each company is just going to be real different because they’re going to have different levels of employees, different levels of knowledge, different facets within their business where they’ve got risk for fraud to occur. So, really needs to kind of be specific to each company when you look at it.

Michael Blake: [00:33:02] Right. Because the nature of the fraud that can occur is going to be different from a burger restaurant to, say, an auto dealership.

Randy Domigan: [00:33:09] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:33:12] Okay. So, we’ve covered a lot of ground today. We probably could cover a lot more, but time is finite. So, if somebody wants to contact you for more information, can they do so? And if so, how can they find you?

Randy Domigan: [00:33:27] Absolutely. The best way to contact me is probably through e-mail. My email addresses is rdomigan@bradyware.com. And it’s R-D-O-M-I-G-A-N @ Bradyware.com. You can also contact me at my Dayton office. The number is 1-800-893-4283, or you can visit our website at www.bradyware.com, and you can go through the services link, you can find fraud there, and there’ll be a link directly to me on that website as well.

Michael Blake: [00:34:09] All right, very good. Well, that’s going to wrap it up for today’s program. I’d like to thank Randy Domigan of Brady Ware so much for joining us and sharing his expertise. We’ll be exploring a new topic each week, so please to tune in, so that when you’re faced with your next business decision, you have clear vision when making it. If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider leaving a review at your favorite podcast aggregator. It helps people find us, so that we can help them. Once again, this is Mike Blake. Our sponsor is Brady Ware & Company. And this has been the Decision Vision Podcast.

NORTH ATLANTA’S BIZLINK: GNFCC’s Tech400 Committee with Winford Williams, LexisNexis Risk Solutions, and Ralph Pasquariello, Snellings Walters Insurance Agency

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North Fulton Studio
North Fulton Studio
NORTH ATLANTA’S BIZLINK: GNFCC's Tech400 Committee with Winford Williams, LexisNexis Risk Solutions, and Ralph Pasquariello, Snellings Walters Insurance Agency
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Winford Williams, Kali Boatright, and Ralph Pasquariello

Show Summary

What’s the purpose of the Tech400 Committee of the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce? How do technology companies connect through the activities of this committee? What’s the latest on key technology sectors in North Fulton? This podcast answers these questions and more, as Kali Boatright, CEO of the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce and Host of “North Atlanta’s Bizlink,” interviews Winford Williams and Ralph Pasquariello, Co-Chairs of the Tech400 Committee of GNFCC.

Winford Williams, Senior Director – Software Engineering, LexisNexis, Risk Solutions Division

Winford Williams

Winford Williams is a Senior Director within the Risk Solutions Division of LexisNexis Risk Solutions.  His experience extends developing information products that service the personal auto and property insurance markets domestically and internationally.  A 1985 graduate of DeVry University (Atlanta), Winford began his career in the insurance industry, as a software developer at Policy Management Systems in Columbia, South Carolina.

For the past 30 years, Winford has contributed to the phenomenal growth of the LexisNexis Risk Solutions Division.  He has led the construction of technology solutions that facilitate the underwriting experience for insurance carriers and large data warehousing applications domestically and internationally.

Currently, Winford is the co-chair of the Tech 400 Committee at the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce to help solve the supply and demand gap that exists between corporations and higher learning institutions relative to filling technology jobs.

Ralph Pasquariello, Snellings Walters

Ralph Pasquariello

Ralph Pasquariello of Snellings Walters is dedicated to many things and Cyber Liability Insurance is one of them. Ralph hosts, moderates and speaks at conferences on Cyber Liability & Data Breach Risk Management. Ralph is the Co-Chairman for Tech 400, Chairman of the annual Cyber Symposium, an advisor to the Georgia Tech Research Institute, and also a member of various organizations including the GNFCC, Technology Association of Georgia, and several special interest groups. Ralph also is an associate member of the GA Electronic Crimes Task Force, under the office of the US Secret Service.

Ralph graduated from Villanova University and is active on the Atlanta Villanova Alumni Chapter Board.

 

About GNFCC and “North Atlanta’s Bizlink”

North Atlanta’s Bizlink is produced by the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce (GNFCC) and is hosted by Kali Boatright, President and CEO of GNFCC. The Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce is a private, non-profit, member-driven organization comprised of over 1400 business enterprises, civic organizations, educational institutions and individuals.  Their service area includes Alpharetta, Johns Creek, Milton, Mountain Park, Roswell and Sandy Springs. GNFCC is the leading voice on economic development, business growth and quality of life issues in North Fulton County.

The GNFCC promotes the interests of our members by assuming a leadership role in making North Fulton an excellent place to work, live, play and stay. They provide one voice for all local businesses to influence decision makers, recommend legislation, and protect the valuable resources that make North Fulton a popular place to live.

For more information on GNFCC and its North Fulton County service area, follow this link or call (770) 993-8806.

FRAZIER & DEETER’S BUSINESS BEAT: Dan Kent, Kent & Risley, LLC, on Intellectual Property Litigation

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Business Beat
Business Beat
FRAZIER & DEETER’S BUSINESS BEAT: Dan Kent, Kent & Risley, LLC, on Intellectual Property Litigation
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Roger Lusby, Colette Varco, and Dan Kent on “Business Beat” presented by Alpharetta CPA firm Frazier & Deeter

Show Summary

How do you protect your technology? What are the various pros and cons of patents and trade secrets? How do you gauge the damages of patent infringement vs. the cost of litigation to recoup those damages? What are some interesting cases arising out of key word advertising on Google? Those questions and more are answered in this week’s edition of “Business Beat.” “Business Beat” is presented by Alpharetta CPA firm Frazier & Deeter.

Dan Kent, Kent & Risley, LLC

Dan Kent

Dan Kent is a Founding Partner of Kent & Risley, LLC. Kent & Risley is a law firm that protects technology by enforcing technology rights in the form of patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets and by contract.  Kent & Risley also protects and defends against the wrongful assertion of alleged technology rights and advises clients about how best to protect technology and to build a valuable portfolio of patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets (also known as intellectual property rights). For more information, go to https://www.kentrisley.com/.

 

Frazier & Deeter

The Alpharetta office of Frazier & Deeter is home to a thriving CPA tax practice and Employee Benefit Plan Services group. CPAs and advisors in the Frazier & Deeter Alpharetta office serve clients across North Georgia and around the country with services such as personal tax planning, estate planning, business tax planning, business tax compliance, state and local tax planning, financial statement reviews, financial statement audits, employee benefit plan audits, internal audit outsourcing, cyber security, data privacy, SOX and other regulatory compliance, mergers and acquisitions and more. Alpharetta CPA professionals serve clients ranging from business owners and executives to large corporations.

Roger Lusby, host of Frazier & Deeter’s Business Beat, is the Alpharetta Office Managing Partner for Frazier & Deeter.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/frazier-&-deeter-llc/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FrazierDeeter
Twitter: https://twitter.com/frazierdeeter

Past episodes of Frazier & Deeter’s “Business Beat”

Decision Vision Episode 6: Should We Hire a CFO? – An Interview with Jay Ruhm, JCR Financial

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Decision Vision
Decision Vision
Decision Vision Episode 6: Should We Hire a CFO? - An Interview with Jay Ruhm, JCR Financial
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Jay Ruhm and Michael Blake

Should We Hire a CFO?

Michael Blake, Director of Brady Ware & Company and Host of the Decision Vision podcast, interviews Jay Ruhm on when to hire a CFO, what a good CFO offers a growing company, and whether there’s a role for the fractional CFO.

Jay Ruhm, JCR Financial

Jay Ruhm

Jay Ruhm recently retired from Dinova, where he was CFO for the past 8 years and is currently offering financial consulting services to startups, early stage, and venture companies through his newly launched firm, JCR Financial Consulting.

As CFO of Dinova, he worked closely with the Founder and CEO as they took a bootstrap startup through several funding rounds of both debt and equity, culminating in a $40 million equity investment by Frontier Capital in 2017.  Finding the startup and venture world the most exciting environment of his career, Jay is looking to share the benefits of this experience with today’s aspiring entrepreneurs.

Jay received his MBA from Columbia Business School in NY.  He spent the formative years of his career at American Express where he rose from Financial Analyst to Southern Region Financial Officer of the Corporate Services Division.  As Financial Officer, he also had financial oversight responsibilities for several other Amex businesses based in Atlanta.  Jay led several major strategic initiatives including a major pricing initiative that saved Amex $125 million of at-risk annual revenues.

Between his stints at Dinova and Amex, Jay spent time as a Senior Managing Consultant at Huron Consulting, leading varied teams of up to 40 people working on the Delphi bankruptcy from the initial filing to post-emergence.  At the time it was the largest manufacturing bankruptcy in US history.  He also initiated and led the development of a system to coordinate the claims across multiple parts of the case.  He also spent time as a Division CFO at Kelly Services improving back office systems and pricing methods.

Michael Blake, Brady Ware & Company

Mike Blake, Host of “Decision Vision”

Michael Blake is Host of the Decision Vision podcast series and a Director of Brady Ware & Company. Mike specializes in the valuation of intellectual property-driven firms, such as software firms, aerospace firms and professional services firms, most frequently in the capacity as a transaction advisor, helping clients obtain great outcomes from complex transaction opportunities. Mike is also a specialist in the appraisal of intellectual properties as stand-alone assets, such as software, trade secrets, and patents.

He has been a full-time business appraiser for 13 years with public accounting firms, boutique business appraisal firms, and an owner of his own firm. Prior to that, he spent 8 years in venture capital and investment banking, including transactions in the U.S., Israel, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus.

Brady Ware & Company

Brady Ware & Company is a regional full-service accounting and advisory firm which helps businesses and entrepreneurs make visions a reality. Brady Ware services clients nationally from its offices in Alpharetta, GA; Columbus and Dayton, OH; and Richmond, IN. The firm is growth minded, committed to the regions in which they operate, and most importantly, they make significant investments in their people and service offerings to meet the changing financial needs of those they are privileged to serve. The firm is dedicated to providing results that make a difference for its clients.

Decision Vision Podcast Series

Decision Vision is a podcast covering topics and issues facing small business owners and connecting them with solutions from leading experts. This series is presented by Brady Ware & Company. If you are a decision maker for a small business, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us at decisionvision@bradyware.com and make sure to listen to every Thursday to the Decision Vision podcast. Past episodes of Decision Vision can be found here. Decision Vision is produced and broadcast by Business RadioX®.

 

Visit Brady Ware & Company on social media:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brady-ware/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bradywareCPAs/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/BradyWare

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bradywarecompany/

Show Transcript:

Intro: [00:00:01] Welcome to Decision Vision, a podcast series focusing on critical business decisions brought to you by Brady Ware & Company. Brady Ware is a regional, full-service accounting and advisory firm that helps businesses and entrepreneurs make visions a reality.

Michael Blake: [00:00:21] And welcome back to Decision Vision, a podcast giving you, the listener, clear vision to make great decisions. In each episode, we’ll discuss the process of decision making on a different topic. Rather than making recommendations because everyone’s circumstances are different, we’ll talk about and we’ll to subject matter experts about how they would recommend thinking about that decision.

