129: Elena Gomez | Chief Financial Officer of $14B Co., Toast

She Leads

Elena is the Chief Financial Officer of Toast, the cloud-based, end-to-end technology platform purpose-built for the entire restaurant community - a public company now valued close to $15Bn.

With more than 30 years of experience in leading large global organizations, Elena’s expertise ranges from scaling and building SaaS businesses into multi-billion organizations and building and leading large-scale operational teams.

Before joining Toast, Elena has held senior roles in finance working as the VP of Finance at Charles Schwab, SVP of Finance and Strategy at Salesforce and the Chief Financial Officer at Zendesk, where she helped scale the company to over $1 billion in annual revenue.

Beyond operating, Elena is an investor and sits on the board of PagerDuty. She is also the chair of the Berkeley Haas School Board, serving as the first woman to serve in this role; Berkeley is also where she earned her Bachelors degree in Accounting.

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Past guests include Margaret Wishingrad, Kara Goldin, Brandi Chastain, Julie Foudy, Ann Miura Ko, Linda Avey, Sarah Leary, Becky Sauerbrunn and many more.

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Show Notes:
1. Intro of Elena Gomez + She Leads
2. Elena's Upbringing
3. The Value of Education and Work Ethic
4. The Influence of Elena's Grandfather in Accounting
5. Early Career at Charles Schwab + Navigating Imposter Syndrome
6. Transition to Salesforce
7. Authenticity and Self-Advocacy in the Workplace
8. Becoming CFO + Building Trust in Relationships
9. Top 3 Skills in a CFO: Storytelling, Communication, Customer Obsession
10. Advocating for Diversity and Inclusion
11. 'Work-Life Balance' as a Mother and CFO
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