Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

In the last few months, my entire team has changed the way they work from the ground up.

There is no more pure designer on my team, no pure engineer, no pure CFO, and the work that used to take us weeks is now happening in days.

I am a CFO with zero coding background, and I just shipped a real feature to my SaaS.

I sat down, opened Claude Code, described in plain English a customer page I wanted on the Model Wiz site, and a few minutes later it was live on the internet.

I did not write a line of code to make this happen.

My CTO Mahmoud called the way he used to work the dark ages, and what he can ship in a week now is something I never thought one engineer could touch.

And then there is the designer on our team.

He has no coding background and no idea what HTTPS even is.

He just shipped an entire feature on his own that real customers are using right now.

I sat there listening to that story thinking, what does this mean for the rest of us in finance and accounting.

Because if this is happening on a small team like ours, in months, then every finance and accounting team is about to look completely different too.

Watch the video below to see exactly how my team works now, the conversation with my CTO, and the part of this that I think you need to see before the rest of your industry does.

https://youtu.be/5GmTx01Yr0s?si=L_Hmw...

If you could rewire how your finance team works tomorrow, what is the first thing you would change?

9 hours ago | [YT] | 46

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

I have lost count of how many AI for finance courses, tools, and Twitter threads have crossed my feed in the last 90 days.


Most of them are written by people who have never built a working financial model in their life.

That is exactly why I am genuinely excited about what Nicolas Boucher is bringing to the Strategic Finance Summit on July 14th.

Nicolas spent 15 years inside finance before he ever taught a single AI workshop.

He started as an auditor at PwC in Luxembourg and Singapore, then spent years at Thales running controlling and finance transformation for a €500 million business unit.

A couple of years ago he started teaching what he was figuring out, and the response in our space has been unlike anything I have seen.

More than 10,000 finance professionals have now gone through his trainings.

Mercedes Benz, Chanel, Hugo Boss, NTT, and Carlsberg have all paid him to teach their teams.

His AI Finance Club is now over 2,000 active members deep, with monthly live workshops, AI tool reviews, and a curated news digest.

It is one of the only paid finance communities I would point a peer to without hesitation.

If that alone is enough to make you want to be in the room when he speaks, register here:

strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_medium=josh-main-p…

For everyone else, here is what his session is actually covering.

It is called "AI for Finance: How Top Teams Are 3x'ing Output," and it is the full operator playbook, walked through live.

Here is what he is going through:

1️⃣ The specific AI tools that automate the repetitive work eating hours out of your team's week

2️⃣ The exact strategies the top performing finance teams are using to triple their output without adding any headcount

3️⃣ Practical AI frameworks you can deploy the week after the summit ends, ready to apply directly to your own work

4️⃣ Prompt engineering built specifically for FP&A, which on its own is worth showing up for

5️⃣ How to write CFO ready AI reports that actually drive board level decisions

If you have been waiting for the right person to teach you AI for finance, this is the one.

Quick context on the summit itself if you have not heard about it yet.

The Strategic Finance Summit runs two days, July 14 and 15.

Nine of the top finance practitioners on LinkedIn are sharing their playbooks live.

It is 100% virtual and 100% free to attend live.

Open your calendar to July 14th and 15th right now.

If Nicolas's session is the one you specifically want to be in, register at the link below.

strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_medium=josh-main-p…

4 days ago | [YT] | 49

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

I built 3 board ready finance dashboards in Claude. Each one in under 10 minutes.

I'm giving all 3 away free at my live workshop on May 14th, plus walking through exactly how I built them so you can recreate them on your own data the next morning

You can sing up here: www.yourcfoguy.com/webinars/claude-for-finance

I've been messing around with Claude on actual finance work for the last few months, and honestly, the results have surprised me.

Some of it is really, really good. Some of it is hot garbage. The trick is knowing the difference, and that's most of what this workshop is about.

Here's what's in the bundle:

A KPI dashboard with 16 metrics. Revenue, COGS, margin, net income, cash, AR, OPEX, debt, all of it. You drop in your data, you drop in your logo, and Claude pulls the colors off the logo for you.

