Cfo Thought Leader

In his early 30s, Guillermo Lopez walked into finance as an outsider. “Nobody was giving me a chance in finance because I was an engineer,” he tells us. Then a boss took “a risk” and moved him into a finance role—partly because he was “good with numbers,” and partly because his consulting background meant he could be put “in front of…external parties,” Lopez tells us.That entry point set the tone for how he builds a career: intentionally and with breadth. At American Express, he moved across businesses and finance roles on purpose, because “it’s important to get breath, especially if you’re thinking about a CFO,” he tells us. Over time, he came to describe himself as “very data driven”—the “non emotional part of the decision making,” he tells us—while also learning to make decisions with “imperfect information” in global roles, he tells us.A later inflection arrived after Visa acquired Tink. Lopez became “the grown up” Visa sent to Stockholm, commuting from London each week, he tells us. The environment was s