Michael Blake: [00:00:41] My name is Mike Blake, and I’m your host for today’s program. I’m a Director at Brady Ware & Company, a full-service accounting firm based in Dayton, Ohio, with offices in Dayton; Columbus, Ohio; Richmond, Indiana; and Alpharetta, Georgia, which is where we are recording today. Brady Ware is sponsoring this podcast. And if you like this podcast, please subscribe on your favorite podcast aggregator and please consider leaving a review of the podcast as well.

Michael Blake: [00:01:05] So, today we’re going to talk about whether to hire a chief financial officer and when to hire a chief financial officer. And this is a decision, I think, that any company that plans to grow to any size must wrestle with. You can’t manage a business without numbers. It’s just impossible to do that. And then, managing by the numbers goes a lot beyond simply debits and credits, counting beans, counting money as it comes in. In fact, on another podcast, we’re talking about data analytics, and that is becoming part of the CFO’s job description.

Michael Blake: [00:01:49] But the big question, particularly for small companies, when you take that plunge, because CFO, these Chief Financial Officers, if they’re any good, they ain’t cheap. And that represent — and they’re not generating revenue – at least, not directly – they’re not selling, they’re not marketing, they’re not advertising, but you can’t find a big or even medium-sized successful company that does not have a competent CFO at the helm.

Michael Blake: [00:02:18] And, as a listener, you’re probably wondering — you might be wondering, “Should I hire a CFO now? Is it something I should wait two to three years on, or did I hire a CFO too quickly? Did I take that plunge too quickly, and maybe I should have waited?” And we’re going to talk about that. We’re going to talk about this issue with one of the best in the business. I am delighted to have my good friend, Jay Ruhm, on the program with us today.

Michael Blake: [00:02:49] Jay and I have known each other for a long time, longer than any of us would probably care to admit. We know where each other’s bodies are buried. We’ll just sort of leave it at that. But Jay recently retired from a company here in Alpharetta, Johns Creek, called Dinova, where he was the Chief Financial Officer for the past eight years, really from startup until exit. And he’s currently offering financial consulting services to startups, early stage, and venture companies to his newly launched firm JCR Financial Consulting.

Michael Blake: [00:03:25] As CFO of Dinova, he worked closely with the founder and CEO as they took a bootstrapped startup through several funding rounds of both debt and equity, culminating in a $40 million equity investment by Frontier Capital, which is a North Carolina-based private equity firm in 2017.

Michael Blake: [00:03:41] Finding a startup and venture were the most exciting environment of his career, Jay is looking to share the benefits of this experience with today’s aspiring entrepreneurs. That’s why he’s here. Jay received his MBA from Columbia Business School in New York. I didn’t realize that. You’re smarter than I thought. That’s great. He spent the formative years of his career at American Express where he rose from financial analyst to Southern Region Financial Officer of the Corporate Services Division. As financial officer, he also had financial oversight responsibilities with several other AMEX businesses based in Atlanta. Jay led several major strategic initiatives including a major pricing initiative that saved AMEX $125 million of at-risk annual revenues.

Michael Blake: [00:04:23] And. there’s sort of the canned introduction. I’m going to go off the script a little bit. Jay brings a wonderful and very unusual combination of technical acumen and just plain horse sense that you don’t often find. And maybe I’ll let him tell you about the Dinova story. I like it so much. I want to tell it, but that’s depriving him of the opportunity. But this is a guy who’s paid his dues. There are a lot of CFOs around, but this is a guy who really paid his dues to get from where he started off with Dinova to now enjoying, at least, a semi retirement. If I build him up any more, he’ll never be able to live up to the hype like the Batman movie. So, Jay Ruhm, welcome to the podcast, my friend. It’s great to have you on.

Jay Ruhm: [00:05:14] Thank you, Mike. Thanks for having me. It’s a delight to be here.

Michael Blake: [00:05:17] So, I’m going to start. I’d like you to talk about the Dinova story because, I think, it talks about the evolving role of the CFO. That company literally went from napkin to something big, something that had an eight-figure exit, and you were there pretty much every step of the way. So, talk about the Dinova story and your role. And I’m already jumping off the script, but we’ve known each other long enough. I can do that from day one, minute one. Talk about that story. It’s so awesome. The world’s got hear it.

Jay Ruhm: [00:05:53] I was on a consulting gig for a number of years in the bucket of no good deed goes unpunished. This was supposed to be a short bankruptcy, 90 days, solve one of the first day motion issues, and I ended up staying for four and a half years helping the Delphi company through its bankruptcy from the day they filed until well after the emergence. So, as I roll off that gig, my second phone call — The first phone call was home of course. The second phone call was to a very, very good friend of mine named Vic Macchio. Vic had this idea for Dinova. And so, I called him and said, “Hey, I’m off. How are you doing?” And he says, “I’ve got Dinova up and running.” I said, “That’s terrific.”

Jay Ruhm: [00:06:46] So, I get home, I go visit him, “What are you doing?” He says, “Well, I’m trying to raise some money. This thing is going to be bigger than I am.” And I said, “That’s a delight. I’m happy to help you. Do you have financial statements?” He says, “No. I don’t need financial statements. This is a pretty simple business model.” I said, “Vic, you need financial statements.” He comes around and says, “Okay. Let’s get some financial statements.” And he says, “But I can’t pay you.” And I said, “Vic, not a worry. I’ve known you 25 years,” at that time. That was 10 years ago. And I said, “It will all work out in the end. I believe in the business. Let me help.”.

Jay Ruhm: [00:07:27] And so, we started looking to raise some funds. That’s where I met my good friend, Mike Blake. Mike, you had no small role in that with your introductions to people in the community. You were a great, great help in helping us secure that funding and helping us network through the community.

Michael Blake: [00:07:46] I think I was the ugliest cheerleader on the planet, but okay. If you want to give me the credit, I’ll stop resisting it. I’m awesome. Go ahead.

Jay Ruhm: [00:07:53] There you go. So, we raised a few million dollars and got the business up and running. And over the years, took in some small amounts of equity, but I would call that A round the primary round. And their incomes, what does a CFO do? The first thing I did was work with Vic and manage the financials, so that we were cash flow-positive. As quickly as we could be cash flow-positive, that’s key. An investor does not want to hear, “I need money from an entrepreneur. I need money to make payroll.” An investor wants to hear, “I have an opportunity, which I’d like to take advantage of. Are you in?”

Michael Blake: [00:08:39] When an investor hears that, “I need money to make payroll,” it’s like we’re talking about the movie Airplane. By the way, does anybody know how to fly a plane? It goes over about that well, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:08:53] So, right away, early on, you could use, at least, some CFO to help guide the financialship as it were. And through the years, we maintained financial discipline, turned profitable in the middle of the period, somewhere around 2014-2015, and grew the business that way. I think one of the key things that a CFO does that’s helpful to a business in that stage is other than the CEO, the CFO is the only other one that doesn’t have a parochial view or a view from a department head. It’s the one place in the company, other than the CEO, where an individual has a cross-company view. And that’s a pretty vital role, and it’s important that the CFO understand that and apply that. So, when one department head says, “I want to do this,” where’s the one place who’s going to say, “Well, you need to talk to this department and that department because you’re going to have impact over there”?

Michael Blake: [00:10:03] That’s interesting. I’d never heard of the CFO’s role being described that way. So, in effect, you become the air traffic controller?

Jay Ruhm: [00:10:10] In effect, yes. And it’s at a peer level too because the department heads and the CFO, they all report to the CEO. And so, that’s key. And so, you’ve got to be a good partner and a good team player.

Michael Blake: [00:10:26] So, let me ask this then. So, you’re brought into Dinova, Dinova, I think, at that time, was not generating revenue, or if it was, it was de minimus revenue. Is that correct?

Jay Ruhm: [00:10:37] It was de minimus, right. As I said, Vic had said, “Yes, I got Dinova up and running.” He didn’t tell me it was $12. Just getting started at 12 bucks, but it was small.

Michael Blake: [00:10:47] But it’s higher than zero, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:10:49] Yes, it was more than zero.

Michael Blake: [00:10:50] So, technically, it was revenue-positive. So, why do you think he saw wisdom in hiring a person whose job is to count money when there is no money to count yet?

Jay Ruhm: [00:11:03] I’m not sure that that’s why he brought me in. I don’t know that Vic was thinking, “I need financial help.” It was more that-

Michael Blake: [00:11:12] Yeah, clearly.

Jay Ruhm: [00:11:14] It was much more that we had been good friends for a long time, and I offered to help for free. And when you’re starting a business, and you’re a CEO, and you’re trying to get something going, you take all the free help you can get.

Michael Blake: [00:11:28] So, one of the things I’m taking away from this is that a CFO, and at least in your case, you tell me if you think it’s more common or not, but you are kind of internal trusted advisor, right? We talk about trusted advisors and the outside. Ostensibly, I am a trusted advisor to god knows who. But you became Vic’s internal trusted advisor that was captive, somebody he could talk to, and early on, would have skin in the game by the way of having a modest ownership of the company and so forth.

Jay Ruhm: [00:12:03] Sure.

Michael Blake: [00:12:03] Right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:12:04] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:12:06] And that has maybe very little to do with finance.

Jay Ruhm: [00:12:11] It has. You’re correct. It doesn’t require the knowledge or the technical skills that a CFO typically has, but that role is vitally important. And many experienced CEOs know that when they’re hiring a CFO, they are hiring a trusted adviser.

Michael Blake: [00:12:33] And is that why you wanted to have a CFO role? I mean, the CFO role is not easy, and it’s high stress. There’s very high turnover in the CFO world. It’s like a baseball manager almost hired to be fired. That’s the nature of the game. Why do you want to do that? What was your calling to do that?

Jay Ruhm: [00:12:55] I was lucky. Early in my career, I started off as an engineer and didn’t succeed very well. And so, went to – as we used to say in the ’70s – find myself. And I found myself curled up in a ball over in a corner, and picked myself up, and started looking at all different kinds of things, and found the business classes to be easy and fun. And the more I got into it, the more I enjoyed the operating finance role as opposed to accounting. What I like about operating finance is it’s there on the front line of the business.

Jay Ruhm: [00:13:33] As you said before, no, I’m not the one ringing the cash register, but I am the one working with the sales leader to price, and what’s a good deal, and to coach and advise not only the CEO but all of the other department heads as to what makes good financial sense.

Michael Blake: [00:13:57] All right. So, now, I think one of the reasons to bring in a CFO is to get the CEO out of the CFO business, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:14:07] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:14:09] To let them do what what they do well. So, if you’re at liberty to do so – We’re going off script again, that’s okay – Talk a little bit about your relationship with Vic. And we know what his strengths are. What did him hiring you enable him to do more of that made Dinova successful?

Jay Ruhm: [00:14:27] In a bootstrapped startup, you have to do everything. And Vic was paying the bills, literally, writing the checks, and keeping track of everything. And so, I took him out of that business. I started paying the bills, keeping the books. That was the very, very beginning, preparing the financial statements, as well as advising on business direction and strategic issues.

Michael Blake: [00:15:00] And then, that enabled him to do more of what?

