Cayla Pingel has led FP&A in sports, gaming and entertainment at companies including Warner Bros, Fox Sports and most recently, 2K Games, a global video game company. At Fox Sports she financially quarterbacked the full P&L for the biggest sporting events including the Super Bowl, the World Series, and the NFL Baseball World Cup.
The senior Director, Finance at 2K describes her approach to business partnering as more like a “sports agent” (“like Jerry Maguire but more calm” says Pingel).
Pingel says “I tell my business partners to think of me as your agent. I’m going to go out and negotiate this for you from a financial perspective. Tell me what you need and let me help sell this so that we can make the case and do it.”
In this episode:
- Being at Fox Sports when live sports came screeching to a halt during COVID
- Show me the Money – managing the superbowl of FP&A at Fox Sports, Warner Bros and 2K and the power of ratings for finance
- How blowouts affect financial performance
- Uncovering the differences between Accounting vs FP&A at Fox Sports
- Why I chose the FP&A direction rather than a COO role
- Most important metrics in sports businesses
- Heavy fixed costs and the challenges of live broadcasting
- Huge tech, streaming and viewership changes in media/sports and entertainment – and how to forecast the future of the game for finance pros
- Metrics in game playing: and finance discussions about whether to put new features in a game
- Leading the Los Angeles chapter for women in sports and events
- Flying out to Prague six weeks into a new job at Warner Bros to fix a mess and the strategic resolution
- March Madness ‘Budget Season’ Challenge at Fox Sports – and why the loser has to do the waterfall charts
Follow and contact Cayla Pingel on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/cayla-pingel-410a1a73/
Full transcript below
Paul Barnhurst:
Hello everyone. Welcome to FP&A Today, I am your host, Paul Barnhurst aka the FP&A Guy. FP&A Today is brought to you by Datarails®, the financial planning and analysis platform for Excel users. Every week we welcome a leader from the world of financial planning and analysis. Today we are delighted to be joined by Cayla Pingel. Cayla, welcome to the show.
Cayla Pingel:
Hey, Paul,
Paul Barnhurst:
Really, really excited to have you here. So let me just give a little bit of background about Kayla. She comes to us from Santa Monica, California. She earned her bachelor’s degree in accounting from Cal State Northridge. She’s worked in multiple finance and accounting roles for various companies over her career. And she’s currently works as a senior director of finance at 2K. And I’ll add on a personal note. She’s a big Dodgers fan, so I appreciate that.
Cayla Pingel:
Yes.
Paul Barnhurst:
Even if it was a painful postseason,
Cayla Pingel:
It was this year for sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, that, no doubt about that. So we like to start every interview with kind of a fun question. And so what we typically start off is, what, what was the most challenging or hardest budgeting experience you’ve ever had in your career?
Cayla Pingel:
So I think for me, I’ve had a lot probably throughout my career. I think every year you get something new for sure. But I think probably the most challenging one would’ve been in 2020. We, I was at Fox Sports at the time. Our budget season kicked off in March generally. So we we’re the world shuts down and sports comes to a screeching halt, and I’m trying to do a budget for next year not knowing when sports will return to air, when live events will return. There’s, you know, not much in the way of content when you build a entire network around live content. And so pretty much every day we’re running scenarios. Just, I mean, literally a different scenario every day. A lot of uncertainty. Not only are we just testing out all these different things, but I, we had not built models that were dynamic enough to handle uncertainty. So at the same time, we are reacting to try to rebuild our models to account for things that we didn’t know what were possible. So we spent a lot of time doing that, A lot of long hours. Plus, you know, you’re working from home for the first time with like, you grabbed your monitor and your keyboard on the way out and trying to figure out how to make all that work. So it was definitely challenging a lot of long hours, but we did it.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, I, I can relate. Obviously not live content, not to that extent, but I worked for a business where a lot of our different units were based on driving. ’cause We did insurance claims. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So if nobody’s driving, nobody’s getting in an accident. So we had business units you saw in 90%, you know, reduction. I supported a lot of car dealers, and when they closed, obviously they all wanted to cancel their product. And so yes, lots of scenarios, lots of long nights. It was quite, quite the night, the nightmare on my end. Yeah. And so, you know, from you, what did you learn? What was maybe your key takeaway from that experience going through that?
