AI to ROI (fka Metrics that Measure Up)

In the first episode of the AI to ROI: Big Story podcast, our co-hosts Peter Buchanan and Ray Rike discuss the emerging importance of Context Graphs in AI Software.Why are context graphs suddenly being called a trillion-dollar opportunity in enterprise AI? In this inaugural episode of The Big Story, hosts Ray Rike (CEO of Benchmarkit) and Peter Buchanan (Managing Partner of New Plan) dive into the "glue technology" that fills the missing gap in the AI stack.While traditional knowledge graphs tell you what happened, context graphs reveal the why! Context Graphs capture the decision traces, policy constraints, and precedents that make AI agents truly auditable and trustworthy. From preventing "data breakage" in regulated workflows to revolutionizing supply chain quality control, discover why context is the key to moving AI from experimental pilots to reliable production.Key TakeawaysThe Why Behind the Action: Context graphs provide the connectivity that agentic AI lacks, recording who made a decision and under what specific constraints.A Trillion-Dollar Value Add: Industry leaders believe context is a massive economic value driver for companies in the era of AI.Beyond Knowledge Graphs: Moving from simple data points to decision lineages that explain the "why" behind an event.Real-World Use Cases: Deep dives into data governance at firms like Vanguard and Prudential, and quality control in the automotive supply chain.The Vendor Landscape: Discussion on current players like Atlan, Neo4j, and Writer, and why tech giants like Microsoft and Salesforce are the "lurkers" to watch.Timestamps00:00 Introduction to the AI to ROI podcast series.02:40 Defining Context Graphs: The missing gap in the AI stack.04:15 The Trillion-Dollar Opportunity: Economic value vs. market size.06:30 Knowledge Graphs vs. Context Graphs: Moving from "what" to "why".09:20 Who should care? Roles from the CEO to the Chief Risk Officer.12:45 Use Case 1: Data Governance and preventing "downstream breakage".15:10 Use Case 2: Unifying the Go-To-Market (GTM) stack.18:30 Use Case 3: Supply chain visibility and automotive quality control.21:40 The Market Map: Current leaders and "Lurker" strategies from Big Tech.25:50 Executive Summary: Things every leader must do right now.Context graphs are a key component to turn Agentic AI software vision into Agentic AI explainability!Read the AI to ROI Newsletter on Substack to dive deeper into this week's Big Story!Subscribe at: ai2roi.substack.comSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Welcome to the first episode of AI to ROI, the newly re-imagined evolution of the highly successful Metrics That Measure Up podcast. In this launch episode, our host, Ray Rike sets the stage for a new era of conversations focused on turning artificial intelligence from hype into measurable business outcomes.The inaugural guest is Todd Olson, Founder and CEO of Pendo, who joins the show for an interactive, unscripted discussion on how companies should measure the real impact of AI agents inside modern SaaS and cloud organizations. Together, they explore how AI-driven “digital workers” are reshaping productivity, workflows, and operating models across the enterpriseKey topics include how companies can measure the performance and business impact of AI agents, the emerging metrics that define agent adoption and activation, and why connecting usage data to tangible outcomes like time saved, cost reduction, and revenue impact is critical for ROI. Todd also shares his perspective on outcome-based pricing, why it remains rare in AI-native software today, and what must change for it to scale.The conversation wraps with a forward-looking discussion on SaaS and AI convergence, as agents increasingly appear on org charts and product roadmaps, followed by practical advice on developing AI competencies for the next generation of business leaders.If you care about moving beyond AI experimentation toward measurable economic value, AI to ROI is your new go-to podcast.Subscribe, rate, and follow AI to ROI on your favorite podcast platform.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The world of FP&A is having its day in the spotlight. New pricing models, a new focus on near real-time business planning, the increased focus on balancing revenue growth and profitability, coupled with the dynamic impact that AI is having on the SaaS market, are all making the role of FP&A a more strategic asset. Albert Gozzi, is the founder and CEO of Aleph, a modern FP&A platform and company that recently raised $29M in their Series B financing from Khosla Ventures.During today's episode, our host, Ray Rike is joined by Albert Gozzi, Founder and CEO Aleph, to discuss the strategic future of FP&A including:The vision behind founding AlephThe evolution of AI in FP&AFP&A’s role in developing corporate strategyGrowth strategies being used in a crowded categoryIf you are a finance leader, FP&A professional or fellow B2B SaaS founder with a product purpose built for the Office of Finance, this conversation with Albert Gozzi is full of unique insights, ideas and opportunity to make your Financial Planning and Analysis organization a strategic asset!