Jay Ruhm: [00:15:03] At that stage in the business and pretty much throughout, his forte is is marketing, sales and marketing. And so, it really allowed him to work that much closer with the sales and marketing folks and build the business on that side. As Vic and I often joke, I say, “Vic, you take care of the revenue. That’s not my thing. You bring in the revenue. I’ll take care of the expenses and the bottom line and make sure we have a healthy balance sheet.”

Michael Blake: [00:15:34] And as I recall, he is very good at raising capital too, which if you’re to generate revenue, you’d better be raising capital. You’ll have one of those two things in the short trip, right. So, I think, the wisdom of him bringing you in as that internal trust advisor enabled him to get out the things that were not value added from his perspective and really focus on the things that were required for Dinova to ultimately thrive, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:16:01] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:16:02] Right.

Jay Ruhm: [00:16:02] Yes, absolutely. One of the things that you mentioned raising capital as a value-add, to a point. When you spend too much time raising capital, you’re not focusing on the business. And one of the things I wanted to do was get Vic out of the capital racing business and raise funds when we had to, when we needed to. And when I say when we had to, it wasn’t to make payroll. Remember debt, from a CFO’s perspective, is a tool if you can lever up the balance sheet from nothing. The example I use is the cost of capital. If your equity costs 30%, then you’re not going to take on a 25% return project. That’s not worth it. But if you can throw a little debt on there at 5% or 10%, you bring that cost of capital down to 20%, then, all of a sudden, you’re 25% projects start to look pretty good, and it lets you do more.

Michael Blake: [00:17:08] And, now, working cost of capital. Now, we’re talking dirty. That’s good. Yeah, the finance geeks are going to really geek out on this. So, I think, a lot of listeners don’t necessarily understand the difference between a CFO and a controller. And many companies, I think, hire a controller and they may decide that that’s enough. But I wonder how many people really understand the difference between a CFO and a controller. Can you explain that difference because they are different roles? The controller typically reports to a CFO if there is one. What are those jobs? How do those job descriptions typically differ?

Jay Ruhm: [00:17:50] Well, it starts right with the skills that are brought to the table. There’s a reason one can major in Finance in school, and one can major in Accounting in school, and they are different. So, it starts right with the skill set. Accounting is very technical, very important. The financial statements are how a business communicates to its audience, its investors. And it’s very, very important that the language of accounting be observed, so that those financial statements mean something. That is the primary focus of a controller is not only the preparation, the debits and credits, also the controls – hence, the word controller – but there are checks and balances that one needs to put in place, segregation of duties. We’re really going to get into it now, Mike.

Jay Ruhm: [00:18:45] When we started, we had our first audit, and I told the auditor, “Yes, I pay the bill. I pay the bills, I reconcile the bank account, and I prepare the financial statements. How’s that for segregation of duty?” Man, there wasn’t any, but that’s what it was. So, the controller is going to build all those processes as the company grows and prepare the company for its first audit, which, by the way, I recommend be done as early as possible. You always want to build the infrastructure ahead of the future growth. You don’t want to find you’ve got all this money coming in, and you can’t control it. That’s a recipe for losing some. And so, that’s the primary focus of the controller.

Jay Ruhm: [00:19:35] The CFO is a broader job. The CFO must be fluent in accounting and all that goes along with it. But the CFO, as we’ve talked earlier in the show, also has to be the internal advisor. Another piece of the CFO job that we didn’t talk about is strategic. And that is, what’s the strategic plan? There’s another function that many folks know is BP&FA, business planning and financial analysis. That falls under the CFO as well. And, oftentimes, in a growing company, the CFO is wearing many, many other hats. I had responsibility for HR. And so, there’s lots of things.

Jay Ruhm: [00:20:25] I had a mentor once, when I was at American Express, a young lad was working for an executive. And he said, “Hey, I’ve got an HR person. I have a marketing person. I have an operations person. And if it’s not HR, marketing, or operations, it’s finance.” And so, the finance is the one place that’s got to pick up all the loose ends. Make sure all the Ts are crossed, and the Is are dotted.

Michael Blake: [00:20:52] Interesting. Okay. So, I’ve never heard the role quite that described and quite that way, but it does make sense of the C-level positions other than CEO as you talked about. It’s the least siloed of any of those functions, right? And I’m reading a lot about the CFO role even changing beyond that as the stereotypical CFO role is you’re the numbers guy. And you leave the strategy to somebody else or the job is to somehow make the finance work with that strategy or advise when the finances will not support that strategy and it must be altered. But I’m seeing a trend where those two roles are now converging. You cannot be a non-strategic CFO and be successful anymore in that role. Do you agree with that?

Jay Ruhm: [00:21:50] I completely agree with that. One of the benefits of being at American Express early in my career is that’s a very, very forward-thinking company. It’s been a leader. What I define as a great company is a company that’s been a leader in its field, top of its game for a hundred years, not 15 or 20, because all of those companies that are leaders in their field and have been for a century are in a completely different business than they were a hundred years ago. How did they do that? Microsoft may very well be a great company, and it is a great company, but their business model hasn’t yet been turned completely upside down. They’re growing, they’re bigger, but they’re not in a completely different business than they were when they started. I think Procter & Gamble has one product that’s a hundred years old, and that’s Ivory Soap.

Michael Blake: [00:22:49] Is that right? I didn’t know that.

Jay Ruhm: [00:22:51] Yeah. Ivory Soap has been around a very, very, very long time.

Michael Blake: [00:22:54] Okay.

Jay Ruhm: [00:22:54] So, right there at the operating level within AMEX, there was a distinction between accounting and a business unit CFO as I was. Now, of course, if something went wrong on an audit report, it landed on my desk. But, generally, I was not involved in the debits and credits. It was BP&FA, and it was an advisory role to the general manager. And that was back in the late ’80s. And the world has since moved much, much more in that direction. And I don’t mean to take anything away from my CPA brethren. They bring a whole lot to the table, and I’ve seen many, many CPAs who are just as strategic as any other CFO, and they make great CFOs.

Michael Blake: [00:23:51] So, I was going to kind of ask this. Historically, there’s been this dichotomy or this distinction that you either had a CFO who is a real accounting wiz, or you had a CFO that really understood finance, could have conversations with bankers, venture capitalists, and so forth, set up financing schemes, and you really couldn’t have both in the same individual. So, you had one of the other, and you chose that role depending on how the organization shakes out, and what their particular goals and needs are. Is that distinction meaningful anymore?

Jay Ruhm: [00:24:36] Yes, it still is.

Michael Blake: [00:24:38] Okay.

Jay Ruhm: [00:24:38] Because as we were talking earlier, when I described the differences in the roles between what a controller does and what a CFO does, they’re still extremely vital to the company. And even a CPA and CFO. And I know many of those, they will also have a controller work for them, so that they’re not totally focused on that, and they free up some time to do the advisory role and the strategic role that’s required of a CFO today.

Michael Blake: [00:25:14] Okay. So, do you have a story out there where you, as a CFO at Dinova, what’s an example where you felt like you made the greatest impact on the company?

Jay Ruhm: [00:25:28] That all comes back in my view, ultimately, to a leadership question. And it’s much more about leadership than it is about necessarily technical finance. So, as we were growing, it had been my approach to prepare the infrastructure for the growth, so that when we had outside funding coming in and needed to deliver audited financial statements that we had the processes and procedures in place, and how would I get that done.

Jay Ruhm: [00:26:05] And in leading a team it wasn’t me. I was fortunate enough to have a dedicated team of professionals, great, great people who I keep in touch with, of course, who I would set the guiding way, and said, “Okay, we need to-” A great example is the implementation of NetSuite. We were on QuickBooks Online. Just didn’t meet our needs. A great product, we used it for many years, but we needed something much, much more. And I wanted online, which, at the time, QuickBooks didn’t have. QuickBooks would have meant a server. I didn’t want that.

Jay Ruhm: [00:26:42] So, we went with NetSuite, and it gave us a lot more flexibility in terms of analytics. It gave us great, great efficiencies, and that had a huge impact because it allowed us to grow and build the finance team and structure and get all those things done.

Jay Ruhm: [00:27:07] Well, I always had my eye on, what’s a world class finance organization? What is it as a percentage of the expenses or the headcount? And my research indicated it was something less than 10%. I wanted less than 10% of the resources of the company going to the finance and the infrastructure. And so, that was the target. And to do that, like I said, it comes back to the team and the leadership. And in leading a team, you set a direction, you leave your door open, and then you get the hell out of the way and let them go to work.

Michael Blake: [00:27:50] So, all right. So, I think this is drawing out a very important point because, I think, many folks, especially if they have not hired a CFO before, we equate CFO with accounting first; finance second, ironically, but there are intertwined. But what’s coming out of this is that it’s not about how much money you have to count. It’s not about how complex your finances are, but do you need somebody else, or you always need somebody else on the team who is a good leader who happens to have a skill set in those particular areas. And no firm can ever have too much leadership, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:28:36] Right. There’s an old saying, and you mentioned it earlier, you said a CFO can be expensive. I would suggest that it’s less expensive than not having one.

Michael Blake: [00:28:50] Because things get missed, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:28:53] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:28:53] And people don’t get led. And when you’re in a startup position particularly, right, you can outspend your mistakes.

Jay Ruhm: [00:29:04] That’s true. And I’m going to relate it back to the advisory role. Every small company tries to get a good board of advisors, but they’re external people. And the CFO can be the internal advisor, as you pointed out earlier. And how that differs from the external is not only a better understanding of the nuts and bolts of the business, but it’s also a frequency. How often does the CEO get to turn to somebody and ask a question? You make use of the outside advisors, but on a daily basis, it’s the CFO.

Michael Blake: [00:29:44] Yeah. It’s a lonely place, right? So, the CFO makes it a little bit less lonely. I’m curious about your position on this. Of course, in your position with Dinova, where Vic didn’t have the money to pay you right off the bat, you accepted equity as part of that compensation. But even if a company has cash, do you think that ownership of the company in some fashion ought to be a requirement of the CFO, or do you think it matters?

Jay Ruhm: [00:30:16] It matters a whole lot. And my own view is that ownership of the company should be spread as far and wide inside the company as possible. Absolutely critical. What goes along with that, just giving somebody ownership of the company doesn’t mean that they’re always going to act in the best interest of the company. And I’m not suggesting malfeasance. What I am suggesting is a simple lack of knowledge. When you give a financial device or implement such as a share of stock to an HR manager who is not very terrifically skilled in HR matters, but not in finance-

Michael Blake: [00:31:01] They’re not Warren Buffett necessarily.

Jay Ruhm: [00:31:04] So, what goes along with that is some level of financial knowledge has to be spread along. So, in my view, just a recap, I think as many people as possible should have stock. And when that stock goes out, there should also be workshops and sharing of knowledge of what is finance. And as a valuation expert, Mike, you understand the name of the game for small companies. To get to that exit, you have to understand valuation. What makes the stock price go up?

Michael Blake: [00:31:37] Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Jay Ruhm: [00:31:38] And it’s more than just making money.