Cayla Pingel:
I think, I mean, I, being flexible, being able to pivot quickly. I mean, you’d wake up and there’d be new news in a new scenario, and you just, you know, whatever I did yesterday is going in the trash and I’m starting from scratch. And then certainly long term I’ve learned to build models that are a little bit more dynamic and can handle a little bit more uncertainty.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, no, for sure. Dynamic models can make a big difference. I think we’ve all built a few of those models where you’re like, oh, that, that isn’t easy to adjust.
Cayla Pingel:
Yep, yep.
Paul Barnhurst:
For sure. I’ll get back to you next week. And then, yeah, <laugh>, shouldn’t it take five minutes? No, not the way the model was built. <Laugh>. Yep,
Cayla Pingel:
Exactly.
Paul Barnhurst:
All right. So we’ve covered the, the, the challenging budget. Can you talk to us a little bit about yourself? Just give us your background and how you ended up where you’re at today.
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah, so I’m born and raised in Los Angeles, which is why I’m a Dodger fan. So but I know there’s not many of us out there. Like you said, I’ve graduated from Cal State Northridge. My degree is in accounting. I also actually became a CPA although I’ve been active now. But I am a CPA. I started my career at Sony Pictures in corporate consolidation for accounting and FP&A actually. So very different from being in a division for sure. And then shortly after that, I went to a startup company for telemedicine. And at the time, telemedicine was like a very new idea. But that was a really cool experience, like working, wearing a lot of different hats, doing a lot of different roles and responsibilities. I mean, everything, payroll, accounting, finance, I even like HR and benefits I was doing.
So that was a really good experience, like just kind of getting exposed to different types of business and trying to figure things out on the fly. And after that, I that’s when I made the move over to Fox Sports. And that was working at the time, Fox Sports was a weekend business, mostly on the national side. We really had NFL baseball and NASCAR, and that was working on their P&L. I spent about a year and a half there, and they got a really cool opportunity with Warner Brothers to work on an outsource project where they were outsourcing all their accounting functions to an outsource company in India. So I had the opportunity to travel the world and go to a lot of places that I would normally have not have gone. Working on this project to help lift and shift the accounting functions out of the international offices was a good experience, really teaching me about process and standardization for sure.
And then after about a year that I realized probably accounting was not for me. So my boss fortunately at Fox Sports had called me and said, we are launching a new network and we are opening a role for analyst and wondering if you’d be interested in coming back. So I went back to Fox Boards and I was there for about seven years, progressing through my career or the different levels. I, there I oversaw the full P&L for the broadcast network sports, which is your NFL Baseball World Cup, all your big events, the Super Bowl. As as well as overseeing the shared service functions that serviced all networks at Fox Sports. After that I was there until late 2020 and then the opportunity at 2K came up to come in as they were expanding their finance function at 2K. Now I oversee the full P&L for the business, working really closely with our leadership, assessing risk and opportunities. Also working with our parent company as well on our FP&A and forecasting. In addition to full P&L responsibilities, I have some oversight over the publishing functions finance, which is really marketing our commercial and growth teams, product management and our studio shared services. So working with a lot of different business partners really getting into the details of what they do every day.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, it sounds like you definitely have a lot of, a lot of partners you’re working with there. One thing I just wanted to ask you that you talked about during your introduction, you mentioned that you got the opportunity to, you know, help offshore to a shared service function, third party. Any advice you would offer for others thinking of doing that? I’ve seen it a few times and I know it can always be a challenge. So just curious, maybe one or two kind of takeaways or lessons you learned from that experience that you could offer others.
Cayla Pingel:
Definitely a challenge for sure. I think you know, it was also my first time managing a team in general. So you need to work to set clear and SLAs with the team to make sure, and really doing regular check-ins and saying like, are we delivering yet? You know, and are we keeping our stakeholders happy? So that was really key. I think the other thing is just working and understanding cultural norms of other cultures when you’re dealing with that. And, you know, that’s helpful in finding what motivates people because it may not be the same everywhere. And that was a really good experience. As well. I still talk to actually some of my team there, like, it’s been, I think 12 years. So it’s pretty cool.
Paul Barnhurst:
That’s great. And I’ve, you know, I’ve had the opportunity to manage some people in India and do some offshoring, and so I can relate to what you said, the importance of the SLA and learning the culture. I think those are, you know, great advice. So, you know, kind of next question I have here is, you’ve spent most of your career in the sports media and entertainment industry. What’s attracted you to that industry? What’s kept you kind of working in that industry?
