CFO Weekly Budgeting for Impact: How Finance Can Lead, Not Just Report with Travis Grundy, Senior Associate of FP&A at Adventum
Sep 30, 2025
Travis Grundy, a Senior Associate of FP&A at Adventum and fractional CFO, shares his wealth of experience in strategic financial management. He emphasizes a bottom-up budgeting approach, leveraging unit economics for realistic projections. Travis discusses the importance of cross-department collaboration and accountability through monthly variance analyses. He also highlights adapting budgeting strategies for different industries, the enduring relevance of KPIs, and even the role of AI in future forecasting. His military background enriches his discipline and insight into effective financial leadership.
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Start Budgeting From Unit Economics
- Build budgets bottom-up from unit economics rather than guessing from the top down.
- Start at the smallest expense level and scale up based on realistic market and demand assumptions.
Be The Reality Check For Founders
- Act as the voice of reality to temper founders' optimistic projections.
- Present numbers that will pass a straight-face test to boards, banks, and investors.
Tariffs Forced A Forecast Rethink
- A client importing goods forced Adventum to model potential tariff impacts.
- They examined whether costs could be passed to customers and how to adjust the forecast accordingly.