Healthy Growth And Taking Risks with Hope Cochran

In this episode of the Revenue Builders podcast, John Kaplan and
John McMahon talk to Managing Director of Madrona Venture Group
Hope Cochran. Hope serves on the board of three public companies,
Hasbro, Inc, MongoDB and NewRelic.


She is the former CFO of King Digital, the developer behind the
phenomenal game Candy Crush. She is also the co-chair of
OnBoarding Women, an organization that supports talented
accomplished women in their journey to the boardroom. Website:
https://onboardingwomen.org/.


Hope pulls the curtain back on what drives CFOs and gives sage
advice on various areas of business, particularly in raising
funds and ensuring that you can achieve healthy growth. However,
Hope also advises that people should not be afraid to take risks
and be open to learning. If it makes you nervous, she says,
you’re in the right place. 


HIGHLIGHTS


There's more to one's LinkedIn profile

Advice for entrepreneurs looking to raise money

Lessons learned in launching Candy Crush

Balancing overachievement and predictability

Always aim for healthy growth

Solutions vs cost justification

CFOs need to be the ears of the company

Working with Onboarding Women



QUOTES


Hope: "I am very mindful of markets and I am
very mindful that when a market is open, I'll figure out how to
get money. Because when the market turns off and that's when you
need money, it's a rough spot." 


Hope: "I'm always quick to stop talking
about  how much money are we taking in and what is the plan
and what's our frame of mind of what we're doing with it.
Meaning, what I want to see is money being applied to areas of
growth labors. If we can spend more money and get more users or
more adoption of the product, that makes a lot of sense." 


Hope: "Lately, really what the markets have
valued is growth. You have to be mindful about what we're looking
at in terms of the markets, as well as the strength of the
balance sheet. Assuming that the company has a good cash balance
and we're not dealing with debt or areas of losing too much cash,
clearly we want to propel growth."


Hope: "As a CFO, my most important thing is that
my numbers are right. And I can do that by making sure my systems
and processes keep up with the size of the organization. So I'm
constantly ensuring that my systems are not too far behind my
growth trajectory."


Hope: "Take a risk. When I think of the big
movements in my career, they've been when I've jumped while
taking a risk, when I've been nervous. I don't think I've ever
taken a job that I felt like I was qualified for. Whenever it
pushed me and made me uncomfortable, I knew that was the right
job."


Learn More about Force Management here:
www.forcemanagement.com


Check out John McMahon’s book here:
https://www.amazon.com/Qualified-Sales-Leader-Proven-Lessons/dp/0578895064