05 - Krishna Vallabhaneni, VP Finance at Grin - The Headcount People

Krishna Vallabhaneni is the Vice President of Finance at Grin, a creator management platform for consumer brands to manage influencer marketing campaigns. With over a year of experience at Grin, Krishna leads the finance and accounting teams responsible for ensuring accurate and timely financials, which are clearly communicated to stakeholders across the company. Additionally, Krishna works closely with various business leaders to provide analytical support and insights on KPIs and their impact on financial performance. Before joining Grin, Krishna held similar roles at Clear and Revel Systems, both technology companies with subscription-based revenue models. Krishna's strong foundation in finance was built through prior experiences in investment banking, private equity, and consulting right after college. With a diverse background in finance and extensive experience in technology companies, Krishna brings a unique perspective to Grin's finance team. In this episode, we cover off on the processes that Krishna uses with his team to make sure the budgets and forecasts at Grin are as accurate as they can be. He discusses collaboration with other teams and how to create data integrity around headcount. 0:00 Cold open 0:54 Introductions 2:49 About Grin and the Finance team 4:52 Who would be your next hire? 6:04 Who is responsible for headcount management? 7:18 The first step in headcount planning 13:56 How are you working 'exact compensation' in your budgets? 15:52 How does org design influence your headcount plan? 17:00 How do hiring managers communicate with you? 19:22 Who shares info with you about internal transfers, backfills, attrition, etc.? 20:22 Why is it important to have the model up to date and precise? 21:30 Are you reporting these numbers up the chain on a weekly cadence? 22:57 How should heads of HR work with Finance? 25:01 Suggestions for Finance leaders planning the next 18-24 months 27:05 How do you approve new headcount requests? 29:25 Conclusion