Michael Blake: [00:31:40] So, one of the roles we often associate with a CFO is to be a counterweight to the CEO. That’s stereotypical. Do you find that to be true? And if so, how do you manage that, so the conversations are always constructive and not potentially destructive?

Jay Ruhm: [00:32:14] I would say that’s even desirable, Mike. You want a yin and yang. There’s no better role for a CFO than to have the classic entrepreneur as the CEO. That CEO is going to do a lot of things that the CFO just can’t. They’re not in the toolkit, right? And that’s where the advisor and the relationship comes in. There has to be healthy discussions. Not every entrepreneur can bring in a CFO that they knew for 25 years. You’re going to have to hire somebody who you previously didn’t know. However, you’ve got to start building that relationship immediately, and there has to be that healthy give and take.

Michael Blake: [00:33:06] And one thing, often, in observing how you manage that, I don’t recall a story of you ever telling Vic no but rather responding to a decision and saying, “Here’s what the impact is.” And we’ve said that we’ve had certain goals. In your case, it was on a certain amount of cash in the account, right, certain amount of safety. And if we do it this way, it’s going to take some of that safety away.

Jay Ruhm: [00:33:37] I would say yes to both. I don’t often retell stories of when I’ve told Vic no, and I’ll let him tell you how many times he’s heard me say no, but it’s always followed up with, “Here’s why.” I would not trade away the classic entrepreneurialism that Vic brought to the table-

Michael Blake: [00:33:57] Sure.

Jay Ruhm: [00:33:58] … for anything.

Michael Blake: [00:33:59] It was critical.

Jay Ruhm: [00:34:00] It was absolutely critical to the growth of the business. So, that’s where our healthy discussions came in is, “You want to do what?”

Michael Blake: [00:34:11] But you didn’t always agree necessarily right off have to achieve a consensus somehow.

Jay Ruhm: [00:34:16] I would say most of the time, we came to consensus. And there were times where he would take my advice and not do something. And there were other times where he would say, “Nope, we’re doing this, and I’m pulling rank on you.”

Michael Blake: [00:34:38] And that happens.

Jay Ruhm: [00:34:39] That absolutely happened. And you know what, didn’t hurt my feelings at all.

Michael Blake: [00:34:42] That’s the NFL, right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:34:43] Yup.

Michael Blake: [00:34:46] So, one last question I want this could be a two podcast. But do you think about part CFOs? There are a lot of those services around, fractional CFO services. Is there a useful role for providers, advisors like that to you’re not quite sure about if  want a CFO full maybe you don’t feel comfortable financial commitment, or do you think you’ve just got to  the Band-Aid off and just go?

Jay Ruhm: [00:35:19] No. I think, there’s a role for the fractional CFO. There absolutely is. What I would advise in a relationship with a fractional CFO is that you don’t have that CFO doing the accounting.

Michael Blake: [00:35:36] Really?

Michael Blake: [00:35:37] Why?

Jay Ruhm: [00:35:40] Because I would want that CFO going over business plans, making forecasts, understanding the business, and advising. I would have an outside CPA or a bookkeeper. What many, many businesses do when they start up is get that accounting piece done. I would keep that away from the fractional CFO, just so that I’m not spending my resources having the CFO doing that.

Michael Blake: [00:36:12] And in effect, spending $250 hour and a $60 an hour skill set, among other things. Right?

Jay Ruhm: [00:36:18] Yes. That’s a good way to describe it.

Michael Blake: [00:36:20] And I think I’ve seen this too is that, sometimes, a CFO will be hired, but then they’re doing the wrong not doing CFO things. And that’s not great either.

Jay Ruhm: [00:36:36] Yeah. There is a balance that has to be struck between where the CFO spends their time. As you recognized right up front, we’re not the ones who make the cash register ring, but I sure want to help make it ring. And if I’m preparing a financial statement, which I did in the beginning because I had to, when I’m doing that, I’m not out meeting a customer.

Michael Blake: [00:37:06] Right, okay. This has been great. We have all kinds of other things we could cover, but we can’t cover this topic exhaustively. If somebody wants to follow up with you and ask about some of this, can they do that?

Jay Ruhm: [00:37:27] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:37:27] So, how would they get a hold of you?

Jay Ruhm: [00:37:30] Best way to do it is through e-mail. I’m at Gmail. It’s my name followed by the number one. So, it’s jayruhm1@gmail.com.

Michael Blake: [00:37:42] All right. Very good. Well, that’s going to wrap it up for today’s program. I would like to thank my good friend, Jay Rhum, so much for joining us and sharing his expertise with us on this CFO issue. We’ll be exploring a new topic each tune in, so when you’re faced with your next business decision, you have clear vision when making it. Again, if  you enjoy this podcast, please consider leaving a review with your favorite podcast aggregator. It helps people find us, so that we can help them. Once again, this is Mike Blake. Our sponsor is Brady Ware & Company. And this has been the Decision Vision Podcast.

To Your Health With Dr. Jim Morrow: Episode 4, Vaping

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North Fulton Studio
North Fulton Studio
To Your Health With Dr. Jim Morrow: Episode 4, Vaping
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Dr. Jim Morrow, Morrow Family Medicine

Dr. Morrow’s Show Notes on Vaping

  • If we are going to talk about vaping, we have to talk about: NICOTINE.
  • Why nicotine? What does it do to your brain?
  • Nicotine activates the circuitry that regulates feelings of pleasure, the so-called reward pathways. Research has shown that nicotine increases the levels of dopamine (a key brain chemical involved in mediating the desire to consume drugs) in the reward circuits of the brain.
  • Cigarettes also cause a marked decrease in the levels of monoamineoxidase (MAO), an enzyme responsible for breaking down dopamine, so…. more dopamine in the circulation.
  • The need to sustain the high dopamine levels results in the desire for repeated drug use.
  • Outward Signs of Nicotine Addiction
    • an inability to stop using tobacco products
    • withdrawal symptoms when nicotine use stops
    • a desire to keep smoking even when health complications arise
    • continued use of tobacco products even if it negatively impacts your life
  • Treatment for Nicotine Addiction
    • Wellbutrin
    • Chantix
    • Support groups

What We Learned

  • In 1950, the tobacco companies came out with a huge ad, a statement to America, that they did not believe that cigarettes were any health threat at all. Their “Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers” essentially stated that they felt tobacco was completely safe and caused no harm, stating that “for more than 300 years, tobacco has given solace, relaxation and enjoyment to mankind.”
  • In 1964, the Surgeon General, Luther Terry, submitted his report on the direct link between smoking and cancer. It concluded that smoking is a cause of lung cancer and laryngeal cancer in men, a probable cause of lung cancer in women, and the most important cause of chronic bronchitis.
  • In 1965, labeling changes occurred and today labels show graphic evidence of what cigarettes can do.
  • In 1967, advertisements for cigarettes had to start giving significant time to the dangers of smoking.
  • What is NOT a Treatment for Nicotine Addiction: VAPING!
  • If you’re puffing on something electronic – it’s vaping.
  • Might call it e-cig, vape, Juul (a brand name)
  • Bottom line is that it is an ENDS (electronic nicotine delivery system)
  • Vaping appears to increase young people’s risk of starting smoking
  • Young people who reported having used e-cigarettes were more than eight times as likely to start using conventional cigarettes
  • Problem may be exacerbated by the many flavors used to enhance the enjoyment of e-cigarette use
  • Adolescents and young adults are known to be very susceptible to flavorings
  • Vaping is exposing them to one of the most addictive chemicals known — nicotine
  • Studies show teens tend to underestimate their risk for getting addicted and overestimate their ability to quit once addicted

Types of e-Cigs

  • 1st Gen: closely resembles a cigarette and is disposable
  • 2nd Gen: larger, pen shaped, rechargeable
  • 3rd Gen: do not look like combustible cigs at all, have large batteries, replaceable parts, these are called “mods”
  • Latest: Sleek, modular design like Juul (looks like a USB drive) and some others. These often have a much higher nicotine content than traditional cigs or earlier devices.

Nicotine Concentrations

  • Levels vary – some are nearly the same as traditional cigarettes
  • Mislabeling is a common problem
  • Nicotine delivery is affected by how the device is used by the consumer.
  • Juul delivers nicotine almost THREE TIMES FASTER than a typical cigarette.
    • This increases the likelihood of addiction
    • Often, (some say 37 % of the time) youth and young adult users are not even aware that the device has nicotine in it at all.

As Harmful as Typical Cigarettes?

  • While e-cigarettes contain some fewer toxins than combustible cigarettes, they are not free of toxins and still deliver harmful chemicals
  • There is an enormous variability within the product category and there is no typical e-cigarette
    • different ingredients and different hardware, and deliver highly variable amounts of nicotine and potentially toxic chemicals

What People Think

  • Among adults,
    • 31% think they are the same as cigs
    • 4% think they are more harmful
    • 29% don’t know
    • 36% think they are less harmful

Usage Rates

  • In 2011, 1.5 percent of high school age students used e-cigs
  • In 2017 that number was up to 12 percent
  • In 2011, 0.6 percent of middle schoolers used them, and
  • In 2017, 3.5 percent used them
  • Among adults, in 2015, more than HALF of users also smoked cigarettes.
  • Among young adults, 40% also smoked cigarettes.

Patterns of Use

  • In 2017, studies showed that 12% of high school and 3.5% of middle school students has used e-cigs in the previous 30 days
  • 2018 NASEM report concluded that, “there is substantial evidence that e-cigarette use increases risk of ever using combustible tobacco cigarettes among youth and young adults”
  • 60 percent of teens incorrectly reported e-cigarettes as being comprised of mostly flavoring.

Juul

  • Since 2016, Juul has surged in popularity – now with 68% of the e-cig share.
  • Many are unaware that the product always contains the addictive chemical nicotine
  • A single JUUL cartridge is roughly equal to a pack of cigarettes

Health Effects

  • Much is still unknown
  • E-cigs can deliver levels of nicotine similar to combustible cigarettes and this is causing concern about the potential risk for addiction
  • Exposure to nicotine among youth is particularly dangerous since it has been shown to have an effect on key brain receptors, making young people more susceptible to nicotine addiction
  • Effect of nicotine on developing brains may result in nicotine addiction and greater vulnerability to addiction to other drugs as well
  • Pregnant women who use nicotine are at a greater risk of stillbirth and preterm delivery.
  • At least 60 chemical compounds have been found in e-liquids, and more are present in the aerosol produced by e-cigarettes.
  • We don’t know what exposure to these flavors will do. Marketing has gotten out of hand with some being labeled “Thin Mint” or “Redi-Whip”, etc.
  • E-liquids can cause unknown problems
  • Explosions of devices can and do occur, although unlikely this is very dangerous.
  • Vaping is in its infancy. It is tobacco fifty years before the discovery that it caused lung cancer. What good could you possibly hope to derive from vaping?

Thinking about vaping? Think before you start! (Before you buy even that first device.)

