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How CFOs Can Drive AI, Data Strategy and Business Growth with Andrea Marin of Logicalis 8-6-26
00:17:46
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- [00:01]
A
When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant, you keep production lines moving and quality on track because there's no room for slowdowns. With Grainger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place. So nothing gets in the way of getting the job done. Call 1-800-GRAINGER clickgrainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done.
- [00:30]
B
This is Scott Becker with the Becker Business and the Becker Private Equity Podcast. Thrilled today to be joined by a brilliant Chief Financial officer. We're joined today by Andrea Mirren and Andrea's going to talk to us about her career trends. She's watching her company and a lot more. Andrea, can you take a moment and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself and your career and your company?
- [00:54]
C
Yeah, absolutely. And first of all, thank you Scott for having me. I'm really happy to be here. I enjoyed being on your AI panel earlier in the summertime. So happy to be here today. So first of all, my company, I'm the CFO of Logicalis here in the us we are a technology services, services and solutions provider. What we do, we help. We help companies modernize their digital infrastructure, their cloud environments, their cybersecurity, all of their data. So a lot of the kind of buzzwords that you hear about today is a lot of the work that we do. So as a CFO, I always like to say that there's kind of three types of CFOs. There's the technical side where they have a lot of technical skills, either with accounting or tax. There's the business development kind which is really heavily focused on M and A activ and then on the operations side and that's where I fall in. There's obviously a cross between all three with any type of cfo. Like we actually we just acquired a company a couple of days ago. But I spend a lot of my time focusing on the operation as a whole and that has evolved over time and how I see it too. So, you know, I'm trying to avoid talking about AI too much, but it's so hard in today's world, not to mention it at all. And a lot of my time really focuses on how, how do we modernize our own business, how do we deliver services to our customers better and how do we operate more efficiently internally. So I'm actually the executive sponsor for our company's AI committee. And when I compare that to the amount of time That I spend, the amount of time I spend in the entire operation versus in finance alone, it's actually more heavily weighted into the entire organization making sure that we're operating efficiently. So I've, you know, throughout my career I've spent a lot of it on the technology side of the business and technology businesses specifically. And that's super exciting to me. I really, really enjoy operating at the intersection of finance and innovation. I will say that I, you know, I've always been in finance. I was a finance major at Michigan State. But I can not say that finances, you know, it's not my passion necessarily. What I, what I do enjoy, what I am passionate about, is working with a great group of people, enjoying the people that I work with, having fun at it and having a variety of challenges and things that I can work on on a day to day basis. So I'm really, really happy that I evolved into the type of CFO position that I'm in today because it gives me so many different challenges and opportunities to focus on.
- [03:51]
B
Where do you see AI making the biggest difference? Where are you most excited about AI and what do you see there?
- [03:58]
C
Yeah, it's a great question and I think that it's obviously a little bit different for every company. But what I will say, and I'm sure we'll talk about this more through the conversation today, but what I'm seeing is that what we hear in the media, what we read in the news is that companies are a lot further along in their AI journey than the majority of the conversations I have with individuals. From whether they're customers or whether they're other CFOs. In my Chicago based peer groups, I talk to people almost on a day to day basis that are very, very early in their AI journey. And so when I think about what area where I'm seeing AI make the biggest impact, it really does vary for each organization. But so many companies can be seen an opportunity within their customer service area. So receiving phone calls can be replaced by agents. How companies support customers can be replaced by agents. And that's where I really, really see an opportunity across the board in is if a company has a customer service, a call center, that's number one. I hate to say it, but in the finance side of the world that's where organizations are really struggling to find opportunities. And for a variety of reasons I think. Well, first of all, there has been a lot of automation within finance to begin with. If you think about accounts payable processes, there's been invoice matching and a Lot of opportunities to really drive efficiencies there. But more importantly, I would say that data is an issue and organizational data is just, it's in a lot of ways, it needs a lot of work in order to really be able to benefit from AI. I think that's a struggle for finance as well as thinking about ERPs. And this is a challenge that we have too at Logicalis. Right now we're on an old ERP system and we need to, we're in the process of migrating to a new one, but it just doesn't make sense to integrate new AI solutions with old ERPs. It's not the most efficient. So I think that companies are not as far along in their transformation journey because of old systems and ways of doing business. Old ways of operating data that need to be modernized first.
