940: All the Moving Parts | Michael Linford, CFO, Affirm

For those executives residing inside the private equity and investment banking realm that aspire to someday occupy the CFO office, it’s not uncommon to seek out an “operator’s role” – one that allows recruiters “to check the box” and confidently present a leadership candidate (operations credentials intact) to a company’s management team or board members.

“Inspect your chute carefully and jump smart,” might be the abbreviated advice for those looking to land inside an operations role.  Once inside, the goal is to canvas the corridors and collaborate with the company functional areas and managers the banking world seldom sees.  Sometimes such operations stints are little more than a year long, while others last several years and incorporate roles at multiple companies.  

For Michael Linford, whose chute opened wide, the operations tour of duty was at Hewlett-Packard, and the multiyear stint would arguably afford him more operational insights than any aspiring CFO could hope to glean.

“When I joined the decision to separate HP’s consumer business and the enterprise business had been made,” explains Linford recalling his 2015 arrival within the firm’s M&A integration team.   The historic split up of Hewlett-Packard company was structured so that the former company would change its name to HP Inc., spin off Hewlett Packard Enterprise as a newly created company and sell off its enterprise services business.

“As the slpit off was happening we knew we had to continue to grow the company. …There was a duality to it.  If you want to achieve change, you must continue to buy and sell companies at the same time,” comments Linford, who tells us he quickly became involved with helping integrate a recently acquired networking firm that had stumbled since being acquired.

“The networking business had been growing quickly, but as it came into the HP mothership it had just stalled, so we spent a lot of time getting that business back on track – and this was as the larger separation was underway – so we were tasked with building a real business and at the same time shed these other businesses,” explains Linford, who tell us the role taught him to be mindful of distractions.  

“If you didn’t focus on getting the value from the acquisitions that were being made – what is left wouldn’t have any value,” comments Linford, who tell us the networking business would ultimately become a “material part” of the business.  

Roughly two years into his M&A stint, Linford joins HP’s software business where he would serve as finance leader for the newly formed HP Enterprise.  

“That was where I encountered one of the hardest problems I’ve ever had to solve in my career,” comments Linford, who tells us the succession of business separations within HP led to a talent shortage as employees found themselves attached to one or another entity.   

“By the time we got to the software business separation, there was nothing left in the cupboard. And so, we had to stand up a whole new technology stack to operate the business. And we had to hire a whole new team to support the business,” remarks Linford, who once more emphasizes the stiff price for indulging distractions.  

He explains “Staying focused on the job at hand while all this change is happening around you is a tremendous leadership challenge, and its alongside the technical, operational and finance challenges that were all very real for us.” – Jack Sweeney

CFOTL: Tell us about Affirm .. what does this firm do and what are its offerings today?

Linford: So Affirm’s mission is to build honest financial product that improve lives. We’re a payment network that helps consumers purchase the things they want and need. And we help merchants grow their businesses. Many people, especially millennial and Gen Z consumers, are not happy with the choices they have for their existing credit products. They do not want to be revolving on credit cards. They do not want the ball and chain that comes with compounding debt.

And with Affirm, they don’t have to. We have never charged late fees. We don’t compound interest on interest. We give consumers immutable certainty of the cost of financing when they check out. We can bring 0% as well as interest bearing products to help merchants offer a differentiated set of financing offers to their consumers. And in all of this is with an eye towards attacking what we think is a lot of areas of potential future benefit for consumers and harm that happens today where consumers do fall into a lot of traps.

I have nine siblings. I grew up as one of 10 people. And I like to tell folks that I don’t care how wealthy you are, financially caring for 10 human beings is something that will put an incredible amount of stress on your financial life. And so for me growing up, there was always a constraint on even access to credit. And my parents were certainly not immune from those who fall into the spiral of never ending credit card debt.

And I saw what Max was building and I said, this is going to be something that has the opportunity to change the world. And that was my criteria. To answer your question, I did not want to work. If I was going to get out of bed and I was going to stop my four times a week running routine and going to the gym, I was going to do all that. I wanted it to be on something that I thought had a good chance of changing the world.

And with that audacious statement, which truly, it’s a lot of audacity to say you want to get out of bed and change the world. I wanted to do it somewhere that I thought was going to do it responsibly. And the combination of financial services, technology, solving a real problem for consumers, to never charge late fees, and then to position yourselves with real principles, we like to say that we will never profit off of a consumer’s misfortune or mistake.