CFO- GSW

Jennifer Cabalquinto

Ms. Cabalquinto is a senior finance executive with a proven track record of improving financial performance, increasing productivity and enhancing internal controls leading to increased enterprise value. In her role as Special Advisor and Chief Financial Officer of the Golden State Warrior, She oversaw all day-to-day and long-term strategic and financial planning, accounting and treasury operations for the organization. She was also responsible for the planning and leadership of IT and Procurement departments. She has over 25 years finance leadership experience in a variety of start-up, turnaround, stable and high growth business environments.

Background

Involved in financial planning, allocation of resources, business associated with the Warriors basketball team: ticket pricing, suites, sponsorships.

Helped with the launch of the 1st privately financed stadium (mixed use development) at a cost of over $2 billion and opened in 2019.

CFO of Universal Studios Theme Park Division (direct-to-consumer business)
Worked as CFO of NBC TV Group in Los Angeles
Worked as CFO for Telemundo Spanish Language station in Miami
Raised in Brooklyn, NY. Moved to Miami for Telemundo position, Los Angeles for NBC/Universal positions, and now in Oakland with the Golden State Warriors.

Initially, it was a big risk to move to L.A., but she loves living in CA

Education

Followed her father's advice and majored in Accounting at SUNY Binghamton in NY. She wasn't passionate about Accounting as a major, but became more passionate about it with practical applications (real world experience).

She took other courses in liberal arts, such as Asian Studies, Women's Studies, and Russian History (3 minors in addition to her Accounting major were beneficial because she became a better storyteller for lenders, investors, consumers).

She is able to translate numbers into a digestible story, which is a competitive advantage versus other accountants who might not have become a CFO.

Accounting is a language of business. Important to know how to read a P&L (Profit & Loss) statement in order to get key insights and understand the health of a business

Work Experience

She did not have any internships in college because she had real jobs to help pay for her undergraduate education.

In today's world, it's Important to try different things out with internships/jobs.
Accounting/finance can lead to different roles: accountant, tax strategy, international business, financial planning, M&A (Merger & Acquisition) work, financial analytics, business analytics.

Her 1st job was with EY (Ernst & Young), a public accounting firm. She was an auditor and looked at different businesses. Good foundation for her career.

Then she moved to private accounting and took on her 1st entertainment industry role with Telemundo in Miami.

She also had an FP&A role with Royal Caribbean (hospitality industry) and then became a controller at a young age with another company.

Likes operational aspects of finance. Jumped at the opportunity for FP& A role at Telemundo (in high growth mode at the time) even though it was a bit of a step down then. She got to do a lot of things in a short period of time.

Sometimes it's important to take a step backwards to broaden your base and develop important/new skills.

She was in charge of selling Telemundo to a large company and it was acquired by NBC. She knew her role as CFO of Telemundo was duplicative with NBC's CFO position, but she got to be a part of the due diligence team, acquisition team and had exposure to the NBC Leadership team.

She was asked to stay on and take over the financial leader role for NBC LA- based TV stations

Work Responsibilities

As CFO, she oversees the Finance Department, including the controller who manages day-to-day transactions: account payable, accounts receivable, fixed assets.

She provides guidance, interfaces with CMO (Chief Marketing Officer), CRO (Chief Revenue Officer), has more strategic-oriented meetings, weekly meetings, one-on-one's.

Less & less doing now with more & more orchestrating. Her job now is different versus when she first started.

Advice

According to EY, Data Analytics and Financial Analysis are more important than

Accounting

When looking at potential majors other than Accounting, consider Business, Analytics, Finance, Managerial Economics.

A career in Finance is translatable across industries. Focus on transferable skills and consider tangential/adjacent industries where you'll be a more competitive applicant.

Data analytics is not specific to any particular industry.
Check out TeamWorks website for sports internships and jobs.
Look at organizations looking to fill positions.
Only 30 NBA teams and only 32 NFL teams.
Only 1% acceptance rate for jobs in the NBA, so it's important to look at other industries, tangential or adjacent businesses.

Focus on building skills that would be applicable to sports AND entertainment. Dynamic pricing, merchandise sales, concessions, and other things that apply to entertainment and sports.

Make yourself more competitive by gaining work experience in hospitality, theme parks, esports, live entertainment production, reality TV, etc.

Better to have a broader lens than a narrower lens of sports.
Mentors are important for building your career and can become friends over time.
Ms. Cabalquinto was an executive, but not in a C-Suite position when she was assigned to a female mentor. This mentor used a "tough love" approach to move her from good to great. She went from being a doer to being more of a leader and influencer.

Theme Park Industry vs. Sports Industry

Theme park industry is a 365-day daily business with 1-time transactions.

Sports industry is a seasonal business with a limited # of home games. She got the Warriors to think about their business on a game-to-game basis rather than on a season-to-season basis.

Sports industry has season tickets, suites, long-term recurring revenue, sponsorship deals

There are very different revenue streams for these 2 industries. With sports, broadcast revenue is #1, especially during COVID and not having any fans.

With sports, broadcast revenue is important to sustain the business model.
With theme parks, no alternative revenue streams without people coming through the gate. Far more difficult during COVID shutdown.

What it's like being a female Asian CFO

Jennifer has 4 brothers, so she grew up in a male-dominated household.

Has been "leaning in" to being a woman and Asian throughout her life/career.
She recognizes that she has different skill sets compared to male counterparts.
Used to have a tendency to self-edit, which can be common among females
Males tend to have greater confidence compared to their female colleagues
Important to be confident and overcome insecurities about skills you don't have.
Keep "Imposter Syndrome" in mind. She would over prepare for things, would practice until she was satisfied.

She would arrive early to meetings in order to get a good seat at the table (rather than a seat in the back)

Remember these 2 things: 1) Acknowledge your weaknesses or insecurities; 2) Focus on what you can do to overcome them.