Professor Steve Wasserman Interview

Biography: Steve Wasserman received his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan and MBA from Babson College. Out of college he was a financial analyst and moved his way up to becoming a full-time CFO. He has been a fractional CFO for a variety of different companies since joining Bentley fulltime. He has been a Senior Lecturer (Lecturer) of Finance at Bentley University for the past 8.5 years and he is able to bring his corporate experiences into the classroom.  

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stwasserman/  

Interview Q&A:    

How did you get into the CFO industry and how/why did you stick with it for the past 20+ years? 

When I was in high school, I was always good with numbers. My dad was an engineer and wanted me to be an engineer, but I just never loved the idea. I thought to myself, what can I do with numbers?  I decided to go to business school. I went to the University of Michigan and when I was there, my favorite class was finance. Out of college, I got a job as a financial analyst, and I loved it! I was using numbers to tell stories and make business decisions. The company was small and focused on cash, so I worked with numbers to maximize cash flow. That’s when I knew I picked the right field. As I moved up the ranks over time and into my mid-30s, I knew I wanted to be a CFO one day. I focused on getting broader experience and moved from one job to another. Then I was fortunate to get my chance as a CFO. I joined a broken public company. The company had $24 million in revenue but lost $10 million. I couldn’t get a good CFO job at that time because I didn’t have a CFO title on my resume. So, I took a chance and joined the team that ended up turning the broken company around. After you have a CFO title on your resume, it’s easy to find another CFO position. It was even easier for me to get my next CFO position after the broken company was successfully sold. I love being a CFO because I get to analyze numbers and make decisions based on the financial analyses.   

What was the moment in your mid-30s when you knew you wanted to be a CFO?  

At a company called EG&G, I was fortunate to have eight different jobs in 16 years. Through this, I was able to get experience in treasury, investments, operational accounting, corporate accounting, and more. After I got the broad experience, I looked at the CFO position and thought to myself “I can do that”. 

How did you know you wanted to stay in the CFO position?  

It’s fun! I love it when numbers or business situations are thrown my way, and I can look at what the numbers mean. Numbers tell me a story. That’s part of why I am a good CFO.  A CFO also must know how to communicate effectively, which are skills I built up throughout the years.   

What is your favorite part of being a CFO based on your experiences at various companies?  

I have two favorite parts. My first is developing people. People who have worked with me have moved up the ranks to become VPs or CFOs. It’s fun to see people develop, which is one reason why I love teaching. The other fun part is interacting with people throughout the company. I’m not only dealing with one department: such as finance or sales. I deal with business issues across the whole company. For example, I developed metrics to measure a broad range of things, such as R&D productivity, which could mean efficiency in developing code.   

What has been your experience as a consulting CFO?  

Being a fractional CFO is different than being a full-time CFO. Being a full-time CFO, you are involved in what’s happening daily. Being a fractional CFO, you miss so much of what is happening. Decisions are made when you are not there. I had three clients and one of them recently outgrew me. That company manufactures a medical device to provide a more accurate and faster diagnosis for physicians. The second one is developing a compound to identify a type of cancer.  The third one is a software company serving the legal industry. One thing I learned early on in my career is that the CFO position is industry-agnostic. The things I do at a software company, I can do at a life sciences company. I must learn different practices, procedures and industry processes of course, but a CFO’s skills are transferable. This is why I can have clients in multiple industries.   

You mention with the shortage of accountants it is harder for smaller companies to compete with bigger firms. Have you had to find solutions as a CFO about this issue or have you been involved in discussions about this?  

One former client has two accountants in Eastern Europe. They outsource transaction processing work. The controller is in the US, but it was too hard to hire other US staff. My second client has completely outsourced all accounting to one of the top 10 US accounting firms. Since we outsource the accounting, it is accounting firm’s responsibility to deal with any turnover. The last company is small, and the CEO has a part-time individual doing the bookkeeping – just cash accounting currently.  The accountant shortage is impacting all sized companies.  Many firms are currently looking for help. I have prior students reaching out to me to ask if I know of anyone their employers can hire. It’s a great time to be an accountant or an accounting student.   

One of the Forbes articles talks about how four indicators may indicate when a fractional CFO will outgrow their ability to serve their clients. Can you talk about your experiences with this? (The four include: overworking set hours, difficulty meeting deadlines during regular work hours, can’t attend important company meetings, and CFO not being involved in key financial decisions).

