Last year, Panera Bread expanded its business into the digital marketplace offering advanced kiosk services and delivery nationwide. These efforts have paid off, but according to Mike Bufano, CFO and EVP, the company’s investment in technology started long before any ROI was experienced. I sat down with Mike this month to learn more about his perspective on strategy and the role he plays in ensuring there’s financial room to innovate.
That offered me the diverse experiences you reference. As you grow your career in finance, it’s important to immerse yourself in the business from the ground up to make sure you have a firm understanding of it and a finger on the pulse of what makes it successful. When it comes to stepping up to new roles, I’ve found that you need to be patient – with yourself and your team. We all want to be great on day one but that’s not the way it works. Take the time to listen and learn. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. And remember that it’s a big change, so practice self-compassion and self-care.Part of Panera’s success can be attributed to its efforts to develop consumer friendly technology and a more efficient dining experience.
As CFO, I strive to make sure we have the financial room to innovate, knowing not everything will work the way it looks in our spreadsheets.As the food marketplace becomes increasingly digital, your team’s capabilities must reflect the new competencies needed to properly take advantage of new technology.
We’ve also made investments in back office technology, like Workday, to improve our efficiency and better serve our bakery-cafes. Our team has embraced the new technology, which in turn, has allowed us to ramp up our finance innovation efforts. We kick off each year with brainstorming sessions with each team within finance, looking for ways we can better serve the bakery-cafes, be more efficient and make the team’s jobs easier.
Yuck. Their food has degraded in quality once they went corporate.
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