About Morrow Family Medicine and Dr. Jim Morrow

Morrow Family Medicine is an award-winning, state-of-the-art family practice with offices in Cumming and Milton, Georgia. The practice combines healthcare information technology with old-fashioned care to provide the type of care that many are in search of today. Two physicians, three physician assistants and two nurse practitioners are supported by a knowledgeable and friendly staff to make your visit to Morrow Family Medicine one that will remind you of the way healthcare should be.  At Morrow Family Medicine, we like to say we are “bringing the care back to healthcare!”  Morrow Family Medicine has been named the “Best of Forsyth” in Family Medicine in all five years of the award, is a three-time consecutive winner of the “Best of North Atlanta” by readers of Appen Media, and the 2019 winner of “Best of Life” in North Fulton County.

Dr. Jim Morrow is the founder and CEO of Morrow Family Medicine. He has been a trailblazer and evangelist in the area of healthcare information technology, was named Physician IT Leader of the Year by HIMSS, a HIMSS Davies Award Winner, the Cumming-Forsyth Chamber of Commerce Steve Bloom Award Winner as Entrepreneur of the Year and he received a Phoenix Award as Community Leader of the Year from the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce.  He is married to Peggie Morrow and together they founded the Forsyth BYOT Benefit, a charity in Forsyth County to support students in need of technology and devices. They have two Goldendoodles, a gaggle of grandchildren and enjoy life on and around Lake Lanier.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MorrowFamMed/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/7788088/admin/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/toyourhealthMD

Dr. Jim Morrow, Morrow Family Medicine

David Maradiaga, Maradiaga Media, and John Mitchell and Randy Hasslinger, Slingshot Product Development Group

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North Fulton Business Radio
North Fulton Business Radio
David Maradiaga, Maradiaga Media, and John Mitchell and Randy Hasslinger, Slingshot Product Development Group
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John Ray, David Maradiaga, John Mitchell, and Randy Hasslinger

David Maradiaga, Maradiaga Media

David Maradiaga, Maradiaga Media

David Maradiaga is the CEO of Maradiaga Media. Maradiaga Media is a video production and marketing agency that helps business owners express their passion and mission, all while reaching more clients. From wedding videos to television commercials, Maradiaga Media has the experience and expertise to deliver your story to the masses. Visit MaradiagaMedia.com for more information.

 

 

John Mitchell and Randy Hasslinger, Slingshot Product Development Group

Randy Hasslinger and John Mitchell, Slingshot Product Development Group

John Mitchell is Chairman of the Board and Randy Hasslinger is Vice President, Business Development with Slingshot Product Development Group. Slingshot Product Development Group, founded in 2001, develops new products for customers in consumer, medical, military/security, and industrial markets. It is driven by the knowledge that new products are the life blood of companies, large or small, and that clients will lead their markets with innovative solutions that meet their customer’s needs. From napkin sketch to manufacturing, Slingshot applies a comprehensive and seasoned set of skills for impactful results through each phase of development. For further information, go to http://www.slingshotpdg.com/.

Jim Gilvin, Mayor, City of Alpharetta

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North Fulton Business Radio
North Fulton Business Radio
Jim Gilvin, Mayor, City of Alpharetta
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Host John Ray and Alpharetta Mayor Jim Gilvin

“State of the City” with Mayor Jim Gilvin, City of Alpharetta

Fresh from his first “State of the City” address, Mayor Jim Gilvin is interviewed by Business RadioX Host John Ray on some of the key issues in front of the City at this time, including transportation infrastructure improvement, North Point Mall redevelopment, the technology industry network in Alpharetta, maintaining a health environment for locally-owned businesses, and more.

Jim Gilvin, Mayor, City of Alpharetta

Alpharetta Mayor Jim Gilvin

Jim Gilvin is the Mayor of Alpharetta, GA, elected in May 2018. Mayor Gilvin has lived in Alpharetta since the late 1990’s along with his wife, Mary Anne, and their two children Justin and Sarah. The Gilvins live in the Windward subdivision and attend Mount Pisgah United Methodist Church. Mayor Gilvin holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Finance from Georgia Southern University. He is a residential real estate agent and an owner of an Alpharetta-based technology company. He served on the Alpharetta City Council from 2012 to 2018, when he resigned his seat to run for Mayor. During his time as City Councilman, Gilvin served as liaison to Alpharetta’s Parks and Recreation Department and the Public Safety Department.

Decision Vision Episode 5: Should We Use Data Analytics in Our Business? – An Interview with Angela Culver, Mobile Labs, and Micky Long, Arketi Group

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Decision Vision
Decision Vision
Decision Vision Episode 5: Should We Use Data Analytics in Our Business? - An Interview with Angela Culver, Mobile Labs, and Micky Long, Arketi Group
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Angela Culver, Micky Long, and Michael Blake

Should We Use Data Analytics in Our Business?

It’s a question for which all businesses should have an affirmative answer. Businesses large and small have all the means to collect and store significant amount of data on every aspect on their business. In this interview with Decision Vision host Michael Blake, Angela Culver and Micky Long argue that business success in coming years will be determined by a company’s ability to analyze the data they collect.

Angela Culver, Mobile Labs

Angela Culver

Angela Culver is the Chief Marketing Officer of Mobile Labs.  Since the first install in 2012, Mobile Labs remains the leading supplier of in-house mobile device clouds that connect remote, shared smartphones and tablets to Global 2000 mobile web, gaming, and app engineering teams. The company’s patented GigaFox™ is offered on-premises or hosted, and solves mobile device sharing and management challenges that arise during development, debugging, manual testing, and automated testing. A pre-installed and pre-configured Appium server with custom tools provides “instant on” Appium test automation. GigaFox enables scheduling, collaboration, user management, security, mobile DevOps, and continuous automated testing for mobility teams spread across the globe and can connect cloud devices to an industry-leading number of third-party tools such as XCode, Android Studio, and many commercial test automation tools. For more information please visit www.mobilelabsinc.com.

Micky Long, Arketi Group

Micky Long

Micky Long is Vice President and Practice Director, Lead Nurturing at Arketi Group. Arketi Group is a public relations and digital marketing firm that helps business-to-business technology organizations accelerate growth through intelligent strategy, public relations, messaging, branding and demand generation. Consistently recognized by Chief Marketer magazine as one of the nation’s “B2B Top Shops” and a “Chief Marketer 200” firm, Arketi helps its clients use marketing to generate revenue. Companies benefiting from this approach to B2B marketing include Cox, First Data, Featurespace, Mobile Labs, NCR and Snapfulfil. For more information, call 404-929-0091 ext. 210 or visit www.arketi.com.

Michael Blake, Brady Ware & Company

Mike Blake, Host of “Decision Vision”

Michael Blake is Host of the Decision Vision podcast series and a Director of Brady Ware & Company. Mike specializes in the valuation of intellectual property-driven firms, such as software firms, aerospace firms and professional services firms, most frequently in the capacity as a transaction advisor, helping clients obtain great outcomes from complex transaction opportunities. Mike is also a specialist in the appraisal of intellectual properties as stand-alone assets, such as software, trade secrets, and patents.

He has been a full-time business appraiser for 13 years with public accounting firms, boutique business appraisal firms, and an owner of his own firm. Prior to that, he spent 8 years in venture capital and investment banking, including transactions in the U.S., Israel, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus.

Brady Ware & Company

Brady Ware & Company is a regional full-service accounting and advisory firm which helps businesses and entrepreneurs make visions a reality. Brady Ware services clients nationally from its offices in Alpharetta, GA; Columbus and Dayton, OH; and Richmond, IN. The firm is growth minded, committed to the regions in which they operate, and most importantly, they make significant investments in their people and service offerings to meet the changing financial needs of those they are privileged to serve. The firm is dedicated to providing results that make a difference for its clients.

Decision Vision Podcast Series

Decision Vision is a podcast covering topics and issues facing small business owners and connecting them with solutions from leading experts. This series is presented by Brady Ware & Company. If you are a decision maker for a small business, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us at decisionvision@bradyware.com and make sure to listen to every Thursday to the Decision Vision podcast. Past episodes of Decision Vision can be found here. Decision Vision is produced and broadcast by Business RadioX®.

 

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Show Transcript:

Intro: [00:00:01] Welcome to Decision Vision, a podcast series focusing on critical business decisions, brought to you by Brady Ware & Company. Brady Ware is a regional, full-service accounting and advisory firm that helps businesses and entrepreneurs make visions a reality.

Michael Blake: [00:00:22] And welcome back to Decision Vision, a podcast giving you, the listener, clear vision to make great decisions. In each episode, we will discuss the process of decision making on a different topic. Rather than making recommendations because everyone’s circumstances are different, we will talk to subject matter experts about how they would recommend thinking about that decision.

Michael Blake: [00:00:41] Hi. My name is Mike Blake, and I’m your host for today’s program. I’m a Director at Brady Ware & Company, a full-service accounting firm based in Dayton, Ohio, with offices in Dayton; Columbus, Ohio; Richmond, Indiana; and Alpharetta, Georgia, which is where we are recording today. Brady Ware is sponsoring this podcast. If you like this podcast, please subscribe on your favorite podcast aggregator, and please consider leaving a review of the podcast as well.

Michael Blake: [00:01:06] And, today, we’re going to talk about making customer data analytics an integral part of your business. And this is a topic that, I think, we’re only, as a community, as an economy, scratching the surface of. American society sort of runs away from math. We kind of run away from numbers. We know what the educational data are out there in terms of our general math capability, but the fact of the matter is, now, if you’re running away from numbers, you’re running away from business. And like it or not, if you want to be successful, you’ve got to get comfortable with data analytics, with data collection, with data science.

Michael Blake: [00:01:52] But that’s an intimidating decision because what I’ve observed – and we have experts here that will say if this is right or not – people are having to fundamentally change how they are thinking about their businesses. They’re changing their business models based on data analytics, and they’ve had to move towards kind of a fact-based, scientifically-driven decision making process that the age of, sort of, the crusty executive that just flies by the seat of their pants and makes gut decisions, takes gut decisions on major points of interests or points of issue, that is rapidly disappearing. So, this is a very interesting topic, a very important topic, and one that I hope that you, as a listener, will listen to very carefully.

Michael Blake: [00:02:37] A little bit of data here. With predictions that by 2020, there will be 1.7 megabytes of data created for every person on earth every second. I’m old enough to remember one when all the data would fit on a half of a megabyte floppy disk. I still have a computer that does that. And now that that data is being created at that rapid rate, there’s no doubt that we’re in the age of data-driven business.

Michael Blake: [00:03:08] Businesses of all sizes, all markets, and all customer types simply must get a handle on the information generated by business transactions, internet behavior, and simple day-to-day activity. Those who understand and find ways to manage this endless and growing data flow will flourish. Those who don’t are destined to drown. And I couldn’t agree with that more.

Michael Blake: [00:03:30] We’re being joined by two guests today. Our first guest, not concurrently, but I’m just going left to right as I sort of see across the microphone, is Angela Culver. Since the first install in 2012, Mobile Labs remains the leading supplier of in-house mobile device clouds that connect remote shared smartphones and tablets to global 2000 mobile web gaming and app engineering teams.