Cayla Pingel:
I mean, I think growing up in LA you’re always kind of close to it. Going to school, sure. You know, kids’, parents were involved. My dad worked in the business as well. So I think you, you know, it’s kind of a natural thing that I always saw myself getting into. I think I obviously tested a few different types of businesses along the way of my career, and it was really realizing that, one, I enjoy watching sports on television, so it makes it a lot easier when you are working on a product that you actually really care about succeeding. And I mean, I used to say like, I’d be watching a football game on the weekend and I’m, while I’m enjoying and cheering for my team or whatever else, I’m also thinking about like the business implications, what it might mean for my business later on down the season and down the line.
And even thinking about like risks and opportunities, you know, associated with revenue. And if the game isn’t going well and as a blowout, like chances are your ratings are down and, you know, your revenue may be impacted or you get, you know, the postseason baseball you get, you are getting seven games in a World Series or the Chicago Cubs the year 2016 when the Chicago Cubs, you know, went seven games and ended their drought of a hundred and plus years. Like, those are big numbers, and it, it’s exciting to be a part of it. Finance can be a little dry at times. So I think really working on a product is exciting. And then with 2K, it’s, you know, being part of like future, the future I think I of entertainment, you know, related to sports. Yeah, it’s kept me there being on a product that keeps me engaged and excited.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. makes sense. If you have a passion for it and you really enjoy sports and you’re able to relate that to what you do for work, I could see how that can make it more exciting. And, you know, that’s interesting. I obviously, I don’t think about that when I’m watching a game. It’s like, oh, that’s a blowout. How that impact ratings, or, you know, there’s times they may think ratings, like when the Red Sox came back from three, nothing to beat the Yankees. I was back east at the time, and that’s all anyone talked about. Yep. So I, you know, the ratings were huge, so I could see how you can directly see it in what you’re watching and understand. Okay. You know, if this series goes to seven, I know that’s gonna help our business. Right. Then there’s the, there’s the sports side of, but I want my team to win. Yes.
Cayla Pingel:
I mean, I’m a Charger fan, so it’s a little tougher, you know, cheer <laugh>, right? It’s painful. So I guess the flip side is, is I accept what it is.
Paul Barnhurst:
I’m, I’m a Titans fan. I was a Houston Oilers fan asa kid, so yes, I can understand. Painful. Yep. <Laugh>
So kind of moving forward. You earned your degree in accounting, but you’ve mostly ended up working in finance. And FP&A I think you hinted a little bit in your intro about this, but why the switch? Why, you know, what, what made you decide to focus more on the finance side than the accounting?
Cayla Pingel:
I think, I mean, growing up my, I didn’t really know what I wanna do and my parents pushed me towards accounting and said, you’ll have a job after college and we won’t have to support you and anymore. But my dad really was said, if you have an accounting degree, you can pivot in a lot of different directions. So I think in the hybrid role that I had at Fox Sports where I was doing both accounting and FP&A is when I really realized like, okay, FP&A is looking forwarded into the future and really helping a business like achieve its goals. And that’s what excited me. I think accounting’s a little bit more present or past focus.
And it just was not as exciting for me. So once I realized, okay, yeah, you get to work with the business operations help influence decision making and all that kinda stuff was really what pushed me in the FP&A direction.
Paul Barnhurst:
I can relate to that. I, you know, I didn’t do an accounting degree, but I’ve always really enjoyed the business aspect of FP&A. I’ve always tried to steer clear of the corporate roles where you’re just doing consolidation and roll up. ’cause I like working with the business unit. I like having those conversations with partners and trying to influence the decisions and being able to see the impact of that. And it sounds like kind of similar for you as well, is that that’s what you like.
Cayla Pingel:
Yep. I think, you know, I, maybe 10 years ago in my career, I thought I wanna be a COO. Like when I got to Fox, we were working a lot with the COO and in providing financial information, I was like, oh, that’s a really cool job. That’s what I wanna do. And being an FP&A you get into all the business areas of the business. And so I was like, that’s my path forward and what excites me. And so kind of, you know, again, progressed on that path to say, cool, I’m learning about all these different areas of the business and how it all comes together.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, I I totally agree that FP&A sets you up for a natural path to do operations. You know, in small companies you often see the CFO also being the COO, it’s not uncommon at all. And you know, I remember there’s a, he’s a CEO now who tells a story that he is like, you know, fFP&A is the only group outside of the CFO and the CO they get to see the whole company, right? Right. You got that 360 view and you’re talking to everybody and that gives you, if you focus on learning the business and not just the finances, which is what you should be doing, it gives you a great understanding of the operations that other people don’t get. And you get that through a financial lens in addition to the operational. So I think it’s a great, great springboard for operations for sure.
