The Backbone — Episode 14: Scaling the Finance Function, Fundraising, Making Acquisitions & Operationalizing Metrics
Ryan Magee, Chief Financial Officer at Cority
After a long hiatus, The Backbone is back!
Joining me on this episode of The Backbone is Ryan Magee, Chief Financial Officer at Cority.
For more background on the launch of this podcast, check out Introducing The Backbone!
Joining me on this episode is Ryan Magee, Chief Financial Officer at Cority. Cority offers software as a service for enterprises whose employees face heightened risk at work, helping them manage their compliance to Environmental, Health and Safety policies and regulations.
Since joining Cority in 2012, Ryan has supported the Accounting and Finance department, ensuring that Cority is on solid financial ground, while building a platform for growth and expansion. In 2014 Ryan began supporting the Human Resources and Legal departments as well. Ryan also leads Cority’s Corporate Development and post-merger integration initiatives. He was pivotal in the acquisitions of regAction and IQS in early 2017 which we dive deeper into on this episode.
On this episode of The Backbone, I chat with Ryan about:
- His journey to Cority and how he got started in finance within the software industry;
- What Cority (formerly Medgate) is all about;
- Scaling the finance function as the company grows from 80 employees to 300+ employees;
- Raising a large round of capital and making 2 acquisitions;
- Operationalizing metrics within the organization and;
- The importance of the finance function at a technology company
We close things off with a quickfire round:
- Go to online resource for all things startup finance related
- Favourite productivity hack
- One thing you don’t leave the office before finishing
Take a listen:
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Check out previous episodes of The Backbone
Episode 13: Serving the SMB Market at a Publicly Traded Software Company vs a High-Growth Startup w/ Darren Wood, Director of Finance & Operations at Jobber
Episode 12: Leading Finance at NPOs to High Growth Tech & Bootstrapping vs Raising Venture Capital w/ Anthony Scolaro, VP Finance & Operations at Lucova
Episode 11: Raising $17M Series A Round & What it Means to be ‘Venture-Backed’ w/ Frank Jessop, Director of Finance, Sensibill
Episode 10: Vendor Selection Considerations & Viewing the Finance Function from an Engineering Perspective w/ Gerti Dervishi, VP Finance at Flybits
Episode 9: The Process of Acquiring Companies as a Startup & Best Practices for Investor Relations w/ Ryan Levenberg, VP Finance at Q4 Systems Inc.
Episode 8: Raising VC Funding to Executing an $110M Acquisition + Demystifying the Progressive Roles of the Finance Leader within a Startupw/ Dwayne Walker, CFO at LookbookHQ
Episode 7: Going Through an Acquisition of an eCommerce Company & Keeping Both Sides of a Marketplace Happy w/ Elena Armstrong, Co-Founder & VP Finance at Exact Media
Episode 6: From Finance to Founding an IoT Startup & Bootstrapping vs. Raising Venture Capital w/ Sacha Sawaya, Co-Founder and CFO at Litmus Automation
Episode 5: Difference Between Being an Advisor vs Finance Leader for Tech Startups & When to Raise Capital w/ Eugene Bomba, CFO & VP Operations at ThoughtWire
Episode 4: Transitioning from Professional Services to Finance Leader of Pre-Revenue Tech Startup w/ Chris Parkes, CFO at NuraLogix
Episode 3: Why Finance & Operations go Together & Dealing with the Highly Regulated Financial Services Industry w/ Leen Li, Head of Finance at Wealthsimple
Episode 2: How Finance Scales Growing from 25 to 200+ Employees & Transfer Pricing w/ Les Cullen, Director Finance & Operations at TopHat
Episode 1: Managing Churn & Being Private Equity Backed w/ Daniel Israelsohn, VP Finance & Operations at Firmex
The Backbone is a podcast hosted by Shubham Datta, that explores the journey inside finance at a startup. Each episode features a finance leader (Director/VP, Finance or CFO) that:
- shares their story of how they entered the world of startups,
- explains what their company does
- describes unique challenges he/she faces in their role
- shares expertise relating to specific topics on the mind of finance leaders
