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The Finance Leader Podcast

The Finance Leader Podcast

Stephen McLain 257 Episodes Oct 7, 2026

The Finance Leader Podcast helps finance and accounting professionals move beyond number-crunching to become strategic advisors. It offers practical insights, frameworks, and real-world lessons on decision-making, executive presence, and cross-functional partnership. Hosted by Stephen McLain, a retired U.S. Army Finance Officer and FP&A consultant, the show blends military leadership with corporate finance expertise. It targets CFOs, controllers, FP&A teams, and business owners seeking to create measurable business value.

Episodes

Improving Restaurant Forecasting with a Driver-Based Process
Improving Restaurant Forecasting with a Driver-Based Process Oct 7, 2026 921 Send us Fan MailEpisode # 161: Restaurant forecasting can feel impossible when demand changes fast and yesterday’s playbook stops working. Sales might be steady while traffic quietly drops, or a shift to delivery lifts revenue but creates new labor, inventory, and margin problems. We want forecasts that explain what is happening, not just a number that misses with confidence.We walk through a driv
Improve Communications Between Finance and Operations: Shared Facts, Better Decisions
Improve Communications Between Finance and Operations: Shared Facts, Better Decisions Sep 30, 2026 927 Send us Fan MailEpisode # 160: Quarterly reviews shouldn’t feel like three teams arguing in three different languages, but that’s exactly what happens when operations, FP&A, and accounting aren’t aligned on the basics. We dig into the real source of cross-functional friction: mismatched definitions, different timelines, and metrics that mean one thing to ops and another thing to finance. When
How FP&A Helps Hospitality Leaders Make Better Daily Decisions
How FP&A Helps Hospitality Leaders Make Better Daily Decisions Sep 23, 2026 1281 Send us Fan MailEmpty hotel rooms don’t roll over to next week, and a slow variance deck won’t save tonight’s margin. We dig into what hospitality FP&A should look like when the business needs real-time decisions on staffing, purchasing, pricing, capacity, and guest service, not just reporting after the fact. If you’ve ever stared at “labor is unfavorable” and still didn’t know what to do next
How the Future Hospitality FP&A Team Forecasts Demand And Protects Margins
How the Future Hospitality FP&A Team Forecasts Demand And Protects Margins Sep 16, 2026 1234 Send us Fan MailEpisode # 158: A hotel room empty tonight is not “lost demand” on a spreadsheet. It’s gone forever. That one reality makes hospitality one of the clearest places where FP&A has to operate in real time, not on last month’s variance deck.We start with the big strategic priorities: building demand sensing forecasts that update with signals like booking pace, cancellations, group s
A Strong Audit Plan Turns Compliance Into Trust
A Strong Audit Plan Turns Compliance Into Trust Sep 8, 2026 1073 Send us Fan MailBonus episode # 103: If you think “the audit” is just a yearly event, you’re leaving your organization exposed. I’m sharing a replay of The Audit Blueprint, my CFO’s guide to financial integrity, because accurate books and strong internal controls are not box-checking, they’re how you protect trust, prevent asset loss, and keep leaders from making decisions on bad data.I walk throu
Small Business Series - Think Like a CEO (Ep 5)
Small Business Series - Think Like a CEO (Ep 5) Sep 1, 2026 623 Send us Fan MailBonus episode # 102: If you started your business to build something meaningful, here’s the uncomfortable question: are you creating an asset or creating another job for yourself? I’m wrapping up my limited small business series by zooming out from the daily grind and stepping into a CEO mindset, without the corporate fluff. This is about changing how we think so our decisions crea
Small Business Series - A Simple Financial Scorecard For Small Business Health (Ep 4)
Small Business Series - A Simple Financial Scorecard For Small Business Health (Ep 4) Aug 25, 2026 576 Send us Fan MailBonus Episode #101: If someone asked whether your business is financially healthy, could you answer without guessing? We walk through five numbers that cut through the noise and tell you what’s really happening, even when sales are up and your bank account looks fine.We start with revenue, but we don’t stop there. We show you how to compare revenue month over month and year over ye
Small Business Series - A Practical Pricing Checkup, Are You Charging Enough (Ep 3)
Small Business Series - A Practical Pricing Checkup, Are You Charging Enough (Ep 3) Aug 18, 2026 578 Send us Fan MailBonus episode # 100: You can be fully booked, gaining customers, and still feel like the business never throws off real money and pricing is often the reason. We take a hard look at the question many small business owners avoid: what if you are not charging enough for what you already sell? When pricing is off, it quietly hits revenue, profit margin, and cash flow all at once, and
Small Business Series - Why Profitable Businesses Still Run Out of Cash (Ep 2)
Small Business Series - Why Profitable Businesses Still Run Out of Cash (Ep 2) Aug 11, 2026 514 Send us Fan MailBonus episode # 99: Your P&L says you’re profitable, but the bank account keeps hovering near empty, so what’s actually happening? I walk through the gap between profit and cash and why small businesses can look healthy on paper while still running out of money. Cash flow is the fuel that keeps operations moving, and when you don’t manage the timing of cash in and cash out, eve
Small Business Series - Why Sales Growth Can Still Feel Like Struggle (Ep 1)
Small Business Series - Why Sales Growth Can Still Feel Like Struggle (Ep 1) Aug 6, 2026 446 Send us Fan MailBonus episode # 98: Revenue can be up and your stress can still be up right along with it. If your business is selling more but cash feels tight, your credit card is creeping higher, and you cannot explain where the money went, we are looking at the wrong scoreboard.We walk through the difference between revenue, gross profit, and net profit in plain language, then use a simple rea
Developing the FP&A Training Plan - Building a More Strategic Finance Capability
Developing the FP&A Training Plan - Building a More Strategic Finance Capability Jul 29, 2026 1245 Send us Fan MailEpisode # 157: We walk through how we build an FP&A training plan that develops individual talent while raising the effectiveness of the whole finance organization. That starts with a formal development strategy, not ad hoc learning squeezed in when time allows. We talk about the capabilities that separate high-performing FP&A teams from strong reporting teams: business acu
SWOT Analysis for a Competitive Strategic Advantage
SWOT Analysis for a Competitive Strategic Advantage Jul 21, 2026 1290 Send us Fan MailEpisode # 156: Most SWOT analyses fail for one simple reason: they end as a four-quadrant chart instead of becoming a set of decisions. I’m breaking down how to run a strategic SWOT assessment that actually changes what you do next so you can outperform competitors over the next three to five years, not just document what you already know.We walk through what SWOT analysis is reall

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