Cayla Pingel:
Yep. Yep. For sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
So I’m curious, you know, in, in the sports industry, I know it’s gonna vary a little bit, you know, what kind of company, but what do you, what are some of the most common, you know, kind of KPIs and metrics you’ve looked at over your career that you’ve kind of had a track?
Cayla Pingel:
I mean, the biggest one for sure at Fox was ratings. Because on a broadcast network, you know, it is how they make money is ad revenue. And so the ratings drive everything, the viewership and you can go be up or down, you know, and have material swings based off of a blowout or a really tight game. So ratings was the number one thing I was focused on. It’s also, sports is one of the only things left that people watch live. And so that rating can really change everything. So ratings was huge. The other thing that we really focused in on was the cost to produce a game. And because when you look at the NFL for example, you only have a set amount of broadcast windows and multiple games will air in that broadcast window regionalized throughout the country. And so you for some reason end up with an extra game or one less game. There is no incremental revenue necessarily associated with that, but you’re incurring incremental costs of course. Whereas, like with baseball, you know, you add an extra post-season game in a series and you’re getting extra revenue to cover that game cost. So we spent a lot of time assessing the cost of producing the individual games.
Paul Barnhurst:
Sure. I would imagine that has to be one of the most expensive things is the production cost from the host and what you have to pay them to the camera, to the crew, to just everything that goes into that shipping, all the equipment, it’s one on and on.
Cayla Pingel:
And it’s something, I mean, there’s the fixed side of it for sure, the camera and the crew and the things that you should be there. Sure. But there’s a variable component. You can’t control your sports rights costs, right. You agree to pay a certain amount of rights for a certain amount of content. And so really production cost is one of the few areas that you can actually go and control costs and manage. So Yeah.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. And and that makes sense, right? Because yeah, you pay a fixed amount to, to the NBA or the NFL for those contracts that are off in 5, 7, 8 years, billions of dollars. So you gotta figure out, okay, where else do I control costs if the economy changes, if ad revenue’s down, whatever else it may be. You’re limited in how much you can scale back.
Cayla Pingel:
Exactly. Exactly.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. That, that, that makes a lot of sense. And that, you know, any industry where you have heavy fixed costs can always be challenging when things change. Oh yes. Just all you gotta do is look at the airline industry.
Cayla Pingel:
Exactly.
Paul Barnhurst:
So I, I’m curious, you know, having worked in this industry, you know, gaming and sports, how have you seen the rise of streaming online gaming, you know, kind of impacting the business and how you forecast and think about things, right. Because we’re definitely going through a huge change within the media and entertainment and gaming industry in general. So I’m just kind of curious, how’s that kind of impacted the way you forecast and think about things?
Cayla Pingel:
I mean, streaming has, there’s more content out there than ever before. And so you’re really competing for eyeballs for people to engage in your content. And differentiating yourself is really important in that regard. And trying to get, you know, again, people into the games engagement, playing longer, the hours that they play. You’re considering all of those things. So I think what’s great is that with streaming and even online gaming, you on a broadcast network, you’re waiting for a Nielsen rating to give you some feedback on performance after the fact, with the information that we’re able to see much quicker in the data, we can certainly plan and, you know, look at indicators to say, okay, maybe we have a risk coming up, or maybe we have a really good opportunity ’cause we’re seeing a lot more engagement, you know, early on, earlier than we expected and look at this o you know, revenue opportunity in the future.
Soi think, you know, there’s a lot of opportunity with that, with the data and the analytics for sure that, you know, we can get in this new world. The other thing I’ll say is with streaming on the television side for sure, you brought in some new companies entering the media landscape, and definitely on the sports side that’s driving the costs up. So again, thinking about the different ways you know, now you pay to watch an NFL game through a subscription with like Amazon where you hadn’t in the past when I was on CBS or NBC. So they have a new way to monetize that. The broadcast networks maybe don’t, but what other things can you do to again, attract people, bring people into your content?
