u/Excellent_Knee_7109

Just like everyone else, I've been seeing the recent news about how AI bills have been skyrocketing for companies. I've been seeing people Reddit posts / comments about how their companies have done a full 180 from "use AI for everything" to "limit AI usage as much as possible".

So I've been wondering - what mechanisms are folks actually using to monitor and control AI costs intelligently? I know the most basic version of this is just seeing your bill at the end of the month, having a heart attack, and then telling employees to stop using AI. But there must be a smarter way to do this right?

Is there some way to track AI usage across departments, task types, and employees (across different LLM providers?). Can managers set limits on what they want their AI budget to be so that you don't get an unexpectedly high bill? Maybe then you could switch low-priority departments or tasks to cheaper model or just stop allowing AI usage for that department for the rest of the month

Just curious on why AI bills are so shocking to people - I assume people are setting hard caps on token usage.

Just like everyone else, I've been seeing the recent news about how AI bills have been skyrocketing for companies. I've been seeing people Reddit posts / comments about how their companies have done a full 180 from "use AI for everything" to "limit AI usage as much as possible".

So I've been wondering - what mechanisms are companies actually using to monitor and control AI costs intelligently? I know the most basic version of this is just seeing your bill at the end of the month, having a heart attack, and then telling employees to stop using AI. But there must be a smarter way to do this right?

Is there some way to track AI usage across departments, task types, and employees (across different LLM providers?). Can managers set limits on what they want their AI budget to be so that you don't get an unexpectedly high bill? Maybe then you could switch low-priority departments or tasks to cheaper model or just stop allowing AI usage for that department for the rest of the month

Just curious on why AI bills are so shocking to people - I assume people are setting hard caps on token usage.

I am currently working on a project on the side that I think has some broad applicability for FP&A departments, but not sure how to fully validate this outside of some prior industry knowledge I had.

I didn’t work in FP&A specifically, but was a consultant and worked with many FP&A managers in the past. And while working with their models I continued feeling a pain point that I’m trying to now solve.

This is very much a side project that I had a random burst of inspiration for, so I’m not sure if I want to burn through personal network on something that I’m not 100% convinced on pursuing myself. I would only see myself asking for personal connections if it was something already in the works / something I was extremely passionate about, but this is more of just a hunch.

Has anyone worked on a project at this depth and found ways to validate / source initial interest? This is B2B, so I can’t just post about it on Reddit and hope I get users.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

I am currently working on a project on the side that I think has some broad applicability for FP&A departments, but not sure how to fully validate this outside of some prior industry knowledge I had.

I didn’t work in FP&A specifically, but was a consultant and worked with many FP&A managers in the past. And while working with their models I continued feeling a pain point that I’m trying to now solve.

This is very much a side project that I had a random burst of inspiration for, so I’m not sure if I want to burn through personal network on something that I’m not 100% convinced on pursuing myself. I would only see myself asking for personal connections if it was something already in the works / something I was extremely passionate about, but this is more of just a hunch.

Has anyone worked on a project at this depth and found ways to validate / source initial interest? This is B2B, so I can’t just post about it on Reddit and hope I get users.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

If you are a finance executive or CEO at a startup or midmarket/enterprise company, I have three questions:

1. ⁠How often does your company create a long range plan? (i.e., a 3-5 year high level financial forecast to help plan long term business strategy)

2. ⁠When preparing for board meetings / during annual planning, how often does the CEO/board ask for scenarios that each take the FP&A team more than a day to prepare?

3. ⁠How much of your / your team’s time is consumed with long range planning (and is this often just for board prep?)

Curious on what you all see as the biggest pain points in long range financial planning, because I’ve only seen it be time consuming, tedious, and ultimately more qualitatively-driven than quantitatively. Wondering if others feel the same way or if this isn’t actually a widespread problem.

If you are a finance executive or CEO at a startup or midmarket/enterprise company, I have three questions:

1. How often does your company create a long range plan? (i.e., a 3-5 year high level financial forecast to help plan long term business strategy)

2. When preparing for board meetings / during annual planning, how often does the CEO/board ask for scenarios that each take the FP&A team more than a day to prepare?

3. How much of your / your team’s time is consumed with long range planning (and is this often just for board prep?)

Curious on what you all see as the biggest pain points in long range financial planning, because I’ve only seen it be time consuming, tedious, and ultimately more qualitatively-driven than quantitatively. Wondering if others feel the same way or if this isn’t actually a widespread problem.