I almost didn't believe that worked the first time I tried it. The whole thing took 3 minutes 45 seconds end to end.

A period comparison dashboard with a dropdown that lets you flip between this month, last month, Q3, YTD, TTM.

Every variance updates automatically. 1,488 formulas. I counted.

This is the kind of dashboard a finance team usually spends a full week building. Claude wrote it in under 4 minutes.

An AR aging command center.

Aging buckets, DSO trend, customer concentration. I haven't built this one ahead of time.

We're going from a blank Excel file to a finished dashboard live, on the call.

You also get the exact prompts I used for every build, the 4 principles I follow every time I prompt Claude on a finance file, and a small Claude skill I put together that writes the prompts for you.

So instead of staring at a blank text box trying to figure out what to type, you describe what you want in plain English and the skill turns it into a finance prompt that actually works.

Now, before you think this is just a "look how easy AI is" demo, I want to be straight.

I went into this half expecting Claude to fall apart on me. In spots, it did.

I crashed Excel a couple of times. Burned through credits on prompts that went nowhere.

Had to scrap and restart more than one dashboard before it came out clean.

And the most annoying one of all: I built a dashboard that looked perfect, then realized later that Claude had quietly hidden the rows feeding the charts.

Half the visuals were empty and I almost didn't notice.

That's the kind of stuff you only learn by doing it.

But the stuff that worked, worked. Way better than I thought it would.

So I'm walking through every build live. The full prompts I used. The mistakes I made along the way. The parts that surprised me, good and bad.

We'll also talk about where Claude just doesn't work.

Mainly when your data is split across 5 different systems and the numbers never line up depending on which one you ask.

Thursday, May 14th at 2pm ET.

Show up live and you walk away with the whole bundle 👉

Reserve Your Spot Here: www.yourcfoguy.com/webinars/claude-for-finance

6 days ago | [YT] | 139

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

The 52 Card Deck of Finance & Accounting 🃏
Pick up a card and learn something new each time!

===

We asked 9 of the top finance leaders to open their playbooks. They said yes.
Spots are limited. I'd grab one.

Register for free: strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_source=youtube&utm…

===

There is a never ending list of things you need to know if you want to become a CFO…

What better way to learn while having fun with the family?

👍 Give this post a like if you want me to produce this deck of cards!

Here’s what’s included:

❤️ ACCOUNTING

Learn the fundamentals of Accounting, the language of business!

Master key terms such as:

• Cash vs Accrual

• Balance Sheet

• Bank Reconciliations

• General Ledger

• Gross Profit

• Profit & Loss

and more…

♠️ FINANCIAL PLANNING & ANALYSIS (FP&A)

FP&A is my favorite area of Finance & Accounting, and once you’re done with these cards, it will be yours too!

Learn all about FP&A, including key terms such as:

• Budget

• Forecast

• Planning

• Variance

and much more…

🔸 FINANCE
Looking to get a loan? Value a business? Work in investment banking?

Then you’ll love these cards…

Get familiar with many terms such as:

• Discounted Cash Flows

• Free Cash Flows

• Net Present Value

• Return on Invested Capital

And more!

♣️ AUDIT / TAX

If you’re thinking of joining public accounting…you’ll need to know about Audit and Tax

and if you’re not…odds are you’ll still need to know these terms

Become a pro at auditing with key terms such as:
• Statistical Sampling

• Qualified Opinion

• Going concern

And become a tax expert by picking up these cards:

• Income Tax

• Sales Tax

• Filing Extension

===

I had a lot of fun putting this one together, and hope you enjoy playing with the 52 card deck of Finance & Accounting!

What are some other Finance & Accounting terms you’d add to this deck?

Let us know in the comments below 👇

PS: If you’d like to get a copy of this deck of cards, give this post a like and let me know in the comments below...if enough people ask, I’ll get it produced!

1 week ago | [YT] | 101

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

ChatGPT 5.5 told me it would beat Claude for Excel work.

So I made it prove it.

For context — last time I tested ChatGPT on a financial model, I was underwhelmed.

