growth, financeNowadays more and more startups kickstart with a strong technical knowledge base. Sometimes the common scenario includes a low, if not completely absent, finance knowledge.
I’m not talking about basic economy/financial knowledge that impact business plans. Is more about having a big picture of the growth process in the mid/long run.Talking about funding, IPOs, stocks admin, forex.
From a tech-CEO/CTO point of view, I do believe is important to have a rough understanding. What would you suggest as a good reading? What pitfalls to look after?
Thank you
Generally the CFO’s are ‘Financial Management’ subject matter experts. So, look for a good book on that subject, look for an edx course (there are 126 courses at the moment, most of them are free and from accredited universities- https://www.edx.org/courses?search_query=financial+management) or look for articles on the subject that FM covers. FM is a big subject that covers a diverse set of topics including
Brigham and Ehrhardt’s Financial Management Theory and Practice is one of the standard textbooks used in formal FM courses
If you are coming from a tech background, it wouldn’t hurt to know some management accounting and some financial accounting as well. Management accounting covers topics like budgeting, capital management, cost and overheads. While financial accounting covers the staples of the bean counting world such as the income statements, cash flow statements and the famous balanced sheet. If you are a CEO, you would at least have to know how to read these. Getting a couple of dummies book http://www.amazon.com/Managerial-Accounting-Dummies-Mark-Holtzman/dp/1118116429 and http://www.amazon.com/Financial-Accounting-Dummies-Maire-Loughran/dp/0470930659 might be a good idea.
One thing to keep in mind is that if you are the CEO, you would be expected to talk to and understand the people who report to you. So you should be able to at least understand the basics of financial management and accounting, technology and product development, sales and marketing, HR and administration and customer service and support etc.
If the CEO does not understand it, then usually that area tends to get neglected and the person in charge of that department either has a tough time trying to bring important matters to the CEO’s attention or may take advantage. So in order to be effective, know what you don’t know and have a plan to learn the basics. This is partly why some young CEOs get mentors/friends from these fields.
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