Tackling your board's next big question

White-knuckle volatility is now BAU for CFOs. Geopolitical disruptions- tariffs, the Iran war, and the resulting energy price shocks - are just the latest curveballs to digest. Among finance leaders, there’s increasing acceptance that “high uncertainty has become the norm.” But how should you respond when frequent disruptions keep blowing up your yearly targets?

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Major price shocks are landing for companies as missiles sail across the Middle East. Trillions of dollars in unexpected price increases across major categories:

Global interest rates are on the rise, while consumer spending is threatened.

In other words, for CFOs, the budget you set in December has aged as well as leftover fish in the office fridge. 

But zoom out, and this type of price and supply volatility has become the norm. Think last year’s tariff chaos, the Ukraine war shortages, or the supply chain woes of the pandemic. And it’s not easing up anytime soon.  

Global conflicts are growing, with around 40 countries at war according to recent data, and policy uncertainty is severely heightened. Toss in geopolitical upheaval, climate change, and social unrest and you’ve got an utterly unpredictable world. 

“Volatility is no longer episodic but structural,” said Todd McElhatton, COFO at subscription management platform Zuora. “Traditional annual plans were built for a world where change happened more slowly. Today, they create blind spots.”

So, how is structural volatility changing what the finance function prioritizes? 

But how?

Forecasting is harder in this environment, which makes conventional annual planning cycles look out of step. And how can CFOs ensure relevant business targets - particularly at an individual level - if budget assumptions go stale so quickly?

“Forecast accuracy usually deteriorates first. The assumptions underpinning your plan (conversion rates, sales cycle time, FX stability) move all at once, creating misalignment between expectations and performance,” said McElhatton. 

For example, if you’ve sent your sales team out to secure a 3% price increase to combat cost inflation, it also means any sales target measured in dollars is now compromised.

For McElhatton, the shift from a world of occasional disruption to one of constant upheaval is forcing CFOs to redesign how finance operates. CFOs are now participating sooner in product, pricing, and market choices, while ongoing planning is emerging as the new finance operating mode.

“There’s immediate pressure on pipeline. Customers slow decision-making as they react to uncertainty, approvals get tighter, and deal velocity drops. That ripples from bookings to revenue, and how the business is performing against plan,” said McElhatton.

Zuora started this year with a plan, but treated it as a starting point.

“We maintain a rolling three-year forecast that we review monthly with real-time data signals, like committed backlog and gross retention, to understand whether the business is tracking toward outcomes. When those signals change, we adjust quickly,” he said. 

“Weekly forecast updates are also critical to give a real-time view into pipeline health, customer behavior, and emerging risks. That helps adjust quickly and proactively,” said McElhatton.

Sandra Kazee, CFO at Ambi Robotics, said upheavals such as tariffs and the Iran war have made it an intense time for CFOs. As a robotics vendor supporting critical infrastructure, her business is exposed to shocks, she said.

“Disruptions show up first in cost pressure, especially hardware components, and potential shifts in deployment timing. The response is immediate: reassess assumptions, update scenarios, and stay tightly aligned with operations to protect delivery and uptime,” she said. 

“Protect the plan by doubling down on what’s in your control. For us, that means prioritizing existing customers. We’ve invested heavily in customer experience and support to ensure deployments succeed and scale. When customers expand, that becomes the most reliable path to growth in uncertain environments,” she added. 

That requires a responsive, event-driven FP&A workflow that closely monitors cash burn, enables the team to update scenarios and assumptions immediately, and helps them adapt, for example, by reducing costs, optimizing processes, and diversifying funding options.

“Static plans break quickly, and finance must operate in real time, with fast decisions, and flexible models to maintain deployment and support customers,” said Kazee.

However, specific variables in every business make it hard to maintain forecasting tools during volatility, according to Kazee.

“Despite tooling advances, a large majority of my peers still use Excel, as it’s flexible enough to adapt to disruptive situations,” she said.

For Kazee, the decision on whether to pass on higher costs starts with customer impact and duration of the cost pressure.

“If it’s temporary, we absorb or offset it. If it’s structural, we evaluate pricing or adjust the commercial model, prioritizing long-term customer value, not short-term recovery,” she said. 

“We’re always looking for ways to optimize our system design, services, and operating model to drive costs down, create flexibility, and better prepare us for these pressures,” she said.

For example, Ambi Robotics offers options such as robots-as-a-service, which gives customers a lower cost of entry and capex. 

“We also dedicate marketing budget to customer experience, support, and success, which drives expansion and gives us room to absorb near-term cost pressure,” said Kazee.

“During times like these, make sure you’re keeping the pulse of the business. For me, the biggest personal shift has been mindset. Stop trying to predict perfectly, and instead focus on staying adaptable and prioritizing the company’s longevity.”

Want more? Check out this month’s Playbook where The Secret CFO is breaking down how to crack the technical debt in your finance function. Read the last part on the modern tech stack here.

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