So I went into this skeptical.

ChatGPT 5.5 surprised me. At least in the beginning.

The visuals it produced from a single prompt were genuinely impressive.

Newspaper-style dashboards. Waterfall charts. KPI cards.

I didn't expect that.

Then I asked it to build something real.

A 3-statement model. Actual data. Drivers, projections, error checks — the works.

That's when the wheels started to wobble.

I'm not going to spoil it.

But it wasn't smooth.

And somewhere in the middle of all this, my best assistant made a cameo.

She's 1.

Is this good enough to replace a finance analyst?

Watch and let me know 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 32

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

Quickbooks Online Cheat Sheet 🤓
Learn how to navigate one of the most widely used software’s in Finance & Accounting

===

We asked 9 of the top finance leaders to open their playbooks. They said yes.
Spots are limited. I'd grab one.

Register for free: strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_source=youtube&utm…

===

Intuit really has the market dominated when it comes to Finance & Accounting software…

• Quickbooks desktop & Online → accounting software

• Mint / Credit karma → personal finance management

• Tsheets → timetracking

• Turbotax → tax software for individuals

• ProConnect Tax → tax software for businesses

Let’s do a deep dive on their most popular products…
Quickbooks Online (QBO):

1️⃣ Platform overview

QBO is an accounting software that allows you to easily manage your businesses finance with a number of useful tools.

If you’re using a spreadsheet for your business, you are missing out on so many automations that will help you sleep in at night

2️⃣ Features overview

These features are what make an accounting software better than a spreadsheet:

⚙️ Bank feeds → automatically import transactions from your bank / credit card, and classify based off of category, vendor, class, and more

⚙️ Bank reconciliations → confirm that the balances in QBO match to your bank (a must)

⚙️ Custom reporting → Run A P&L, a Balance Sheet, and dozens and dozens of other prebuilt reports. Don’t see what you need? Go ahead and create a custom report. The possibilities are endless

⚙️ Sending out Invoices → send customers an invoice for your services, and enable ACH / CC payment options so they can pay directly from the inoice

⚙️ Processing payroll → QBO will even allow you to process paychecks to employees, and withhold the applicable tax amounts (separate subscription)

3️⃣ QBO tips & tricks

OK, now that you know all about what QBO has to offer, let’s talk about some tips & Tricks

💡 Bulk reclassify → this is my favorite feature, and it’s only available to “accountant users”. You can select multiple transactions, and with the click of a button reclassify the category or class on each transaction

💡 Rules → looking to save time in categorizing your transactions? Set up a rule. The rule can automatically classify transactions based off of custom instructions that you give, saving you time

💡 Bulk upload invoices → we use this one in our accounting firm. Need to invoice your customers? Don’t upload your invoices 1 by 1. Instead, create a spreadsheet and run some automation with powerquery. When you’re done, upload it to QBO and save hours.

===

Is QBO my favorite accounting software?

I have to be honest…it is.

It is certainly not the most powerful (netsuite, SAP, and others are far more powerful)…

but it’s a great solution for SMBs and startups, especially if you’re just starting out.

What are some other things about QBO that you feel are useful?

Let us know in the comments below 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 97

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

The 4 Stages of Forecasting
from BEGINNER to ADVANCED

===

We asked 9 of the top finance leaders to open their playbooks. They said yes.
Spots are limited. I'd grab one.

Register for free: strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_source=youtube&utm…

===

Which stage is your business at🪜?

Every month, I meet with founders who are looking for help around their financial model.

I rarely see a company working with a level 4 forecast…

and oftentimes, founders don’t realize how much more value can be unlocked with just a few tweaks.

Let’s go over each stage, and what to think about as your company scales

🪜 LEVEL 1 - CREATE A REVENUE BUILD (Beginner)

This is where most founders start with a forecast.