Last year I had to go to the CEO at a company and tell him that he they either needed to find a new fractional CFO with more bandwidth or a full-time CFO. The company was making suboptimal decisions when I wasn’t available. With my teaching schedule, I am available one day per week plus weekends. My clients must be comfortable working with me during these times. However, this CEO couldn’t wait for me to make decisions. For example, this CEO decided to accept a new pricing model for customers. The CEO said the gross profit margins were almost the same as those of the current business model, which is why they accepted the new model. However, the company only looked at the percentage margins and ignored the dollar margins.  The company ended up swapping out high-dollar business for low-dollar business. These types of things started happening more frequently at the company

In one of the articles, you talk about AI and its impact on the college classroom. Can you speak about your experiences with AI?  

Every company uses some sort of financial analysis. What I see happening with AI is that more companies are using it to automate data collection, analyze the data that is collected and present the data at a minimum.  More advanced users are using AI to determine what may happen in the future and what actions should be taken by the company. Analytics has been around for many years.  However, the tools today are putting more power in a company’s hands, which enables a company to better take advantage of the power of analytics.   

Throughout your career what has been your favorite field within the finance industry and why? (He mentions how he did corporate finance & accounting, financial planning, and Wall Street experience raising debt and equity capital)  

It’s more of what my favorite companies are. One of the nice things about being a small company’s CFO is there is more nimbleness and variety in the day-to-day work. At a big company, the work is more structured. My favorite two companies were EG&G and Constant Contact. When I joined Constant Contact, the company was growing at 70% per year. We saw we were making a difference for small companies through email marketing, and employees enjoyed working there. What was fun about Constant Contact was that I had the opportunity to do many things: including investor relations, capital raising, financial planning/analysis, accounting, and SEC reporting. If I couldn’t be a CFO and had to do something else, it would be financial planning/analysis. I like looking at numbers and seeing the story behind those numbers.   

You mention some of the benefits of starting at a small company when entering one’s career; can you highlight some of the main reasons why students should look at alternatives (i.e. small companies) to big corporations when first getting started?  

It depends on what your personality is. If you’re the type of person who needs structure, you will be miserable at a small company. If you like walking into work and not knowing what you’re going to be working on, you will love a small company. For flexible people, you get such great experience doing all different types of things at a smaller company. Everyone must pick what they are comfortable with. If you’re at a big company but like to do all different things, you might get bored.   

If a student is interested in becoming a CFO, do you have any advice for them?  

What hurt me in my career early on was that I didn’t learn enough accounting in my undergraduate studies. So had to learn a lot of accounting on the job. If someone told me they want to be a CFO, I would encourage them to be a CFA major. Just knowing accounting is important, because accounting is the language of business. This doesn’t mean if you're a finance major, you can’t become a CFO. But in my mind, getting a CFA degree would be the best way to prepare yourself for becoming a CFO. As a CFO, you must lead both accounting and finance. It’s not one or the other.   

You highlight the importance of networking and how to go about doing so. What is your advice for building the confidence to initially start networking for the first time?  

The way to get comfortable networking is by doing it. Networking is normal and common in the US. This is what I would tell a student in my class if they were interested in a specific subject. What you do is go onto LinkedIn and find people who have graduated from Bentley and are working in the field you want to learn about. Then reach out and say “Hi, my name is Jane / John Doe from Bentley University, and I am trying to learn about your industry. I would love your advice. Can we set up a 15-minute Zoom call to talk about it?” The response rate is usually 80%-90% positive from Bentley graduates. By the time you hang up on the 15-minute call, it usually ends up being a half hour. The benefits of this type of call are number one: you have a new networking contact and number two: you learned what the field is like. At the end of each call, you can ask “Is there anyone else you suggest I talk to”. Just get out there and try it. If you want to learn about different careers and industries, go find Bentley graduates and ask for advice. You will learn and you will build your network.    Also, if you are networking to look for a job, never ask for a job, never! Only ask for advice.

What is your favorite part of being a professor?  

First, when I see a student reach an aha moment. Second, when a graduate tells me what I taught them in class was helpful in their job or job search. I feel great helping students. I now have students who I taught years ago coming back to ask me to help recruiting for their companies.    

Out of the students that have succeeded in your class what are some of the characteristics they have in common?  

The people who do the best in my classes don’t procrastinate, keep up with their work weekly and think. I give students 80% of the information they need for a perfect grade on assignments.  I do not provide 100% of the information they need because when they are working, there is no perfect information. In my classes I want students to think through the last 20%. The students who see why something doesn’t look right and find the underlying issue are the students who will have the most success post-graduation.

What is a piece of advice that you would give to a Bentley student?  

Take advantage of what Bentley offers.  When I am at the open houses talking to parents and prospective students, I tell them these are the three things that make Bentley special: the Trading Room, BIG, and the mix of faculty. There are faculty with PhDs who teach the complex finance formulas and theory, and faculty who bring real-world experience to the classroom. Someone coming to Bentley gets access to all the technical tools from the trading room and students learn about financial theory in the classroom and how finance  works in practice from BIG and in the classroom.