Fundraising, AI, and Starting Smart in 2025, with Jeffrey Fidelman
The Growth-Minded CFO · 2025-07-23 · 45 min
Episode notes
In this episode of The Growth-Minded CFO, we sit down with Jeff Fidelman—Founder and Managing Partner at Fidelman & Co.—to talk about how startup fundraising has shifted, what VCs actually want to hear, and why today’s CFOs need more than spreadsheets to lead. Chapters: 02:00 - Why Fidelman & Co. Was Born from a Market Gap 06:00 - Broken Incentives in Startup Fundraising 09:00 - How the Fundraising Game Changed Since 2021 13:00 - Why Founders Must Talk Like Operators 16:00 - The Role of Financial Models (and How to Build Them Right) 21:00 - Why Top-Down Models Alone Don’t Cut It 25:00 - AI: Useful Tool, Not Magic Bullet 29:00 - AI Use Case: Building an Internal CRM for $300 34:30 - Fundraising Tips for Finance Leaders 37:00 - CFOs as Process Owners During a Raise 38:00 - The Two Types of CFOs (and Why It Matters) 41:00 - Final Reflections on Strategic Thinking and Belief Key takeaways: Fundraising now takes 6–9 months—build relationships early VCs invest in operators, not just visions The best financial models are built with founders, not for them AI is best used to get hands-on, not to replace human thinking Strategic CFOs do more than books—they pitch, plan, and believe.