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Think about the unparalleled growth that OpenAI has experienced since the public introduction of ChatGPT on November 30, 2022. Now, think about being in finance, or being the controller who had to scale their financial processes, including closing the books to keep up with a company that has scaled from less than $100M in revenue to $10B+ in less than 3 years!?!?That was the situation that Sowmya Ranganathan, Former Controller OpenAI and CEO, Lumera found herself facing in the early part of 2023.During today's conversation with Sowmya, our host Ray Rike discusses several important lessons and use cases of AI at OpenAI in the Finance department including:Why there was no existing playbook for scaling Finance in a company like OpenAIChallenges in one of the fastest growing software companies of all timeUnderstanding compute expenses is critical to understanding the financial performance today and tomorrow at an AI companyWhy excel could not work at the scale of OpenAI (1M+ rows)Using OpenAI to enable finance to write the python code to write the statistical model to analyze financial dataWhy historic analysis is not a good place to start for forecasting in a hypergrowth, compute intensive companyLeveraging AI in the Financial close process - leveraging data warehouse information to build a repeatable processTracking GPU costs in real-time throughout the month - not an excel scale requirementHallucinations are a real concern - but once your AI is encapsulated as standard code - the concerns are minimizedHuman review on any stochastic model is a best practice - such as contract data fields from signed contracts to establish billingA long description would not do the conversation justice - so jump in and be ready to pause the audio to capture the highlights.Sowmya has been in financial leaderships at Square and Rippling in addition to OpenAI, so she has a very unique perspective on not scaling finance to meet the unparalleled growth at OpenAI, and two other hyper growth companies. If you are interested in learning about real-life stories of using AI in Finance at the world's largest AI software company - this episode is a must listen!!!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Christina Ross is the founder and CEO of Cube. Prior to founding a SaaS platform purpose built for everyone of those companies still using Excel (majority of companies) for business modeling but want to enhance the collaboration of business budgeting, planning and performance across the company, Christina was a corporate audit executive at GE, financial transformation consultant at Deloitte and a multi-time CFO at companies including Rent the Runway, Criteo and Eyeview.During today's episode, Christina and our host, Ray Rike discuss multiple aspects of the Financial Planning and Analysis role, department and the strategic opportunity for FP&A to materially increase the impact on business strategy and performance. Topics we discussed include:How the experiences at larger companies including GE and Deloitte shaped her view on the strategic role of FP&AThe biggest challenges facing CFOs with the FP&A function todayThe role of FP&A in business strategyThe impact of FP&A on business performanceIf you are a CFO, FP&A leader or even the CEO this episode is full of great insights and ideas on how to increase the business impact of your FP&A function!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Exit Ready Analytics is a concept that any B2B SaaS company CFO and CEO should become familiar with before entering into any potential strategic company sell initiative, deal due diligence and/or data room preparation.During this episode, Will Sullivan, Managing Partner at Predictive Analytics Partners discusses his experiences from over $30 Billion in strategic acquisitions across 20 transactions. Topics discussed include:Exit Ready Analytics - the when, what, and howThe differences between a strategic Chief Revenue Officer and a Head of SalesWhen to hire a CRO and their responsibilitiesHow to bridge the CRO and CFO relationshipIf you are a CEO, CFO or CRO in a B2B SaaS company that is either considering a strategic sell process and/or want to increase the strength of the CFO and CFO relationship - this episode has something for you!