Paul Barnhurst:
Sure. I that’s Thursday night, right? That Amazon, is that the Yep. Yeah, no, I know here locally kind of just talking about all this, I’m a Utah Jazz fan, big jazz fan, and they just added streaming option to watch all the games. You know, in addition, they put it back on local tv, so it’s not on cable anymore, it’s on local tv. And then they did a streaming package as well. Yep.
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah. So it’s it’s definitely changed the game for sure, and it’s made everything more competitive. But I think, you know, from a forecast perspective, we’re you’re able to see things quicker and react quicker to make sure you’re providing content that your consumer or your player want for sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
Sure. Versus waiting the next day and seeing, okay, how did we do on the nil, the preliminary Nielsen ratings? Right. What do those final numbers look like? What do they really mean? Yeah. I would imagine it’s, it’s a little bit of a wait versus, okay, we could see today something’s popped on this game, it’s up 20%, what’s going on and is there something we can do to continue that behavior?
Cayla Pingel:
Exactly. Exactly.
Paul Barnhurst:
And so is that one of the biggest things kind of in the streaming is just looking at the or particularly gaming, I’m guessing it’s kind of time on game. Is that usually the most common metric or are there other things you kind of look at within that play that helps you understand how it’s performing? Yeah,
Cayla Pingel:
I think, you know, hours played and engagement, you know, again, online gaming gives hundreds of hours of content, you know, and people can keep going. So yeah, looking at where they’re engaging, I mean, we can see across the whole life of the game, you know, oh, NBA tip off, maybe they’re engaging a little bit more around that part of the season or maybe, and you can assess all those things. So I think that’s one of the big things we use for sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, I know that, that’s great. I’ll tell this since we’re talking gaming. I once applied to work for a gaming company. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And in the interview I got told when we got done, I asked the person if they had any concerns and they’re like, I don’t think you’re passionate enough about video games. And so I didn’t get hired and I kind of laughed. I’m like, so I joke sometimes with kids. I’m like, you just need to play video games more. It could help your career.
Cayla Pingel:
I’ll say, I, you know, had not played video games probably since I was a teenager when I got this job at 2K. Of course new NBA 2K, you know, you know those things Sure. In way, like, it’s huge. But one of the first things I did was, okay, I need to buy a console. And, which was tough at the time in 2020 and 2021 I got an Xbox Oh
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. Trying to get a console during that time. You, you paid a premium. Yeah.
Cayla Pingel:
Yes. So, but I was like, I need to understand this product. So I went and got an Xbox and then downloaded our games and started playing to be like, okay, what, I mean, they’re so much more complicated than they were when I played Nintendo 64 regular Nintendo as a kid. But really understanding like, what are the elements that go into this? And really trying to make sure I understand the, what we’re producing and creating.
Paul Barnhurst:
I, I love that you took the time to test the product, to learn the product. ’cause That adds so much value to what you’re doing in your job. Oh, yeah. And I, I, I think it’s huge. I still remember in college kind of talking about, you know, buying a game console. I had a friend who, he did his master’s thesis on video, a video game, like protagonist or something. He ended up getting a master’s in gaming later on. And so he would he bought a few different games. He got a grant. And so we’d always joke every weekend we were helping him do his research when we played games. Yeah. You know, but he really did, he would be observing things and helped him with his research. Not so much us, but that was our excuse is we were helping him with his research.
Cayla Pingel:
So, no, I think for sure, like early on when I started at 2K, there was, we were debating, you know, what, with one of the games, you know, do we spend the extra money to put these features in? Do we not? You know, there was a discussion happening and after the game came out and I played the game, I was like, wow, I am actually really happy we spent the money and did that. Like, that is really cool as somebody, you know, a casual player of game. So it makes you appreciate those things and understand it a little bit more For sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
Sure. When you’re in the conversation and then you can actually see it and play it and be like, oh wow, that is really good. Or I wish we would’ve spent the money to put this in. Right. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative> that, that really would’ve added to the game.
Cayla Pingel:
Right. And it helps with my partnership, you know, in discussing with people. I’m like, oh, okay. Like, I understand you, you know, and like, let me help advocate, you know, and build a business case of why we would wanna add features or certain things. For sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. Because I’m sure the on the game side, they wanna add everything, right? <Laugh> always. And you’re like, you know how much that’s gonna cost.
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah.
