Alice Fong, a member of Anthropic's corporate finance and strategy team, discusses how she utilizes Claude to create a cohesive financial narrative for the CFO and board. This approach has allowed her to reclaim 10 to 20 hours each week for more impactful work.
In the finance sector, professionals often find themselves focused on ensuring the accuracy of numbers rather than interpreting their significance. Fong highlights the challenge of revising presentations multiple times as figures are updated, which can detract from the analysis of what these numbers actually mean.
For instance, Fong manages the analysis and metrics for the quarterly board deck presented to the CFO. The collaborative nature of this process means constant updates from various team members, necessitating a thorough review to ensure consistency in the narrative. Claude now assists in maintaining this integrity, allowing her to focus on the overarching story rather than getting bogged down in details.
Joining Anthropic in March 2025, Fong's role involves synthesizing insights from various finance teams to deliver a clear narrative regarding revenue performance, margin trends, and cash deployment. This narrative must remain coherent amid rapid changes within the company, such as new product launches and pricing adjustments.
Fong employs both Claude Cowork and Claude for Excel to streamline her workflow. Claude Cowork aids in drafting and refining documents, while Claude for Excel helps edit financial models directly. For the board deck, she uses Claude Cowork to verify that all numbers and claims align with a single source of truth, ensuring clarity and coherence in the narrative.
During monthly financial reviews, Fong integrates financial tables into Google Docs and utilizes Claude Cowork to draft initial commentary, maintaining a consistent voice across reports. This consistency is crucial for effective communication with stakeholders.
As Claude's capabilities evolve, so does Fong's workflow. Claude for Excel has improved significantly, now capable of tracing discrepancies across multiple tabs, which enhances efficiency in identifying issues within financial models.
Fong emphasizes the importance of project memory in Claude Cowork, which retains context from previous documents and discussions. This feature allows her to streamline decision-making processes and maintain continuity in reporting.
Her colleagues in the finance organization also leverage Claude Cowork's functionalities, which have become integral to their operations. Fong encourages others to start with simple tasks, such as summarizing documents, and gradually expand their use of Claude for recurring workflows.
By integrating Claude into her financial processes, Fong has significantly improved her ability to keep pace with the fast-changing business environment, allowing her to focus on strategic insights and future analyses.