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Imagine leading Finance for a company that has made 31 acquisitions over the last six years. Then, imagine the challenges of having near real-time visibility into a recently acquired company to ensure the forecast accuracy that a Private Equity firm expects from their portfolio companies, specifically from their CFO.That is exactly the environment that Josh Schauer, CFO at insightsoftware, operates in every day! During today's episode, we discuss three main topics that are part and parcel to achieving near real-time insight into the data, performance metrics, and trends required to drive financial decisions - quickly. Those topics include:The challenges with fragmented data for financial decision-makingMoving from historic to real-time data for Financial decision-makingDeveloping a process to quickly integrate acquired companies into your financial systemsModifying budgets based on actual performance insightsIf you are considering private equity as a potential exit strategy, or are part of a company that is growing through acquisition, this is a must-listen-to episode!!!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Casey Woo, Founder and CEO of the Operators Guild has a very interesting journey, from being a West Point cadet, a Harvard graduate, an investment banker at Goldman Sachs, a multiple-time CFO and now the founder and CEO of the Operators Guild, and General Partner at Fog Ventures. With this background Casey has been able to experience and identify the critical role of the "scaler" in companies.During the conversation with Casey we cover multiple topics including:The role of the scaler versus specialist in businessThe personality traits of a scalerHow process and performance interact from a scaler's perspectiveHow the Operators Guild became a community of scalersIf you have ever felt that one department, one role and doing the same thing day over day was not fully leveraging your skill set and talents - this conversation is thought provoking and inspirational.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Melissa Howatson is the CFO of Vena Solutions, a $100M+ ARR cloud-based financial planning and analysis (FP&A) platform that helps companies streamline budgeting, forecasting, reporting, and financial modeling, with a strong emphasis on Excel integration.During the episode, we covered multiple topics with Melissa including:Latest trends in B2B SaaS FP&AAI in Finance - the importance of change managementMetrics that Matter at > $100M ARRMeasuring the Impact of a podcastThe 30-minute conversation hit upon multiple key trending topics including: 1) how FP&A is evolving as a strategic business partner to the other key functions; 2) why the CFO needs to lead a culture of experimentation with AI; 3) how EBITDA increases in importance as a company scales and; 4) how to measure the impact of a company sponsored podcast!If you are an aspiring CFO, or a CFO looking to scale your company beyond $100M ARR or are interested in how a world-class CFO came to be this conversation has something for you!!!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Marcos Rivera is the founder and CEO, Pricing I/O. Marcos has a long career as a B2B Software operating executive and now leverages that experience to help B2B SaaS and AI-Native companies optimize monetization, pricing, and packaging.9 ingredients for a winning pricing strategy9 psychology concepts for pricingDifferences between SaaS and AI pricingThe value of pricing frameworksMarco was the head of pricing and packaging at Vista Equity, one of the top Private Equity firms in the B2B SaaS industry - an incredible foundation to see how leading companies leverage pricing as a strategic growth lever.Marcos started by sharing the key ingredients to developing a winning strategy, explains all nine, and highlighted why he believes the top four are most critical:Knowing the compelling value that our software deliversEstablish a clear market positionPricing that builds trustCase studies and ROI proof Have a pricing point of viewConsistent pricing messagingData-Driven pricing insightsSocial proof and testimonialsOngoing price optimizationAnother key topic discussed was the 9 psychological concepts for pricing, including:Halo effectLoss aversion (FOMO)Social proofConfirmation biasScarcity effectMere exposure effectAnchoring effectAuthority biasGoal gradient effectIf you are responsible for creating, testing, refining, or selling B2B SaaS or AI-Native products - this episode is a great way to understand the "why and how" of pricing - not just the what!!!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.