This will oftentimes suffice for an early-stage company, as the focus here is simply on the business model and the details behind the blueprint for how the company plans to scale

The key here is to think about these 2 things:

1️⃣ How will INPUTS result in OUTPUTS (eg: an investment in sales reps results in more sales)

2️⃣ What are the SOURCES of your revenue (eg: existing customers vs customers in your pipeline vs new customers)

🪜 LEVEL 2 - ATTACH A PROFIT & LOSS (Beginner / Intermediate)

Your revenue build is important, but it's not the only area of your business you need to think about.

At this stage, you start to introduce other costs.

It's here where you'll also want to attach a dynamic headcount build, showcasing the details behind who is on your team, and who you will hire in the near future.

🪜 LEVEL 3 - INCLUDE A BALANCE SHEET & CASH FLOWS (Intermediate / Advanced)

Most companies report on the accrual basis, especially as they scale.

Under the accrual basis, the amounts reported on your profit & loss won't equate with your cash flows.

It's here where you'll want to implement a 3 statement model showcasing the movements in your Balance Sheet, allowing you to dynamically showcase cash.

🪜 LEVEL 4 - INCLUDE HISTORICAL DATA AND DASHBOARDS (advanced)

This stage involves you importing your existing data around your financial statements, allowing you to understand where you have been, and where you are going, all in one view.

With this data in place, you can refresh your forecast each month, allowing you to tap into limitless dashboards for any business case.

===

So...which stage are you at with your forecast?

It’s never too late to climb the rung and add more value to your company 🪜.

What else would you add?

Let us know in the comments below 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 202

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

Here are 4 questions that tell you what stage of finance function you're actually in.
Once you know your stage, sign up for my upcoming webinar with Ramp to find out exactly what you should be doing for it

virtual.ramp.com/finance-milestones/?utm_source=sp…

9 out of 10 finance functions I look at are running the wrong stage for the company they serve. And almost nobody realizes it until something expensive breaks.

Most people get this wrong. The labels feel right, but the function tells a different story.

These are 4 questions that cut through that. After you're done, vote in the poll below and let everyone else know where you land.

1. Who's doing your bookkeeping?

If you're the founder and you're still classifying transactions on Friday nights, you're somewhere in Stage 1 or 2.

If you have a part time bookkeeper or admin who handles classifications and a fractional firm closes the month, that's Stage 2 or early Stage 3.

If your bookkeeping is happening inside your company, by full time staff, with a Controller reviewing it, that's Stage 3 or 4.

2. How long does your monthly close take?

If you don't have a real close and just reconcile the books annually, that's Stage 1. If your close takes 3 or more weeks and the team is working overtime to get it done, that's a broken Stage 3.

A healthy Stage 3 close runs 5 to 10 days. Stage 4 closes in under a week.

A 3 week close almost always means you're running a Stage 2 process inside a Stage 3 company. The team isn't broken. The function is.

3. Can your CEO confidently explain last month's variance off the top of their head?

If the answer is no, your reporting isn't doing its job. That's Stage 2 thinking inside whatever stage you're in.

Real Stage 3 reporting answers questions before they get asked. Stage 4 reporting tells the CEO what's about to happen, not just what already did.

4. Do you have someone whose full time job is forecasting?

If the answer is no, you're in Stage 1 or 2. If someone updates the annual budget once a year, that's Stage 2 or early Stage 3.

If someone runs a rolling forecast and updates it monthly, that's Stage 3. A whole FP&A function with driver based models, scenario analysis, and board reporting is Stage 4.

Tally up your answers.

If you're seeing a mix across the 4 questions, that's the most common pattern. It means your function is partially built and partially behind.

That's where most companies sit, and it's why almost every team feels like something is off without being able to name it.

But the bigger question is whether you're actually in the stage you think you are, and what should change about your function once you know.

That's exactly what I'm walking through on May 8th at 1 PM ET, live with Ramp during their Small Business Week summit.

May 8th at 1 PM ET

1 week ago | [YT] | 12

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

How to Audit a Financial Model 🕵️‍♂️
Building a financial model is only half of the game...

===

We asked 9 of the top finance leaders to open their playbooks. They said yes.
Spots are limited. I'd grab one.

Register for free: strategicfinancesummit.com/?utm_source=youtube&utm…

===

Most of the time, you're working with someone else's model, or you're collaborating with someone else and sharing what you put together.