Michael Blake: [00:03:55] The company’s patent of GigaFox is offered on premises or hosted and sells mobile device sharing and management challenges that arise during development, debugging manual testing and automated testing, a pre-installed and pre-configured IPM server with custom tools, provides instant-on IPM test automation. GigaFox enables scheduling, collaboration, user management, security, mobile dev ops, and continuous automated testing for mobility teams spread across the globe and can connect cloud devices to an industry-leading number of third-party tools such as Xcode, Android Studio, and many commercial test automation tools. Angela, thanks for joining us today.

Angela Culver: [00:04:35] Thank you.

Michael Blake: [00:04:36] We’re also being joined by Micky Long of Arketi Group. Arketi Group is a public relations and digital marketing firm that helps business-to-business technology organizations accelerate growth through intelligent strategy, public relations messaging, branding, and demand generation. Consistently recognized by Chief Marketer Magazine as one of the nation’s B2B Top Shops and a Chief Marketer 200 Firm, Arketi helps its clients use marketing to generate revenue. Companies benefiting from this approach to B2B marketing include Cox, FirstData, Featurespace, Mobile Labs, NCR, and Snapfulfil. Micky, thanks for joining us.

Micky Long: [00:05:14] You’re welcome. Glad to be here.

Michael Blake: [00:05:16] So, you guys are tag teaming today. You guys, obviously, had a relationship. Talk about that relationship. How did it start? How are you guys working together?

Micky Long: [00:05:26] You want to go first?

Angela Culver: [00:05:28] So, I actually inherited Arketi. I joined Mobile Labs about four months ago, and they were the agency of hire. I know one of the founders of Arketi. He’s been in my network for quite some time and was, actually, introduced to Mobile Labs through Mike Neumeier. I’m a data-driven marketer. Mike is all about numbers as well. He has built a practice, a marketing agency practice around that. So, there has definitely been synergy. I met Micky about four months ago. And we’ve had a great relationship. He is one of the drivers. I see him and his team as my extended marketing team, and they help me execute almost on daily tasks for what we need to get done.

Micky Long: [00:06:22] Yeah. As you say, we are a company that believes in the data. Everything we do is built around data. And having Angela at Mobile Labs has been really refreshing because with her approach, it really, really works much better than if you’re dealing with an organization that perhaps doesn’t have the same focus and commitment to making the data work for you.

Micky Long: [00:06:40] So, marketing has changed. Marketing over the years goes back to the way — I go back as far as to say I remember the days when marketing and advertising was built around I know that of every dollar I spend, I’m going to waste 50 cents of it, but I just don’t know which 50 cents. Well, those days are really gone. We have the tools, we have the data streams, we have all those things today that we can measure it. We just, now, have to figure out how to put it into practice and make it work.

Michael Blake: [00:07:05] Yeah, that’s a great point. So, I’ve heard that expression before. I mean, that’s just not acceptable anymore to say you’re going to waste 50% of your money, right?

Angela Culver: [00:07:14] Yeah.

Michael Blake: [00:07:14] But it wasn’t that long ago when that was sort of considered acceptable losses, right? But, now, for most well-run businesses, if you tell somebody, “Hey, look, I need $5000. We’ll do well to get 2500 bucks of value of.” You’ll be laughed at out of their office at this point, right?

Angela Culver: [00:07:33] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:07:33] For most mature businesses, right?

Micky Long: [00:07:35] Right.

Michael Blake: [00:07:35] There are others, I’m sure, that haven’t gotten the program yet. So, where’s this data coming from? Data is hitting us from everywhere. I’ve got Amazon Echoes in my house, I’ve got a smart home, I’ve got cameras every place. Pretty much anybody on the planet who wants to know anything about my habits, they know it all, right. Where’s the data that you’re working with coming from?

Angela Culver: [00:08:03] So, we’re inundated with data. It truly is coming from all different sources. Everything that we do is tracked, essentially. My iRobot tracks and mops my house and becomes more intelligent on how it needs to vacuum my floors. Your Echo tracks your behaviors and delivers products to you that is more succinct with what you want.

Angela Culver: [00:08:38] It really is coming from everywhere. We are in a situation where we are living in a world, especially in business, where the mindset is the more data I have, the more I rule the world. And we’re about to take a bit of a shift with this. It’s no longer how much data you have. It’s how you use that data and why you’re using that data. And we’re starting to see that shift happen where our big data is just too big for us to manage and for us to actually use intelligently. And, now, we’ve got to focus on the quality of the data.

Micky Long: [00:09:17] It seems to me it’s kind of gotten to the point now there is so much data available. It’s like living in a library where all the books are in a foreign language.

Angela Culver: [00:09:25] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:09:26] Right? And there’s so much of it that you cannot possibly use at all. And 20 years ago, companies would be begging for this kind of data. They thought they died and gone to whatever heaven it is they believe in. And, now, it’s an embarrassment of riches. They’re so much coming from all sides. Is it fair to say the first step is kind of wrestling that steer to the ground, and hog tying it, and just trying to organize it?

Micky Long: [00:09:56] I think you have to start with the goals of your own business. And this is where we see because we deal with a lot of companies helping them try to figure this out. And what we typically find is companies start at — Usually, they start at step two or three. And what is missing is the initial step of saying, “Okay, I’ve got all these data streams, but what from a business standpoint do I really want to accomplish with this? What can I do? What do I want to do? Assume I have everything, but what do I want to do?”

Micky Long: [00:10:22] And figure a plan based on that because once you have your strategy, then you can plug in what you’ve got. If you don’t do that, you go back to sort of just thrashing about. And we see a lot of thrashing. Companies have not really mastered that yet. That’s one of the things that we’re working with Angela is to figure out how the process is supposed to work. So, I think that’s the key. That’s the first step you’ve got to look at.

Michael Blake: [00:10:43] So, is there a particular kind of data that you find is the most often overlooked? There’s just a goldmine sitting right there in front of people. They just walk by it every day, not realizing they’re walking past a goldmine.

Angela Culver: [00:10:55] Yes. So, especially in B2B, one of the most overlooked data sources or types of data is emotional and behavior data. From a marketer, we all buy from people. We buy products. And for the longest time in B2B, there was a sense that there was no emotion in the buy. There’s always emotion in the buy because you are buying into a relationship with another organization, and you’ve got an entry point of the person.

Angela Culver: [00:11:28] Tracking that type of information, it’s been difficult. It’s much like unstructured data. We’re inundated today with unstructured data. Figuring out how to manage it is a bit reminisce of about 20 years ago, 15-20 years ago, of how you manage transactional data. Everybody wanted very structured data, non-changing. It stayed essentially in its format and didn’t it morph into something else like transactional data. And, now, we’re looking at that in an unstructured data. But within the unstructured data, the gold mine is understanding how to use the emotional behavior components.

Michael Blake: [00:12:17] All right. So, you said something really cool I want to come back to because I think there’s a very important vocabulary point, but this notion of of emotional data is really fascinating. And I’m in finance, and emotions have finally worked its way into what I do. It’s called behavioral economics or behavioral finance where academics and I are asking, “Well, what if everybody doesn’t make the right decision all the time?” Well, we never thought of that. Well, let’s start thinking about that.

Michael Blake: [00:12:43] Is emotional data, is it as simple as, “It’s 10:00 at night, and I stress eat, so I know I’m going to Taco Bell,” or is it, “I’m more likely to make impulse purchase because I’m depressed or I’m an insomniac. I’m up 2:30 in the morning watching QVC or Home Shopping Network”? Is it as simple as that or is it — Where else does that kind of show up?

Micky Long: [00:13:07] From my perspective, one of the things that is really interesting is you, now, with the tools and the ability, you have the ability to track behavior enough that I’ll eventually know more about you than you know about yourself. So, I know what behavior you take. And we often tell people, and this is somewhat overlooked when you’re looking at just crunching the numbers, if you want to find out what people are about sometimes, one of the easiest ways to is to ask them because from a behavioral standpoint, they’ll tell you. If you ask the right questions, they’ll tell you.

Micky Long: [00:13:35] A lot of companies we work with will do why they won analysis of sales, but what they don’t do is they don’t do the loss sale analysis. They don’t say, “Why did somebody either did not buy my product in favor of somebody else’s or just not buy anything at all?” And knowing that information to balance that scale is critical if you want to drive additional sales from learning what the behavior was that was going on in your prospect’s mind when they made the purchase decision, or they didn’t make a purchase decision.

Michael Blake: [00:14:02] And that requires behavioral changes of itself, right, because a big part of what I do is in sales, and learning a new engagement candidly is an endorphin rush. I like it. I never thought I’d enjoy sales as much as I do because I’m a natural introvert. My wife always says if they ever do a Mars mission, I’m going to be first one. Like I’m going to be a tin can with no way to talk to for seven months.

Angela Culver: [00:14:28] Yeah.

Michael Blake: [00:14:28] I am in. Radiation be damned, but that on the other side, it’s human nature to focus on the positive. But as Bill Gates is famous for saying, “Success is a lousy teacher. It’s learning from the places where you failed,” but that’s hard to do. So [crosstalk].

Micky Long: [00:14:45] I think, you learn more about it from why you failed if you really look at it that way because, again, we all believe that what we’re selling is wonderful, and it solves a problem for people, and what have you, and everybody should buy it, but not everybody does. So, learning why they didn’t is really the key thing. To me, that’s the most interesting data points that you can pull out of things. And, now, with the tools we have, we don’t have to do a one-to-one conversation each time. The behavior is out there for us to kind of measure and pull together. And it makes it much easier.

Michael Blake: [00:15:16] But, as a company or as a decision maker, you’ve got to have the courage to dive into the failure.

Angela Culver: [00:15:23] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:15:23] And I think, Angela, you’ve told me stories about that with people that have basically made that kind of change in terms of their attitudes and approaches to things that it really drives it.

Angela Culver: [00:15:34] Yes. Emotional type of data can be seen as abstract. And I’ve learned over the years, I started off my career in technology and business intelligence, BI tools. And I went through the dot com boom, and then immediately the bust. And I realized very quickly that in order to keep my job, I had to become a data scientist. And then, I had to teach my team and my customers how to be that as well. One thing I realized is that marketing has really started taking this shift.

Angela Culver: [00:16:10] I seem to take it probably a little earlier than most folks, but, now, everyone needs to be a data scientist in marketing. And I use the scientific, basically, approach. I create a hypothesis, I formulate what my end result is going to be, I use math to manage and monitor that result that I’m anticipating. And with emotional behavior data, you’ve got to do the same thing. You’ve got to understand how you’re going to use it to make business decisions, and you’ve got to put a stake in the ground to start with. I find that a lot of people find this intimidating initially until they start working through this process. And it is all about a process, putting a process in place.

Michael Blake: [00:17:02] So, you mentioned something a little while back, but I think it’s important vocabulary, structured versus unstructured data.

Angela Culver: [00:17:09] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:17:09] What does that mean? What is the difference?

Angela Culver: [00:17:11] So, unstructured data would be e-mail, or Slack messages, or Instagram feeds, or video content where you’re — I’m going to throw another word out there, where you’re managing it through metadata, which is essentially data about data. You’re giving a description. But the core information content is not in a table column field format that’s easy to search on. You’re doing more of a, I would say, free-form find and search.

