^exponent

"Just do something. Just start. Because you can't ever figure out what you want if you don't start trying." Meet Taylor Dunn, City President for Fifth Third Bank's Kansas City market, building the bank's commercial presence from the ground up. With 20 years in financial services, she's learned that the best opportunities often come from saying yes when you don't have all the answers. She started at Bear Stearns in securitized products, survived its 2008 collapse when J.P. Morgan acquired it, and built her career with JPM, even spending three years building their London office. After moving to Kansas City and working on research for what would later become FedNow at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, she rejoined JPMorganChase's commercial banking office before joining Fifth Third Bank. Now she's leading Fifth Third's market entry with a team assembled from Audit, IT, M&A, and Corporate Finance. Her philosophy on banking is refreshingly simple: listen first, customize solutions, and do what's right for the client, not the bank. Check out her full interview in the comments to learn how she navigated getting fired three months after moving to Kansas City, why curiosity separates successful owners from the rest, and what the One Bank approach means for middle-market companies. #Banking #Leadership #Finance #KansasCity #Community

"People are not data points. They are whole humans with whole lives outside of work." Meet Melissa Hurrington, CFO and VP of Operations at Premier Claims, a public adjusting firm that has scaled from four employees to nearly two billion dollars in insurance claims worked across 47 states in eight years. Her people-over-profit philosophy is her competitive advantage. Her career across nonprofit work, hospitality, and now startup scaling taught her that retention drives growth. At Premier Claims, she bootstrapped the company with no outside funding while scaling 35 to 150 percent year over year. The only way to do that? Genuine care for your people. Check out her full interview in the comments to learn how she built retention, solved the cashflow problem, and why she posts vulnerably on LinkedIn about imposter syndrome. #Leadership #Finance #Operations #People #Retention

"Don't be so afraid of making mistakes that you don't act at all." Meet Emily Haynes, Assistant Vice President at Exbo Group and Founder of Promosh, a platform helping young professionals track their career wins and advocate for themselves. At EPR Properties, she learned to fight for deals by presenting alternatives and pulling different levers until finding a yes instead of accepting no. At Essential Properties Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE: EPRT), she moved from deal-level work to corporate-strategic thinking. Now at Exbo Group, she manages teams and helps startups and middle-market companies with their finance operations. When she kept seeing the same problem pop up—her friends weren't advocating for themselves at work—that's when she built Promosh. Her philosophy? "If I work hard, maybe someone will notice" isn't enough. You need to bring the receipts—document what you've done, show the impact, and speak up before that conversation happens without you in the room. Check out her full interview in the comments to learn how she walked into a raise with documentation of all her work, why she moved to New York at 26, and what Promosh does to help the next generation advocate for themselves. #Finance #CareerDevelopment #Entrepreneurship #Women #Leadership

Really enjoyed opening up with ^exponent's, Kate Gardner about my venture journey. Thanks, Kate for finding my story worth sharing.

"Valuation is only as good as the data you have to prove it." Meet Jamie Lukaszewski, financial operations leader at Trivest Partners, a $6.5 billion private equity firm supporting 50 portfolio companies. His path from KPMG to co-founding a production company that scaled to 35 employees, to The Onion's leadership team, to private equity shows how real operator experience translates into genuine credibility with founders. At KPMG, he learned rigor and high standards. At RocketJump, the production company he co-founded, he learned to manage creatives and capital simultaneously—raising venture money, scaling from a dorm room to millions in revenue through brand partnerships and crowdfunding. At The Onion, he navigated the brutal world of digital media and complex acquisitions. Now at Trivest Partners, he serves as the financial operations expert supporting 50 founder-led businesses, drawing on all of it. His team's approach to hiring and building teams? "If it's not a hell yes, it's a hell no." Check out his full interview in the comments to learn how he turned 50,000 ball pit balls into one of his company's best pieces of content, why cultural fit matters more than being right, and what separates exceptional finance talent from the rest. #PrivateEquity #Finance #Entrepreneurship #Operations #Leadership

"Venture is really about the number of 'at-bats.' You can't anticipate what markets are going to do without repetition and real-world practice." Meet Maggie Kenefake, founding partner of Iron Prairie Ventures, who built her first venture fund focused on industrial technology during one of the hardest fundraising environments in venture history. Her path from a decade at The Kauffman Foundation to launching her own firm shows how deep expertise and authentic relationships matter more than a conventional resume. At Kauffman, she learned how capital and networks drive opportunity. Through the Kauffman Fellows program, she built relationships needed to pursue her industrial tech thesis — a space with real market problems but few investors paying attention. She closed her first fund in December 2024 after 20 months of fundraising, completing 16 deals along the way. Her insight? "Stay in your lane" is the worst advice you can get. The best opportunities come from working across disciplines and building unexpected connections. Check out her full interview in the comments to learn how she navigated the toughest fundraising market in venture history, why the Midwest matters for industrial tech, and what shaped her conviction to start her own firm. #VentureCapital #IndustrialTech #Entrepreneurship #Fundraising #Midwest

