Step 4: Align Finance and Ops Weekly

Ensure your finance and operations teams are aligned through a dedicated weekly meeting. Discuss KPIs, hiring plans, spend, and budget-to-actuals to keep decisions connected and avoid costly surprises.

Why This Matters

Misalignment between finance and ops can cause runaway spending, missed hiring targets, and delayed responses to issues. At Series A, even small inefficiencies have big dollar impacts. Regular syncs build a shared reality and allow course corrections in real time.

Key Activities

Block a recurring 30-minute meeting between finance and ops leads
Review actual vs. forecast for key expenses and outputs
Align on:
Hiring timelines
Vendor and tooling decisions
Budget updates
Update scenario plans and forecasts as needed
Clarify ownership of upcoming initiatives and assumptions

Common Mistakes

Treating finance and ops as separate planning streams
Using the sync only to review numbers, not make decisions
Allowing forecasts to drift from operational reality
Failing to adjust budget models based on on-the-ground insights
Skipping the meeting when “things feel fine”

Signals You're Doing It Right

Budget and headcount decisions happen collaboratively
Ops changes (e.g., new tools, shifts in workflow) are forecasted financially
Hiring or vendor commitments are stress-tested in real time
Scenario planning reflects actual operating capacity
There’s mutual trust and clarity between functions

Red Flags

Finance finds out about ops changes after they happen
Forecasts are consistently off without a known reason
One team feels “in the dark” about the other’s decisions
Disputes over numbers, assumptions, or ownership
You’re surprised by cash swings tied to ops-led decisions

Who Should Own This

COO and CFO or Finance Lead, jointly responsible for driving agenda and follow-up