Adriana Carpenter's guest appearances

Adriana Carpenter

CFO THOUGHT LEADER

Where Accountants Go - The Accounting Careers Podcast

OwlTail

As we seek to highlight the milestones that mark the path to the CFO office, one of our favorite queries is to ask finance leaders to recall from their career-building years the first time they presented to their company’s board.     For Adriana Carpenter, memories of that board gathering will forever call to mind ASC 606, the mazelike revenue standard that only a few years ago upended the placid temperament of many an accounting organization.    “Make no mistake—this was really my first time, and I was delivering bad news,” recalls Adriana, who perhaps not unlike many of her CFO peers received her first “invitation” to address the board regarding a sticky issue, rather than to highlight the anatomy of a strategic win. “A majority of our revenue came from on-premises software subscriptions, and 606 dramatically changed the timing of revenue for these types of subscriptions,” continues Carpenter, who for 8 years served as chief accounting officer for Ping Identity, a developer of identity security software. For Ping, the timing issue meant that the company would be required to take a big cash hit on the eve of realizing its goal of selling shares to the public. “606 distorted our revenue and EBITDA numbers, which really forced us to figure out how to explain to investors what was really happening in the business,” comments Carpenter, who entered the boardroom that day with a portfolio of accounting experience that any board worth its salt would have savored. Carpenter had arrived at Ping 5 years earlier, just as the company had begun the tricky journey from being a perpetual revenue model to evolving into the subscription revenue mode. “Within that first year at Ping, I led the complete overhaul of our quote to cash process, which included everything from revamping how we were selling our software to helping to implement additional software modules to enable the business to scale,” remarks Carpenter, whose tenure as Ping’s CAO involved navigating not only the differences between revenue models but also the differences between owners as Ping went from VC to private equity ownership.    Then came 606’s timing issue and Carpenter’s invitation from the board. While milestones along the path to the CFO office frequently vary as far as time and place go, Carpenter’s arrival inside the CFO office at Emburse within 3 years of having received Ping’s boardroom invitation makes us think that perhaps timing is indeed everything. –Jack Sweeney

As we seek to highlight the milestones that mark the path to the CFO office, one of our favorite queries is to ask finance leaders to recall from their career-building years the first time they presented to their company’s board.     For Adriana Carpenter, memories of that board gathering will forever call to mind ASC 606, the mazelike revenue standard that only a few years ago upended the placid temperament of many an accounting organization.    “Make no mistake—this was really my first time, and I was delivering bad news,” recalls Adriana, who perhaps not unlike many of her CFO peers received her first “invitation” to address the board regarding a sticky issue, rather than to highlight the anatomy of a strategic win. “A majority of our revenue came from on-premises software subscriptions, and 606 dramatically changed the timing of revenue for these types of subscriptions,” continues Carpenter, who for 8 years served as chief accounting officer for Ping Identity, a developer of identity security software. For Ping, the timing issue meant that the company would be required to take a big cash hit on the eve of realizing its goal of selling shares to the public. “606 distorted our revenue and EBITDA numbers, which really forced us to figure out how to explain to investors what was really happening in the business,” comments Carpenter, who entered the boardroom that day with a portfolio of accounting experience that any board worth its salt would have savored. Carpenter had arrived at Ping 5 years earlier, just as the company had begun the tricky journey from being a perpetual revenue model to evolving into the subscription revenue mode. “Within that first year at Ping, I led the complete overhaul of our quote to cash process, which included everything from revamping how we were selling our software to helping to implement additional software modules to enable the business to scale,” remarks Carpenter, whose tenure as Ping’s CAO involved navigating not only the differences between revenue models but also the differences between owners as Ping went from VC to private equity ownership.    Then came 606’s timing issue and Carpenter’s invitation from the board. While milestones along the path to the CFO office frequently vary as far as time and place go, Carpenter’s arrival inside the CFO office at Emburse within 3 years of having received Ping’s boardroom invitation makes us think that perhaps timing is indeed everything. –Jack Sweeney

793: When Timing Matters | Adriana Carpenter, CFO, Emburse

Adriana Carpenter, the Chief Accounting Officer for Ping Identity, a company in Colorado that just recently went public, joined us for this episode of Life In Accounting, the Where Accountants Go podcast.From finance major to CPAAdriana knew from an early age that the business world appealed to her, and consequently she started out early in an internship with IBM in the Accounts Payable department. However, due to her dislike of that particular internship, she decided to go the finance route in college instead and initially got her Bachelor’s degree in Finance. After a short time in her first financial analyst role though, she realized that she wanted to be closer to the financial reporting process, so with the support of her employer she went back to school to finish a Masters in Accounting, and subsequently became a CPA as well.Narrowing in on her interestsAfter becoming a CPA and continuing her career in industry for a few years, she decided to move on into the Big 4. For almost 12 years, she worked her way up at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) before eventually deciding to move her career back into a leadership role in industry. However, it was during this time at PwC when she found that the technology sector in particular appealed to her. It was also this experience that helped her hone her team management skills.Ringing the bell!For over 10 years now Adriana has been back in industry, this time in the technology sector. For the first five years of that period she worked with an international technology company helping them rebuild their global accounting team. Afterwards though, Adriana had joined a start-up in the identity and access management field (Ping Identity) that recently went public on the NYSE. Adriana had the opportunity to be part of the team that “rang the bell” to open the markets on the trading floor just a month or two ago. She goes into great detail to help us visualize the experience. It really is cool part of her story.I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as we did recording it. Adriana shares many insights that will help you further your career, whether you are just starting out or have many years of experience. There truly are some gems in this interview.If you enjoy this episode with Adriana Carpenter, please check out these episodes as well: Sylvester Sly Johnson and Sarah ElliottFor information on the publication mentioned in the interview, please click here.To listen in on this conversation with Adriana Carpenter, please click on the player below.

Adriana Carpenter, the Chief Accounting Officer for Ping Identity, a company in Colorado that just recently went public, joined us for this episode of Life In Accounting, the Where Accountants Go podcast. From finance major to CPA Adriana knew from an early age that the business world appealed to her, and consequently she started out early in an internship with IBM in the Accounts Payable department. However, due to her dislike of that particular internship, she decided to go the finance route in college instead and initially got her Bachelor’s degree in Finance. After a short time in her first financial analyst role though, she realized that she wanted to be closer to the financial reporting process, so with the support of her employer she went back to school to finish a Masters in Accounting, and subsequently became a CPA as well. Narrowing in on her interests After becoming a CPA and continuing her career in industry for a few years, she decided to move on into the Big 4. For almost 12 years, she worked her way up at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) before eventually deciding to move her career back into a leadership role in industry. However, it was during this time at PwC when she found that the technology sector in particular appealed to her. It was also this experience that helped her hone her team management skills. Ringing the bell! For over 10 years now Adriana has been back in industry, this time in the technology sector. For the first five years of that period she worked with an international technology company helping them rebuild their global accounting team. Afterwards though, Adriana had joined a start-up in the identity and access management field (Ping Identity) that recently went public on the NYSE. Adriana had the opportunity to be part of the team that “rang the bell” to open the markets on the trading floor just a month or two ago. She goes into great detail to help us visualize the experience. It really is cool part of her story. I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as we did recording it. Adriana shares many insights that will help you further your career, whether you are just starting out or have many years of experience. There truly are some gems in this interview. If you enjoy this episode with Adriana Carpenter, please check out these episodes as well: Sylvester Sly Johnson and Sarah Elliott For information on the publication mentioned in the interview, please click here. To listen in on this conversation with Adriana Carpenter, please click on the player below.