Micky Long: [00:17:52] And the tools are getting better. And there’s a lot of the — We’re starting to see the prominence of artificial intelligence coming into data management and things like that that are giving us the ability to sort of go after this unstructured data and start to pull it together in ways that we didn’t have before. But it’s still early stage on that. But it’s a matter — You still have to do both because there’s a lot of unstructured data that factors into the process that you’ve got to consider.

Michael Blake: [00:18:15] And that unstructured data has a lot of really cool stuff. It’s harder to use because it’s unstructured. But like so many things, the thing that’s most valuable requires the most effort to monetize. So, yeah, I suspect almost anybody who’s listening to this podcast has read an article, Harvard Business Review, McKinsey Quarterly, whatever it is, you got to get on data. You got to get on data. Does that apply to any sized company? Like if I’m a small, three-person, graphic design shop, do I need to get on top of data, or is this something that only applies to the NCRs of the world, the Coxes of the world, and so forth?

Angela Culver: [00:19:02] Yes. Everybody needs to have an understanding of their data. You’re not too small. You’re definitely not too big. The biggest challenge I’ve seen over the course of my career is that companies start too late. They start during a growth acceleration period. And at that point, they don’t have the historical data captured to help them make decisions to properly forecast on growth. How many leads they need to have? How many leads turn into sales opportunities that, then, turn into closed one? They’re having to back step, and capture the data, and hoping that their intuition is going to guide them in the right direction while they’re going through growth acceleration.

Angela Culver: [00:19:50] So, I believe you start the minute that you open your company doors. Do you have to have so much sophisticated technology? No. You can start with a spreadsheet, but you have to have a plan. That’s the number one thing that you have to go to the table with is having a data management plan. And you need to be looking at where you need to go two quarters from now, but also a year from now, versus five years, so that you can grow and manage your data strategy according to the company growth.

Michael Blake: [00:20:27] It’s a whole lot easier when you’re small.

Angela Culver: [00:20:29] Yeah.

Micky Long: [00:20:30] Yeah.

Michael Blake: [00:20:30] … than when you get bigger.

Micky Long: [00:20:30] That’s right. It really is. And so, if you get the right things, it’s like a lot of other things, if you set the discipline up on the early stage, and you put the processes in place that are going to drive it, it’s a whole lot easier than trying to come back and backfill as Angela mentioned when you get larger or when you’re going through a growth stage. That’s a challenge.

Michael Blake: [00:20:50] I don’t know this for sure, but it makes intuitive sense. As you grow the data inflows become exponentially greater, right? And it’s just it’s harder to wrestle that loose firehose off the ground and do something with it. You haven’t developed habits. And then, I’m guessing, I do a lot of work with startups, when you do hit that high growth, when you haven’t put in that discipline of data analytics yet, it’s hard to kind of stop and make yourself do that when you have five prospects wanting to get a proposal right away, right?

Angela Culver: [00:21:22] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:21:22] And the next thing you know, it just never gets done. Until then, it becomes such a big problem you can never tackle, right?

Micky Long: [00:21:27] Yeah. Let me give you a really, really quick example of what you were just talking about. A lot of companies spend a good bit of time trying to make sure they capture their information about prospects into a program like Salesforce. If they don’t have the discipline set up on the early stage to identify, “How are we going to manage the titles of these prospects that we’re using or the functions of these prospects?” and they allow that to go on for a while, you could end up-

Michael Blake: [00:21:54] We had a client, for example, and a couple of years back that will remain nameless that when we went in to try to find out how to segment to do a better job of marketing, they had 375 different types of titles in their Salesforce program because they never forced their salespeople to consolidate. So, if I was the vice president of stuff in my organization, that’s what went into Salesforce. But the vice president of stuff is not really something that you could really sort on.

Micky Long: [00:22:24] So, the reality is as it gets larger, and as your database gets larger, this company had 100,000 people in their database when we started to look at this. It was a phenomenal problem, a very expensive problem to fix. So, if you start early, and put the discipline process in place early, when you have 25 people or 100 people, it’s a whole lot easier to deal with.

Michael Blake: [00:22:45] Yeah. Our firm is a case study as well. We’re starting to go back now and trying to understand basic things about our clients. What industries are they in? And can we associate them with [makes] codes, so we can start doing some kind of categorization, and some geographic analysis, and income levels, very basic stuff.

Michael Blake: [00:23:05] But we’ve been in business 60 years. The easiest thing to do is to cache that stuff and make people put that on the client intake form. But then, you try to go back and capture. You’re trying to ask a partner who’s building it 400 bucks an hour, and it’s busy tax season. Like, “Hey, can you verify these 80 different clients?” Like, “No, I can’t. I mean, I understand you need this data, but I’m not going to tell — which client do I tell their tax return doesn’t get filed because I’ve responded to your data request.” It’s because 65 years ago, nobody thought about this. But, now, we have to go back. It does become 10 times harder.

Michael Blake: [00:23:42] But let’s say you do have a clean slate, and start a company called Donut Shop. What’s the most — What are the pitfalls or how do I get started? Sorry, this. How do I get started doing that, right? I think about data, open the door day one. What’s my to-do list?

Angela Culver: [00:24:04] So, I always advise people to start with the company goals. What are your company goals? What are you trying to achieve within this first calendar year? And then, how do you need to make those decisions whether it’s successful, failure, or neutral? And then, from there, start building an alignment with the type of data that you need to help you manage to those goals.

Angela Culver: [00:24:35] Data is not the only thing that you’re using as a resource, but it should be one that allows you to create predictability. Most of our data is still historical. So, if you’re just starting, then you really need to identify your company goals, so that you can start mapping. And a lot of times, I advise people to start with a free technology. Start with a spreadsheet and just start identifying some of those metrics that will help you move towards that.

Angela Culver: [00:25:09] Being in marketing, I focus more on that. So, I’m looking at, what is it going to cost me to acquire a customer? What’s my cost per lead? What are my retention rates? How many products am I selling by month, by quarter? Do I have any slow periods? What is the actual selling price on average, and the time for payback as well? Not just marketing but overall cost of the company. Those are some fundamentals that I look at initially. As you drill down, you’ll see that you have website metrics that roll up to that. You’ll have advertising metrics that roll up to that. But it all starts with company goals. Micky, what do you think?

Micky Long: [00:25:59] Yeah, you have to have them. And the other part of this is you can’t go too far too fast. What I mean by that is you have to — I would say the way I would put it is you have to figure out the appetite of your company for this because if you try to bite off too much and go way down the path, you’re not going to win. You’re not going to be able to do it, and you get frustrated, and somebody’s going to throw up their hands and say, “Well, that was a wasted exercise.” And it isn’t. It’s just that you tried to do too much. So, the idea of having a plan based on your business goals and taking steps along the way, so you create milestones is really the way to sort of do it in stages, so that you’re not trying to eat the elephant all at one time. So, that’s an important consideration.

Michael Blake: [00:26:40] So, there’s something to be said about being incremental and that-

Angela Culver: [00:26:42] Yes.

Micky Long: [00:26:42] Absolutely, absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:26:43] Otherwise, you’re so intimidating, like, “Yeah.” You’re just sort of-.

Micky Long: [00:26:44] And if you try to do too much too fast, this is where you run into problems with something that nobody from the marketing side, anyway, wants to hear about, which is the data quality issues. So, that’s a real problem for clients now, for companies that are trying to deal with this because as the data flow comes in, and this data gets into their systems, if it’s not set up right the first way, if it’s not cleaned regularly, what you’re going to end up with is the dirty data issue, which costs companies millions of dollars to sort of struggle through. And that’s a big problem that it’s out there because if you run it too fast, you’re not going to have the discipline to sort of figure it out.

Micky Long: [00:27:22] So, I could be in your system as Micky Long, Micky L. Long, M. Long, or something else, and how do you know it’s all the same person? So, if you don’t have those things figured out, the tools and the processes, you’re not going to get there. So, you really have to make sure that you put the emphasis on ensuring that the data that you have in your system is clean. That’s a big consideration.

Michael Blake: [00:27:44] And the data collection itself, I think, to a degree, needs to be non-intrusive too, right? I’m old enough to remember RadioShack. And RadioShack used to be able to get cool stuff. I want to fix my TV, I want to get a remote-controlled car, you go to RadioShack. But, golly, the thing I always dreaded was that they would insist on taking my phone number every time I went in. Every time, which meant they took it. So, they wanted it, presumably, to know the geographic distribution of their customers, but they never hung onto it. There’s nothing — And, I think, the technology is not available that there is a central database to which they could connect, right?

Michael Blake: [00:28:30] If you think about it, if we had that barrier to kind of mechanically cough up our data every time we bought something, we’d never buy anything. We’d all live on some sort of agricultural economy and just share things with each other because the time costs of going into Kroger, and share, and getting our blood drawn is just not worth it, right?

Angela Culver: [00:28:49] Yeah.

Micky Long: [00:28:50] But the reality of that is I often had this this conversation with my kids, there is more data about you, and there are more people out there that know more about you than you’ll ever imagine. So, we’ve given up a lot of our data freedom, if you will, because of the exchanges we made. So, the reality in my mind is it’s there. Why can’t companies put it together and make sense of it? So, why can’t I walk into a Publix or a Kroger, and as I’m walking down the aisle with my mobile phone, have them immediately start feeding me offers about the dog food that I bought last time I was in the store or the competitor’s dog food with a special opportunity to try it?

Michael Blake: [00:29:29] All of that exists. All of that data is there at all of the stores. This is what Angela’s company does is help companies with these mobile applications. So, the applications are there. The data streams are there. Why haven’t they put it together? That’s, I guess, the big question is, why haven’t they figured out how to join A to B to create a really strong environment? Because they build better customer interactions that way, along with higher revenue.

Michael Blake: [00:29:54] Is part of it because maybe the data tools themselves are just prohibitively expensive, intimidating?

Angela Culver: [00:30:01] So, intimidation is probably one key. So, if we just look at MarTech alone, in 2018, there were over 8000 types of technology in this space. So, if you look at the Loomis Escape, you need a magnifying glass to actually see the logos now on the sheet. About five years ago, I think, we were at about 600 companies. So, the space has grown considerably. So, there’s more options than you know what to do with.

Angela Culver: [00:30:33] And a lot of companies start with, “Okay. I’ve got this huge dataset. I know I have all the answers in this dataset. So, I need to run out and buy the technology to support that, and be able to mine it, and digest it.” The problem is they start with the how. They go out and buy this complex system, multiple systems, integrated together, but they never really understand why they’re doing it and what they’re trying to solve for.

Angela Culver: [00:31:03] So, they put in these systems. They’ve got the technology to find the answer, but they don’t know what the answer they’re looking for. So then, they start breaking it apart and going backwards. So, we see this shift in companies quite a bit just because they didn’t start with the plan initially to figure out what they wanted. So, if I went into a grocery store, and they had an aisle that said, “Angela, here’s all the products you want. And this is what you typically buy,” or they packed my bags for me, they have all that information, and they could manage that if they wanted to create that type of a customer experience for their customers.