Paul Barnhurst:
And so how do you think about that process? You know, kind of being finance, of helping them manage that, of, you know, what features go into the product and all that. Any any thoughts or advice you’d offer to finance professionals? Because we all deal with that. Yeah. Whether it’s in game or whatever it might be of scope creep and product cost and those type of things.
Cayla Pingel:
I think for us, you know, I am not an expert at gamingat all, which I’ve said, right? Like, so I’m gonna really trust the experts to come and say, this is why I need this and I really need this, and I’m going to help find a way to support their decision. So if that’s what it is, is looking at, okay, is there a revenue opportunity or something else out there or is there somewhere else, maybe we could try to find a way to reduce spend to make sure you get this, you know, feature that’s really important to you. Because yeah, I’m not the expert. I’m just the finance person and if you tell me its important. I will help you find a way to get it what you want.
Paul Barnhurst:
And I like that you’re trusting the expert. And then it’s okay having that discussion, which I think is so critical of how can we do this? You know, there, there’s often a view that finance is , I’ve heard it referred to CF-noMm-Hmm. <Affirmative> the office of No. And that, that never wins. Friends when it’s just like, Nope, that’s too expensive. And you shut down the conversation versus, okay, well why is that important? How can we increase the revenue to support that? ’cause Right now it doesn’t economically make sense. I can’t. Right. You know, bring it forward and then they app, I think they appreciate it when you really kind of help educate them on the financial side of what your concerns are and try to help ’em come up with a solution versus Yeah. You may be the expert, I’m just gonna tell you No, the budget’s not there.
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah. I I tell people, a lot of my business partners, I say, think of me as your agent. I’m gonna go out and negotiate this for you from a financial perspective. Tell me what you need and let me help go sell, you know, sell this somewhere else so that we can make the case and do it.
Paul Barnhurst:
I like that. I haven’t heard that one of the agent. I like that one. That’s a good one.
Cayla Pingel:
Working a lot of sports. So <laugh>. Yeah,
Paul Barnhurst:
I figured as much I, yeah, as you said agent, I’m thinking of Jerry McGuire for
Cayla Pingel:
Some reason. Exactly, yes. <Laugh>, I’m a little calmer than him. <Laugh>.
Paul Barnhurst:
I would hope so.
Cayla Pingel:
Yes.
Paul Barnhurst:
So I know you’ve been very active as a volunteer in the Los Angeles chapter for women in sports and events for, you know, several years. Can you talk about how that experience has helped you in your career? Kind of what you’ve learned from being involved in that?
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah. It was a really cool opportunity that came to me. Actually the president of Fox Sports, his assistant managed our Fox Sports relationship with the organization. So she said, she called me one day and said, you know, one of these organizations we work with is looking for a woman who works in sports and does finance, and you are the only person I can think of right now. Are you interested? And I said, sure, you know, I’ll take the lunch and have the conversation with the board. So I went and met with the president of the board and a couple others, and basically they convinced me, you know, that this would be a really cool opportunity. I mean, a lot of my career, I think I’ve said, okay, sure. I’ll say yes, why not? And it was a really good opportunity to learn a different kind of business, a nonprofit organization.
For sure. Again, I’m touching taxes in that, things that I have not done in my career. The other thing I think that was really interesting was like learning about event planning. Because that was our, our main way to raise money and fundraise and think about our sponsorship opportunities and how we price those things in order to raise money again. And at the time, it was a good way to connect with other people just in the industry in LA as well. We, it’s a national organization, so Los Angeles was just a chapter, so you’re connecting with other people around the country as well at different teams and leagues and really learning a lot. So yeah, it was a cool opportunity. And then two years ago I handed over my treasurer responsibilities to someone else. And that’s been fun ’cause she was not a finance person when she came into it, but she signed up and said, I wanna try. So, you know, I work, I still talk to her regularly and help kind of coach her through on how to do the finance, do budgeting. I mean, there was no budget when I got there. And then help people think about that. So it’s been awesome.
Paul Barnhurst:
It sounds like you’ve learned a lot and it’s really helped you in your career just making those networks, getting those opportunities to learn new things and just expand your horizon, so to speak.
Cayla Pingel:
Yes, it’s definitely given me a big appreciation for, again, what everyone else does in a business.
Paul Barnhurst:
I appreciate that. So next question here, and this is another one we like to, to ask pretty much all our guests, is can you tell me about a time in your career when you experienced what we’ll call a strategic moment, kind of a strategic insight that it later empowered you to drive change within the organization?
