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Of all of the career experiences that Robert Goldenberg has acquired on his way to the CFO office, you would think that his stint with a bankrupt landscaping company would not be apt to make his list of all-time opportunity door-openers.

Still, when we asked Goldenberg to look back to share the experiences that first propelled him into the C-suite, the landscaping business came to his mind.

To wit: It was back in 2015, when software developer 6sense was interviewing to hire its first full-time CFO, that Goldenberg\u2014a career investment banker\u2014nabbed an interview spot with the firm\u2019s part-time finance leader.

\u201cHe told me that my investment banking background was great, but that 6sense needed someone who could start at Ground Zero and had more tactical accounting experience,\u201d recalls Goldenberg, who assured the executive that he completely understood\u2014before suggesting that they dedicate the interview\u2019s remaining time to accounting questions.

\u201cHe grilled me for 20 minutes and then said, \u2018You\u2019re great!\u2014I\u2019m going schedule your next six interviews,\u2019\u201d continues Goldenberg, who was soon hired after having made the rounds with five senior executives and one board member.

When it came to accounting practices, the part-time finance leader no doubt had anticipated that the seasoned banker sitting across the table may have had a blind spot\u2014an addressable affliction, but certainly one that can frequently lengthen the path to the CFO office.  

\u201cIn this instance, it was an objective fact that I was better than the average investment banker when it came to accounting,\u201d explains Goldenberg, who credits one banking deal more than any other with sharpening his accounting knowledge\u2014which brings us back to the bankrupt landscaping company that he had been tasked with selling whose books had been susceptible to recurring chaos.

\u201cIn my experience, very small landscaping companies in bankruptcy are not known to have solid internal accounting functions,\u201d observes Goldenberg, who adds that for a span of 3 months he had made the company\u2019s dated accounting systems the center of his world. In fact, Goldenberg himself would make journal entries and seek solutions to reconcile old accounts.

Consequently, his deep dive into the company\u2019s books provided him with a base of accounting knowledge that he has continued to retain and build on to this day.    

\u201cWhen you get exposure to something and it\u2019s critical that you learn it with some measure of competency,\u201d Goldenberg reports, \u201cI find that the resulting learning compounds over time\u2014even when it\u2019s not related to your day-to-day job.\u201d \u2013Jack Sweeney