Q4 doesn’t just stress your warehouse—it stress‑tests your finance. We sat down with Sourabh Nolkha to unpack why the busiest season creates both record sales and record leakage, and how to build the finance stack that keeps more of what you earn. From pre‑season prep to real‑time dashboards, we map the exact systems that let you track inventory, reconcile revenue across channels, and stop variable costs from swallowing your margins.
We start where most teams stumble: revenue visibility. Multi‑channel selling blurs the line between orders and actual cash, especially when commissions, shipping fees, returns, and settlement timing differ by channel. Sourabh breaks down the biggest blind spots—40–60% variable costs and an avoidable 3–5% revenue leakage—and explains how automated reconciliation and exception tracking recover money that would otherwise vanish. As companies scale, finance is often the first team to strain. We share practical signals your close is slipping, why “revenue minus cost ≠ cash” is a red flag, and how to fix it with better data flows and targeted automation.
Then we get tactical with AI. Clean, contextual data is the prerequisite; once that’s in place, AI can spot anomalies, trigger alerts on return spikes, and answer high‑value questions like last‑seven‑day profitability by category. Saurabh opens the hood on Zen Statement’s AI stack: intelligent data capture when APIs are missing, self‑serve reconciliation to link new sources, conversational analytics for decision speed, and the next frontier—a dispute management agent that turns detection into recovery. Finally, we reframe forecasting. Demand prediction is only half the story; true cash forecasting bakes in cost structures and payout schedules by channel so you can plan inventory, marketing, and working capital with confidence.
If you want Q4 to fund your growth rather than drain your bank account, this conversation gives you the blueprint: unify your data, model your costs, monitor in real time, and let AI guard your margins. Enjoyed the episode? Follow, share with a fellow operator, and leave a quick review to help others find the show.