Micky Long: [00:31:50] Amazon’s doing it. You look at what Amazon does. When you go to Amazon, you buy something from Amazon. And so, for the next lifetime, you’re going to get recommendations from Amazon based on the products you’re buying. So, they’re using that same kind of technology with the data from previous sales to give you a better user experience. And that’s what it’s all about is trying to make the user feel more comfortable, more personal, and more engaged with the brand of the company.

Micky Long: [00:32:14] And that goes across, I think, companies from the three-person company that starting out as a very boutique-oriented company to a large organization. It’s trying to just keep things going in the middle of the road. So, whether you’re large or small, you really want to build that brand. So, it’s all about customer experience.

Michael Blake: [00:32:32] Now, there’s the tool out there. And that makes sense. I mean, if you have a mismatch tools, it’s like buying a Tesla. And then, all of a sudden, realizing you really like to do off-road stuff, and you think it’s the Tesla’s fault, right.

Angela Culver: [00:32:45] yeah.

Michael Blake: [00:32:46] Well, it’s not. You just you didn’t buy a truck. So, the other side of the coin is the skills, right?

Angela Culver: [00:32:54] Right.

Michael Blake: [00:32:54] Not everybody has taken a course in statistics. And many who did like me 20 years ago in my MBA diploma’s in a caved wall in France someplace, I don’t necessarily remember it. How do you get up to speed or how do you hire for that, find somebody that can make sense of that data and interpret it in a way that becomes useful business information?

Angela Culver: [00:33:16] So, when I’m hiring someone into a marketing operations role, which is traditionally where my data scientists, or analytics person or persons would sit, I am looking for someone that has a science and math mind, and they have a natural curiosity to solve problems with numbers. They’re usually linear in thought, but they’re very flexible to creative ideas. So, they’re a bit different than a financial person that you would see doing accounting or working in the finance department. But I found if — I have discovered that if I find someone that has a knack for science and really likes math, then they can learn the technology and be successful in this job.

Micky Long: [00:34:12] I think, you got to find somebody — Forgive the term. You have to find some that’s a little geeky, somebody that really gets excited over data, the kind of person that kind of runs out of their office and says, “Look what I found,” when they put these two things together, but they really have to I think have a passion for it because if you really want to see what the insights are, you’re looking for something, as you said for that, you want that curiosity, that deep curiosity that says, “If I put A and B together with 1 and 4, what I’m going to show you is this is something you never thought of before, and this is going to help drive our business in a different direction or a different way.”.

Micky Long: [00:34:43] To me, that’s nirvana. That’s what you really want to get out of this is to be able to take these things together in ways people haven’t thought of and say. “That’s going to put us in a new direction. That’s going to really, really light some fires under the sales team to get some high revenue coming in.” And it happens every day. You just have to have the right people.

Michael Blake: [00:35:00] And that sounds a lot like what Angela was describing in terms of that like hybrid of flexibility and linearity. You need the flexibility and creativity to ask the right questions, but then the linearity to answer the question in a process-driven way-

Angela Culver: [00:35:13] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:35:14] … so, that the statistics are meaningful? right?

Angela Culver: [00:35:16] Yes.

Michael Blake: [00:35:16] If we don’t do that, then you get gobbledygook basically.

Micky Long: [00:35:19] Right.

Michael Blake: [00:35:24] What do most companies miss? What are companies most missing out on in data management? What do you think is the most frequent opportunity or biggest opportunity they’re missing out on?

Angela Culver: [00:35:33] I think to go back to when they get started, I think that is a miss that I see quite a bit in a lot of companies where they’re starting too late. They don’t set it as a priority earlier in the business when it can have a huge impact. They’re not treating data as an asset from day one. And that’s a potential mess.

Micky Long: [00:36:02] Yeah. I see two things. Number one, they take the approach that’s incorrect, which is that this is a marathon, it’s not a sprint. You have to be able to do this and have the discipline to do this over the long haul, and not do this as, “Oh, let’s try this for a couple of months. And if it doesn’t quite work, we’ll go back and do something else.” That’s one thing.

Micky Long: [00:36:18] And the other thing is it’s not a marketing exercise for the most part, it’s a revenue exercise, which means you can’t just sort of take the data streams coming in and say, “That’s the prevalence of the marketing organization.” You’ve got to join marketing and sales together for this thing to really work. And that’s something that is still a challenge.

Micky Long: [00:36:36] I remember back in the day when marketing automation tools first started. It was supposed to be the answer to all of our prayers. It was going to be marketing and sales were now, finally, going to get together, and sing Kumbaya around the campfire, and we’re all going to do everything together. And we’re still trying to put marketing and sales people together. And it’s been at least 10 years since that started. So, why has that not happened? It’s because we still have issues. They’re the people issues. They’re not tool issues.

Micky Long: [00:37:00] So, the reality of it is you’ve got to look at this thing holistically and say, “It’s a business issue, not so much that.” So, that’s what people miss, in my mind, that are big things that they don’t look at. It’s the integration.

Michael Blake: [00:37:10] So, do you have a favorite data success story, something really wonderful, spectacular you’ve found that you just did not expect to find in a data exercise?

Angela Culver: [00:37:20] I have two actually. I was working for a company a few years back, and part of what I was hired to do was to increase the brand equity of the company in a relatively short period of time. And when I got into the company, the brand colors were predominantly green and red. And after looking at the customer base, I realized that 80% were male, most of them were between the age of 35 to 50, and 1:10 were color blind, red/green colorblind. So-

Michael Blake: [00:37:59] Oh, yeah. I’ve heard of that statistic. Yeah.

Angela Culver: [00:38:00] Yeah. So, our ads, the call to action were either highlighted in red or green. And the company was losing almost a half a million dollars in advertising cost due to the end user not being able to see the call to action. So, I went into the leadership team, said, “We need to change the brand colors,” presented my data, and within seconds had the approval to change the brand colors. I changed from red/green to essentially green/yellow, citron. And we immediately saw an uptick in the brand value. We went from about 16% to a 25%, which is unheard of, especially with a tech company. So, I wouldn’t have been able to do that without the data.

Micky Long: [00:39:03] So, I can give you one that’s a really simple one hasn’t having to do with database size and the quality of data we talked about before. I had a client that had a base of 100,000 people, and they were doing the classic marketing e-mails and things like that to try to get them in place, and they were having miserable returns, miserable e-mail open rates, and all those statistics you look at. So, what we did was we started doing an analysis. And what we found was there was a large group of these 100,000 that had never opened an email, had never engaged with it, and had never done anything for them.

Michael Blake: [00:39:36] So, what we tried was something very revolutionary for that company, which is we said, “Let’s ignore that 75,000 people in your database that have never touched anything. Just don’t send e-mail to them. Don’t think about them when you’re crafting your messages, and concentrate only on that smaller group, and really refine that smaller group to see what we could do.”.

Michael Blake: [00:39:56] And as you might expect, what’s happening is the company is now seeing a tremendous return on the investment against that smaller group of people. And, now, with better messages and better approaches, they can start to expand out to other people that are like that. And the 75,000 that never did anything, they still sit there, and we don’t do anything with them.

Michael Blake: [00:40:14] So, the reality is it’s a matter of concentrating on the people that are likely to do something and ignore the ones that don’t. And I would predict that most companies, if not all companies, have that same situation in place.

Angela Culver: [00:40:25] We have been dealing with email within our support group. We track at mobile apps, all our support tickets. And we actually get a little worried if we’re not receiving support tickets from our customers because, typically, they’re not using the product daily. One set of support tickets we’ve realized has helped us educate and improve the functionality of the product. So, within our product, we use iPads, telephones, mobile devices. They come in at all different versions. So, you’ll have an iPhone 6, an iPhone 8, and they’re plugged in 24 hours a day.

Angela Culver: [00:41:15] After a certain period of time, you will start seeing battery bloating. And it will slow down the performance of actually testing a mobile application on one of those devices. So, through our support tickets, we started seeing that customers were complaining about battery bloating. So, we actually started sending out information in advance. We knew if they were a customer for six months, and that they were constantly plugged in, that they were most likely going to start seeing deterioration of devices. And we’ve been able to counterattack that through putting out more educational information through emails; where in the past, we would send out promotional materials and emails, and they weren’t getting it, they didn’t want it, but this educational material is actually helping them improve the performance of the product overall. And in the end, it has an impact on retention rates, customer churn. So-

Michael Blake: [00:42:14] Sure, it makes sense. So, okay. So, we’ve talked through a lot of topics here. Some of our listeners are thinking, “Okay, I’m sold. I got to make data part of my business,” where do they start? What’s the what’s the first thing on their to do-list?

Angela Culver: [00:42:32] Start with the goals, set realistic expectations. So, like what Micky has said, you don’t want to try to boil the ocean. Start with what your company can tolerate. So, understanding that if you’re going to set up a marketing data hub, and you need to utilize sales information, understand what the tolerances from your sales team. Putting over 50 required fields in Salesforce for them to fill out every time they have a prospect come in probably might be over their risk tolerance or their ability to handle that initially. Maybe start with five fields if you’re just starting to input data and utilize data. So, setting up expectations would definitely and setting goals would be my first.

Micky Long: [00:43:34] Mine would be just do it. Just stop talking about it, stop thinking about it, stop reading about it. Just go do something because even if the first thing you do isn’t 100% correct, it’s going to get you further than if you just start reading whitepapers about, “Look, I get this data under control.” And that’s what we see is just that inertia is what stops a lot of people because they start looking at all the downsides to it. Just go do it is really what I would recommend.

Michael Blake: [00:44:00] Just rip the Band-Aid off.

Micky Long: [00:44:01] Just rip the Band-Aid off and just go for it.

Michael Blake: [00:44:04] Okay. So, all right. So, again, a lot to unpack here. We’ve only scratched the surface. We could easily make this a three-hour podcast, but not everybody would listen for three hours. So, if somebody wants to learn more, can they contact you and ask you some questions?

Angela Culver: [00:44:21] Absolutely.

Michael Blake: [00:44:21] Would that be okay?

Micky Long: [00:44:21] Sure.

Michael Blake: [00:44:21] So, Angela, why don’t you go first? If somebody wants to ask you about your experience with this, ask you some advice, how would they contact you?

Angela Culver: [00:44:28] So, you can definitely contact me via LinkedIn. That’s my name, Angela Culver, Mobile Labs. Also, my email, angela.culver@mobilelabsinc.com.

Micky Long: [00:44:41] And likewise, my LinkedIn profile is out there for prevalence. And my email is really, really simple. It’s mlong@arketi.com.

Michael Blake: [00:44:53] Okay. Gone are the days, the long strings with nine different numbers behind the at symbol, right? So, thank goodness for that. That’s going to wrap it up for today’s program. I’d like to thank Angela Culver and Mickey Long from Mobile Labs and Arketi Group respectively so much for joining us and sharing their expertise with us.

Michael Blake: [00:45:13] We’ll be exploring a new topic each week, so please tune in so that when you’re faced with your next business decision, you have clear vision when making it. Again, if you enjoy this podcast, please consider leaving a review with your favorite podcast aggregator. It helps people find us, so that we can help them. Once again, this is Mike Blake. Our sponsor is Brady Ware &c Company. And this has been the Decision Vision Podcast.

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