"We always plan for success. Even when I first started and we weren't making playoffs regularly, we were preparing for success so that when we hit it in 2020 with our first Super Bowl in 50 years, we were ready." Meet Dan Crumb, CFO of the Kansas City Chiefs, whose journey from reading stock quotes with his dad at age five to managing the finances of an NFL dynasty reveals how early interests can shape entire careers. His path through KPMG, gaming startups, and professional sports demonstrates the power of taking opportunities that others might overlook. At a New Orleans gaming startup, he went from Controller to CFO in two years by getting involved in operations and contract negotiations beyond his traditional finance role. After experience with the New Orleans Hornets, he's been with the Chiefs for 15 years, where he's not only managing an NFL team's finances but also co-founded Foolish Club Studios to produce "The Kingdom" docuseries. "It's all about the team around you. You have to have good people and good systems." Check out his full interview at the link in the comments to learn how Dan balances CFO duties for both the Chiefs and Foolish Club Studios, why the Taylor Swift phenomenon created unexpected demographic shifts, and how the Chiefs prepare financially for success even during down periods. #NFL #Chiefs #sportsfinance #CFO #kansascity #sportsbusiness

"The biggest mistake is people assessments. If you don't have the right people on your bus, the bus isn't going to go where you think it's going." Meet Shane Parr, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of TGP Investments, L.L.C., who has spent over 20 years proving that staying small is sometimes the smartest strategy. While most firms chase billion-dollar funds, Shane built TGP's reputation by focusing exclusively on lower middle market companies doing $2-4 million in EBITDA. At George K. Baum Capital Partners, he executed an aggressive roll-up strategy, acquiring nine businesses in 21 months and learning that "some of the best deals we did were the deals we didn't do." At TGP since 2005, he's grown 60% of portfolio companies to $8-10 million in EBITDA, creating multiple arbitrage opportunities by bringing them to mainstream private equity entry points. "We both enjoyed working with companies directly as chairmen, working with CEOs, and helping grow lower market businesses. We saw a niche in the lower middle market with companies doing $2-4 million in EBITDA where there was less competition." Check out his full interview at the link in the comments to learn how TGP wins deals, why Shane believes management incentive plans granting 20% equity are key to attracting talent, and his framework for deciding when internal growth beats acquisitions. #privateequity #lowermiddlemarket #kansascity #dealmaking #leadership #TGP

"Spreadsheets are actually right. Stop trying to get people out of them." Meet Bobby Pinero, who turned his frustration with finance tools into the founding thesis for Equals. After scaling Intercom from 20 to 500 employees as Head of Finance, he faced a choice: take another lucrative head of finance role or build the data-connected spreadsheet that every finance team actually wants to use. At Intercom, he learned the right and wrong way to scale: "The biggest mistake I made was thinking I could solve our scaling problems by throwing more analysts at them" instead of investing in foundational systems first. Now at Equals, he's building what finance professionals have always needed - spreadsheets that connect directly to data. "Every time I thought about the founder thing, I felt this expansive energy. Every time I thought about the other role, I didn't feel that same energy. That was my sign." Check out his full interview at the link in the comments to learn why finance leaders under-resource their own teams, how "letters to his previous self" became an unintentional customer acquisition strategy, and his framework for building ARR reporting that gets you from 97% to 100% accuracy. #fintech #spreadsheets #startups #finance #SaaS #entrepreneurship #equals

"I feel incredibly fortunate to have experienced the investing world from the sell side, the buy side, and now the credit side." Meet Lauren K. Luallin Luallin, whose strategic career progression from Citigroup USA Inc. investment banking to private equity at Highlander Partners to private credit at Freedom 3 Capital has given her a rare perspective across the entire investment landscape. Her journey reveals how the same analytical skills apply differently depending on which side of the capital structure you're on. At Highlander Partners, she learned "what it takes to make a great investment and how to approach strategic decisions" in traditional private equity. At Freedom 3, she discovered that private credit allows her to "play a private equity-type role without taking away control" from founder-owned businesses, becoming a trusted advisor while they retain their equity upside. "Our philosophy is to partner with these businesses, and we're often the first institutional capital they've ever had. We get to play a private equity-type role without taking away control." Check out her full interview at the link in the comments to learn why Lauren believes private credit is perfect for businesses that have outgrown banking relationships but aren't ready to sell, how she's learned to embrace her "lighter touch" approach in finance, and why the biggest lesson she's learned this year is that it's okay to ask for help. #privatecredit #privateequity #investmentbanking #founderowned #familybusiness #womeninfinance