- [06:40]
B
Thank you. And how big a lift is that to clean the data, modernize the data, make it more useful for the AI tools that people want to use? What does that look like?
- [06:49]
C
Oh my gosh, Scott, it is huge. It's gigantic. We're actually in the process of a data governance overhaul and it truly is an overhaul. I use that term all the time. We've engaged with a consultant and just to focus on three areas of our data. So. So customer data, vendor data, and item or product data. It's going to take us about 12 months to tackle. And that's just talking about how do we structure our data going forward, how do we make sure that it's governed going forward, how do we clean it up? That's not even the process to get our data into a data lake so that we can actually use it. And again, that's only focused on three, three small parts of our data for the organization. So it really depends on how long the company's been around, how many systems they have, etc. But if you want to do it and you want to do it right, this isn't just a six month project. It's honestly a multi year undertaking. And it's something that you have to remember that it's not just one and done. You can't just get it cleaned up and then expect to be good going forward. It's really a way of operating your business differently going forward. People need to think about how they enter information into the system. You need to have controls and checks and balances in place. So there's a lot that goes into it that really changes the way that businesses operate. But I'm under the true philosophy that if you do it and you do it right, There's a lot of opportunity for your data to be an actual asset versus being either a risk to the company or being net neutral on whether or not it helps you. So I'm excited for where we're going to land, but it's a long, long road that we have ahead of us.
- [08:46]
B
Thank you very, very much. And let me also note, what trends are you watching heading into next year? What are you most focused on and excited about in addition to AI? What are the big trends you're watching?
- [08:59]
C
Yeah, well, I do have to double down, actually, on the data side. I see data becoming a strategic priority for organizations, and I do see it becoming a big asset for companies. I think that some companies are talking about or they already do kind of monetize their data and sell it. That's not really where I see a lot of value. Where I do see a lot of value is really being able to support your customers in a strategic way from how you're able to use your data. Right. Customers are data hungry and using that information to help them succeed in their business, I think can be a strategic priority and one that can be monetized. Another area that I see, and this has been in the works for a while, but it's the evolution of the cfo. Back in the day, and I am speaking a long time ago, most CFOs were only focused on the technical side of the business. Business, they were focused on the accounting side of the business. They were focused on historical reporting. Right. All of those things. What you think of a traditional cfo. And that started to evolve several years ago. That's nothing new. But the way that I see the position evolving has been accelerated so much by the advancement of technology over the past couple years. I mentioned a few minutes ago my CFO peer groups here in Chicago. I'm pretty active in that community and I speak with people quite often about where they're at in their journey. And it's a big, big difference to me, the number of CFOs that I've talked to today that are very, very actively curious about and investing in technology, understanding where their role fits in and how they can support that modernization journey. That's different than what I saw five years ago. Even though five years ago I would say that the CFO role was not the traditional one anymore, but it was more focused on, you know, different, different areas of the business. Maybe it was more focused on HR or sales.
- [11:11]
B
No, no, no. And take a second there, because traditionally you've seen CFOs, some of them really got in the numbers. Finance sort of really taking care of. Yeah, you know, it. Advanced numbers. I'd say second, operations, CFOs, they're also the cross between COOs and CFOs. And then third is the CFO that. That's really deeply involved in strategy. You know, that's almost closer to the right hand, connected to the. To the CEO.
- [11:40]
C
Exactly.
- [11:42]
B
And you know, if I went back a long time ago, most CFOs were sort of in that the numbers area more of evolution to the operations and strategy. What do you see today in terms of the evolution of CFOs? And also it does seem like CFOs hard to find at the right level and a little bit overwhelmed. And does that lessen their ability to step into CEO roles and so forth?