Cayla Pingel:
So when I was at Warner Brothers, about six weeks into the job they said, we’re putting you on a plane to Prague and you’re gonna go work with the team there. The outsourced team was in the office doing transition, knowledge transfer of the activities there. So I said, sure. I was very young, 25 years old and said, okay, I will go. And I got there and realized very quickly that the project had gone very sideways. They were way behind <laugh> on the transition plan. The controller who was working with the outsource team was very upset and she had pretty much shut down working with them. And I’m on the other side of the world in a job six weeks in and saying, what do I do? So I had luckily, you know, I was in Europe, so I had a few hours before the west coast got up and I formulated a plan.
I mean, part of me was like, maybe I just don’t do anything, or you know what, I didn’t know what to do. And so I I sat down and said, no, you need to say something. You need to formulate a plan and you need to tell them what’s going on and how they can fix it. So I called by the afternoon, I called our head of the project as well as the head of the outsource center, and then our VP of finance and said, I need to have a call with you and I need to tell you what’s going on with you. And that’s where I clearly laid out, here’s the problem, here’s what I think we can do to fix it. And I, here’s how I think we implement it going forward. Amd that was like a big moment just for me personally as well, like really see it. They acted on it right away. Within 48 hours we had more resources on the ground in Prague to help get the project back on track. It ended up delivering on time, but it was really a moment where, for me, even saying, okay, if you clearly organize your thoughts and make a recommendation and think be thoughtful about what you do, people will hear you and act on it. And that was really exciting because again, we delivered on time, which was concerning that we would not so
Paul Barnhurst:
It sounds like kind of one of those aha moments for you earlier in your career where realizing if I really think through this logically and come up with a plan, people are gonna listen. And I can make a difference. Right. It allowed you to see that you could really influence versus just doing what you’re told so to so to say Yes. Make sense. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah, that’d be a, that’d be a tough one. Fly halfway across the world and realize everything’s a mess.
Cayla Pingel:
And it was very, I mean, six weeks into a new job where you’re still like, I don’t even know what’s going on. So
Paul Barnhurst:
<Laugh> Yeah. You barely know which way’s up at that point, right. Let alone how do you fix a big problem. Yeah. Yeah. It sounds like it was a really good learning opportunity for sure.
Cayla Pingel:
It is. I I actually keep a pen on my desk still to this day that I ha that I use to like write my plan out in the office and I’ve carried it with me just kind of as a reminder for sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
That’s cool. That’s a great little memento reminder to have, you know, kind of speaking of pens and things that remind us, this next section is what we call the get to know You section. Okay. So you get no more than 30 seconds to answer each of these questions. So, you know, relatively brief, but we have four of them that we’re gonna ask you. And the first one is, what is something interesting about you that not many people know? Something that makes you unique?
Cayla Pingel:
So not athletic, but recently, well, I guess during the pandemic really. I got into golf and took golf lessons, so and now I regularly golf.
Paul Barnhurst:
Cool. And how are you enjoying it?
Cayla Pingel:
I love it. It’s like great to get outside. It’s a good way to socialize, catch up with friends while we’re still doing something. So yeah. Play a lot of golf now.
Paul Barnhurst:
Well, good. That’s a fun one to pick up. So next question, if you could meet one person in the world, dead or alive, who would you meet and why?
Cayla Pingel:
So maybe it’s two or one or the other. I think I, you know, Brene Brown or Adam Grant. They do a lot of stuff together, so maybe it could be ’em together. But the entrance there is really, I’m always trying to find a way to be a better leader for my team to help develop them and I guess also like be a better colleague. And I think they have a lot of advice. I just love to pick their brain on how to work effectively.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. Adam Grant has a lot of great advice. I’ve listened to some of his podcast episodes. I’ve read his Think Again. And last year, not this year, but last year, he was the keynote speaker at AFP. Oh, okay. I got the opportunity to watch him present, and he’s a great presenter. Awesome. It was really fun to be there in the, you know, in the conference room and watch him work.
Cayla Pingel:
Yeah, his new book [Hidden Potential is really good about you know, coaching for sure, coaching people.
