Our Conversation With Rahul Jain

About Rahul

Soon after clearing CA, Rahul started working at Deloitte in the audit division. Rahul then transitioned into an industry involving trading and infrastructure. During this time, with valuable insights into business management, customer interaction, and heading businesses he was able to optimize the cost as well as generate new vertical line of business. Amidst SaaS's booming success, Rahul decided to challenge himself by joining Hippo Video and is now there for more than 2 years - adding even more knowledge about finance to his expertise set.

About Hippo Video

Hippo Video’s platform – powered by generative AI – helps companies increase sales engagement with hyper-personalized, interactive video content delivered at scale, which drives a significant increase in meetings booked and improves win rates.

Challenges in Finance:

Founders of new startups often need help to keep up with their financial goals, as they come from a non-finance background. Without proper oversight and follow-up measures, they can fall behind, failing to make necessary improvements quickly enough - leaving them stuck in an uphill battle with business growth.

Being creative is rarely an option when it comes to decision-making, especially regarding coordination between finance and management. To ensure every operation has been thoroughly verified, a double confirmation process must be employed - despite its hindrance to creativity. The main challenges in finance is Managing cash flows and make sure you have adequate capital or runway along with ticking all the statutory compliances.

The right time for a startup to hire a finance head

It is right to hire from the start but As an investor-backed startup, the finance team has to enter the picture at Pre-Series A or a little earlier stage which require an expert's eye for all the operations and compliances.  In other cases, consider outsourcing or hiring qualified professionals help - it's the sensible option for any growing startup. Of course, if operations become more extensive over time, investing in an internal team to manage the finance function may make financial sense!

A word of advice: There must be a pivot point even if your data entry (or any finance function) is outsourced. There should be someone in-house who understands the pulse of the industry, and it will help the founders realize what needs to be done or discarded.

A day as the finance head of a startup:

One good thing about a startup is its culture; we prioritize deliverables and timelines and not just the “job description”. The hybrid work system adds more to the work culture. There is an excellent work-life balance, and employees can manage things on the go.

So the day starts with yesterday on the follow-ups and building financial models, analyzing and preparing financial statements. Managing the payroll, vendor payments and statutory compliances. Active involvement in vendor onboarding and negotiations process and handling employee related issues that arises. Apart from this, Rahul manages the FP&A and works closely on transactional the structuring. Not to mention the Monthly/Quarterly MIS.

As compared to others in the league, Rahul also works hands-on on Variance analysis and identifying the cost centers that exceed budgets

Right balance between In-House & Outsourcing the finance function

The outsourcing option is good, but the control has to be in the hands of the in-house finance team. Outsourcing comes at reasonable costs and removes the friction of managing day-to-day activities. Everything falls back to the finance head regarding data entry, monthly closures, and statutory reporting.

Two-people in-house team can do book-keeping, data entry, and so on. If not, you can outsource to manage day-to-day entries or be done internally; there should be someone to understand the pulse of what is needed or not needed. But the finance head roles cannot (and must not) be outsourced because they will not be able to support the founders and are essential to the operations.

Taking the function entirely in-house is good if the founder cannot depend on outside in terms of high volume of transactions. If you are missing something, and it is hitting you back again. Investors will question you, “Why don’t you have an in-house team if you have a high influx?” The investors will suggest they keep it in-house.

In terms of structure, maintenance, and working capital, a startup needs to handhold the outsourced talent. Founders need to follow up regularly. At the same time, the burden is lessened when the finance function is managed in-house.

How a firm can differentiate itself from others?

• Be available when the customer needs you and give the right advice at every stage of their growth.

• Reporting can be specific for SaaS. Especially SaaS Metrics, Cash Flows, MIS etc.

• Have meetings at regular intervals with Founders and Finance team to understand the bottlenecks

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