- [12:06]
C
It can, yeah, it certainly can lessen their ability. And I think that. Well, for me personally, what I've been, what I found to be so successful in enabling me to have more of an enterprise mindset and an enterprise role is. This sounds so simple when I say it, but developing a fantastic team. I am so proud to have a superstar team that, well, not only do we work well together, but I really can rely on them to excel at everything they do. So if I have that trust and have that support from my team, it really enables me to step more outside of finance specifically and really partner with the business leaders throughout the organization, partner with the CEO, partner with our Chief Revenue Officer, partner with our HR side. And that has that enterprise role where finance really sits between all of the functions, I think, is where we can offer the most strategic value to the organization. It really just broadens perspective, it broadens decision making. And I think that there's a lot of gray area really that has started to evolve between each of the functions. And finance really is that glue that keeps everyone together.
- [13:30]
B
But isn't that so true that having that great team in place is everything in terms of being able to have flexibility and do other things?
- [13:37]
C
It really is. It really is. And the. I think it goes both ways too, because I put a lot of trust into my team, which makes them. Which empowers them. Right? It empowers them to take the lead and to grow in their roles and then to delegate more to their team. So we all just kind of elevate each other together. And it's. You know, I would say looking back on my career, those are some mistakes that I've made in the past, is that I've held on to employees that were not a good fit not the best fit that they could be for too long. Right. If you want to build a superstar team, you can't. You need to move fast, and you need.
- [14:21]
B
You have to be willing to sort out people. But it's not easy to do.
- [14:24]
C
Exactly. Exactly. It's never easy to do, you know, for a variety of reasons either. You know, one, it's hard, too. It's just humanly hard to get rid of, you know, to terminate people. But then also, I think that there's a part of. Well, there is at least a part of me that really wanted to hold on, that really wanted to try, that would think about all of the time already invested, and you. You want to hold on to some kind of glimmer of hope. Right? You always. I always see the good in. In people. But there comes a time when you know that you need to move on. And I've learned over time that you need to make those decisions sooner.
- [15:03]
B
100 and they're tough, tough decisions, no fun. But to build a great team, you've got to sort out who are the people that are great, who are the people that are really important to contribute and who don't belong there and very challenging to do talk about. One last question for you. What advice would you give to emerging leaders, People emerging into either CFO roles or other leadership roles. What advice would you give to emerging leaders?
- [15:28]
C
Well, first of all, going back to what we were just talking about, I think it's incredibly important to develop an enterprise mindset. I truly believe that the biggest opportunities really sit between the functions. They sit between the CEO and finance and operations and sales and technology. And the broader that you open up your perspective, the better the decisions that you'll be able to make, the more impact that you'll have on the organization as a whole. I think it's so important to really keep an open mind as you're learning how to navigate throughout the enterprise. Keep an open mind about what drives decisions for other functions throughout the organization. What is truly important to them and why do they operate differently? Why do they communicate differently? What's important there? Because I've seen so many finance people, finance leaders and also sales leaders, right, Burn bridges because they don't try to understand what's important to the other person. And I really think that's what's made me successful in my last few roles is that I'm curious and I ask questions. And I would say that that's really important for any emerging leader today is to be curious. You find instead of assuming that you have all the answers and being the expert, take time to ask better questions. Really, really get to know the full context of the situation that you're dealing with instead of making assumptions. Something else that I think is important for leaders is to, especially today, is to really think about how to get comfortable with change. Right? You want to make sure you're comfortable with change before you're forced to deal with change. And things are changing so rapidly, it's natural now. You have to expect that things won't stay the status quo. So I think that that's a key, key attribute of any leader. Be the change maker. Don't be forced to make some change 100%.
- [17:44]
B
You know that by the time you're forced to make a change, you're usually in a corner and have to don' Great options review. Have some optionality up front. A far better situation. Love that piece of advice as well. What a fantastic pleasure to visit with you on the Becker Business and the Becker Private Equity podcast. Remarkable career. Go Spartans. Let's hope Michigan was is every game this year.
- [18:10]
C
Thank you. Thanks for having me. Scott.
- [18:17]
A
When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant, you keep production lines moving and quality on track because there is no room for slowdowns. With Grainger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place, so nothing gets in the way of getting the job done. Call 1-800-GRAINGER clickranger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done.