Paul Barnhurst:
So I’ll definitely have to check that out. But yeah, he, he’s great. I really like his stuff and if you ever get the chance, see, I don’t know if you’ve heard his story, he told on one of the podcasts where his mom basically outed him for playing video games too much as a kid to like the newspaper <laugh>. Yep. He’s like, I’ve done studies on it. There’s really no data that shows it’s bad for kids as long as you manage it appropriately.
Cayla Pingel:
Yep, yep.
Paul Barnhurst:
So I thought of that when you mentioned Adam Grant. I remember him telling that story. So, yes. All right. So the next question, what is the last thing you Googled or looked up on YouTube related to finance? FP&A or Excel?
Cayla Pingel:
So I was recently trying to reconcile three different data sources. So I was deep in Google on if some product and seeing how many ways I could layer things together to try to do that. I, it was how, yeah, it was, I was really deep into Google and YouTube watching different for reading different formulas and statements for sure.
Paul Barnhurst:
I have definitely been there. I think we all have when trying to reconcile a data source and you’re trying to, okay, what formula do I use here? How do I do this? So, right. I can, I can relate to that one. So this last one here is, what’s your favorite thing about Excel function or feature?
Cayla Pingel:
My favorite one is waterfall charts. I remember when you had to do the waterfall charts by hand. So the, and I do a lot of waterfall charts. Our executives love that, so I love that. It’s so easy. I just click of a button now.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yes. It is so nice compared to what it used to be. I had a boss who most people do the bar chart where you adjust everything. Yep. He had found some website that is said this is a lot easier. It was a lot harder to set up and understand, but it was actually using scatter plots to build your waterfall chart. And it was quite challenging. Yes. It took me a while to understand what in the world it was doing. Once I learned it, I loved it. But I was so glad when they added the waterfall feature ’cause it’s so much easier.
Cayla Pingel:
My boss at Fox Sports during our budget season, like I mentioned, was during March. And so there’d be a company-wide March Madness Bracket Challenge. And depending on who had the lower ranking would have to do the waterfall charts. Like the old bar charts, he would, he, every time he would come up be like, oh, sorry, you’re lower ranking this week. You’re, you’re doing all the bar the waterfall charts for everyone. ’cause We hated it so much.
Paul Barnhurst:
That’s funny. The only thing I wish they would fix about it is you can paste the format of any other chart. Like if you build a chart and paste the format over and it doesn’t work with a waterfall chart.
Cayla Pingel:
No. So I spent a lot of T time changing the colors for sure. <Laugh>.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah. I found a few little trick tips and tricks here and there, but I exactly know what you’re talking about. All right. So we’re coming up to the end of our time. We just have two questions left for you. The first is, if someone was starting a career today in FP&A, what advice would you offer ’em? What would you tell them?
Cayla Pingel:
I think the two biggest things I look for in candidates or anyone starting out is curiosity. Just asking a lot of questions. Learn like, and I guess maybe going along with that is the courage to ask for help too along the way. People love to talk about themselves, so like go to your business partner, ask a lot of questions about what they do. I find that everyone’s willing to talk and it makes you so much better and effective at your job. But being curious, willing to, not only with your business partners but dig into data and try to find trends I think is really key. And then asking for help. There are a lot of people with ideas out there that can help you.
Paul Barnhurst:
Great advice. I mean, curiosity and asking questions is always important and being willing to ask for help is not a sign of weakness. It’s a sign of strength. Yeah. It shows that you’re willing to learn and that you don’t think you know everything.
Cayla Pingel:
Right. Exactly. Exactly.
Paul Barnhurst:
Great advice there. Last question. If someone wanted to get ahold of you or reach out to you, maybe connect with you, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Cayla Pingel:
Linkedin. Find me on LinkedIn. Message me. Connect. Let’s talk
Paul Barnhurst:
That. That’s what I figured. I’m almost going to just start going, you know, what’s your name on LinkedIn instead of asking how to connect because that’s 99% the time, the way we all do it today. Yep. Although I did have one guest give his phone number, which did surprise me a little bit. <Laugh>. Wow.
Cayla Pingel:
Okay. That a lot of respect for them.
Paul Barnhurst:
Yeah, I was gonna say. Yeah. Good for them I guess. Yep. So, alrighty. Well thank you so much for your time today. I’ve really enjoyed chatting with you, Kayla, and talking a little bit about the sports industry and your background. And thanks again for being on the show. Yeah,
Cayla Pingel:
Thank you. Thanks for the opportunity. This has been great.