But how do you make your models user-friendly?

And more importantly...how do you ensure the model you inherit is free of errors?

Let me break it down 👇

➡️ Why Audit a Model?

Very simple...to prevent catastrophic errors 🥵

Ever share a financial model with an error in it, only to have someone else notice the error before you do?

It's not pretty, and it cost you a LOT in your career.

➡️ When Should You Audit a Model?

2 parts of the coin here:

1. Before handing off YOUR OWN model (to a client, colleague, investor etc.)

2. Whenever you inherit SOMEONE ELSE'S model

➡️ How to Build an Easy-to-Audit Model

The best defense is a strong offense.
Follow these 3 steps:

1️⃣ Consolidating structure:
Use a single “Model” or “Drivers” tab to consolidate inputs.

2️⃣ Color Coding:
Explain the different colors for inputs, calculations, references, and checks.

We use:
🔵 - inputs
🟣 - references to other cells
⚫ - calculation
🔴 - error checks

3️⃣ Error Checks: Built-in alerts flag errors immediately.
This is one of the best ways to keep your model in check.
Anytime data is passed from one location to another, there should be an error check to confirm the values match.

➡️ What if You Inherit a Messy Model?

Most of the time when you inherit a model, there isn't clear documentation.
Follow these steps instead:

1️⃣ Use ‘Go To Special’ to find hardcoded inputs.
Press F5 → “Special” → “Constants.”
This will highlight all cells that should be assumptions.

2️⃣ Spot formula inconsistencies with CTRL + /.
This will highlight cells that don’t match their neighbors.

===
These tips have helped me in my career...but with each mistake, I've become stronger and more credible with my financial models.

What tips do you have?
Share them in the comments below 👇

1 week ago | [YT] | 82

Josh Aharonoff (Your CFO Guy)

There are 4 stages of a finance and accounting function.

Most companies are running the wrong one for the size they're at right now.

On May 8th at 1 PM ET, I'm going live with Ramp during their Small Business Week summit to walk through all 4 of them 👉 virtual.ramp.com/finance-milestones/?utm_source=sp…

This is the same session I ran inside my private community recently.

Members pay thousands to be in there, and this week the whole thing is free.

The pattern shows up almost everywhere I look.

Two completely different companies, hitting the exact same wall.

I'll see a 5 person company running a fractional firm and a full time Controller.

Their close looks great, but they're also burning $20K a month on overhead they don't need yet, and the function is built for a company 5x their size.

Then I'll see a 60 person company where the founder is still classifying transactions on Friday nights.

The close takes 3 weeks.

The CEO stopped trusting the numbers a year ago, and now every conversation about the financials is a low grade fight.

Two opposite extremes, same root cause.

The function doesn't match the company.

When the function lags the company, you become the bottleneck. When it gets out ahead, you become the cost.

Most teams can feel something is off, they just can't always put a finger on what it is.

And then there are the 3 thresholds: around 5 employees, around 20, and around 60. They're hard breaks, and they catch most teams completely flat footed.

Cross one of them without rebuilding the function around it, and the cracks start showing at month end.

So on May 8th we're going to spend an hour walking through all of it.

Here's what we'll get into:

• What each of the 4 stages looks like and how to figure out which one you're in right now

• The bookkeeping foundation that has to be in place by Stage 2: separating accounts, picking cash vs accrual, choosing the right software, and building a chart of accounts that's readable, not just compliant

• The 5 step month end close, the day count benchmark you should be hitting at each stage, and why a 3 week close almost always means something earlier is broken

• The difference between a P&L pulled straight out of QuickBooks and a real financial summary that tells you what's actually happening in the business

The session is one of 8 inside Ramp's first ever Small Business Week summit. Anyone who registers and shows up to 4+ sessions across the 3 days gets entered to win a Traeger Flatrock Flat Top grill worth $900.

May 8th at 1 PM ET.

Hope to see you there 👉 virtual.ramp.com/finance-milestones/?utm_source=sp…

1 week ago | [YT] | 66