FP&A Today

Caroline McAuliffe is Senior Vice President, Head of Corporate Finance (FP&A and Procurement) at Fannie Mae. In its Q1 2026 results, the government-owned mortgage giant boasted 33 consecutive quarters of profitability and $3.7B in net income in the quarter—delivered by a team of 7,000 employees. In this episode Caroline reveals the FP&A mindset and processes behind this success.

The career progression from audit to controllership, and FP&A

Combining procurement and FP&A 

Shifting from an annual budget cycle to a 2-year rolling forecast

How AI is transforming repetitive low value work including AI “flash reports needed supporting 50 officers at Fannie Mae

Secrets to being a CTA (Challenging Trusted Advisor) at Fannie Mae

In the third in our series on finance business partnering we are joined by David Manela, who has had the role of CRO and CMO at Fiverr, Ideei, and Vivre. As managing partner and co-founder of Violet Growth he is in high-demand at some of the hottest scaling companies, designing a  growth operating system that “speaks the CFO’s language from day one”. It is tailored to companies spending more than $10m annually on marketing and sales - with digital as the main growth channel.
“Spending a dollar in marketing is no different than spending a dollar in infrastructure, on say a forklift that you might need for your warehouse. You need a return on a specific schedule, and you need a percentage of returns on that schedule. Don't start with a campaign, start with a financial goal.”

 

In this episode on the highlights and lowlights of the FP&A relationship with marketing, David talks:

 

His background from audit to marketing and P&L responsibility at companies 

Marketing as an “investment” not a “cost”

The power of getting a marketing forecast  based on cohort behavior 

Payback period and capital constraints at Fiverr

Disconnected and expensive mistakes in business partnering 

The power of AI in marketing and finance

Swati Bagri, head of FP&A for a major global FMCG company was told early in her career: “Either you are sales or you are helping sales”. In this second in our series of finance business partnership Swati, representing finance, is joined by Stephanie Troy, VP of Sales at Datarails, for a candid conversation with host Glenn Hopper about what sales leaders actually need from FP&A, and what great revenue-producing partnerships look like.

In this special episode: 

The dynamics of sales vs finance needs 

Pipeline communication challenges 

The problems with forecasting

Where lack of communication hurts sales and finance

What finance needs from sales leaders in budget season

Dealing with the Office of No

Today on the show, we're launching a special series on finance business partnering - exploring different facets of modern finance business partnering. Today’s special guest is Tunc Tezel VP group FP&A, Ontax, bringing 30-years of lessons from Ontex, Pladis, British American Tobacco, Procter & Gamble, and Gillette - business partnering with marketing, sales, and operations to reach common goals and bringing some of the most popular CPG products to market. 

From “spy” to “strategist” in business partnering   

Secrets to storytelling 

Embedded vs. centralised FP&A business partnering 

Working capital as a partnering tool

Breaking bad news in business partnering 

When business partnering breaks down

Tom Hinkle, senior leader in data and analytics at TIAA, has  built his career at the intersection of finance, technology, and strategy. He also has a budding YouTube channel (Tom's Data World, which includes instructional videos on Excel, SQL, and AI). He's worked extensively with Excel (is a Microsoft MVP) and SQL, as well as Tableau and Power BI, and has worked with major financial institutions, including Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and TIAA. 

"Nobody really gets excited about spending money on data governance. They get excited about machine learning, about AI, about data storytelling — everybody wants seminars on that. But data governance? At the end of the day, you're coming up with something you thought was right anyway, and then you're asking someone to spend more money just to make sure it's right."

Why data governance is the foundation of AI 

Trust but verify challenges

The two sides of data governance: master data management vs. data quality and controls

How FP&A teams should think about their role as downstream consumers of data

Why domain expertise is still non-negotiable in the age of vibe coding

Tom's Minesweeper-in-Excel story, and what it taught him about prompting