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Forum Select
for CFOs

The private executive community where Chief Financial Officers talk about AI, what it costs, what it replaces, and what it's really worth.

The CFO's AI Moment

The numbers don't
yet add up, and you know it

Every CFO right now is being asked to sign off on AI spend that is large, urgent, and very hard to model. The ROI frameworks don't exist yet. The accounting standards haven't caught up. The board wants a number and the business wants a blank cheque.

Forum Select gives CFOs a room to have that conversation honestly, with other CFOs sitting with the same spreadsheet, the same board pressure, and the same uncertainty about what AI actually costs over five years.

"The most useful conversation I've had about AI investment wasn't with a consultant or a vendor. It was with a CFO at a private dinner who had already made the mistake I was about to make."
What CFOs Talk About at Forum Select
  • →How to model AI ROI when productivity gains are real but hard to attribute
  • →Build vs buy vs subscribe, the true total cost of ownership
  • →AI and workforce cost, what does honest headcount planning look like?
  • →Board-level AI spend reporting, what metrics actually matter?
  • →AI vendor contracts, the clauses that will matter in three years
  • →Finance function AI, what gets automated and what gets better?
  • →AI and audit risk, what are your auditors about to start asking?
  • →Capital allocation in an AI-driven competitive landscape
Why the Format Matters

The CFO can't speak
honestly in public

A CFO on a conference panel can't say what they actually think about their AI spend. They can't share which vendors have underdelivered, or be honest about what the board is really asking for. The moment they do, it becomes a market signal or a shareholder concern. Forum Select's off-the-record rule changes that entirely.

Off the record

Say what you actually think

The Chatham House Rule applies to every Forum Select dinner. Nothing is attributed, recorded, or shared. CFOs can speak about their real AI spend reality without it becoming a press story.

Peer exchange

CFO to CFO

The most useful AI finance insight comes from other CFOs who have already done the modelling, made the vendor mistakes, and negotiated the contracts. Not from consultants who haven't.

No vendors

No pitches at the table

Forum Select is not a vendor event. There are no sponsors presenting at the dinner. No one at the table is trying to sell anything. The conversation is between peers.

The AI Finance Questions No One Is Answering Publicly

The real questions
CFOs are asking

Forum Select dinners regularly surface the finance questions that CFOs are actually wrestling with but cannot ask in any public forum. These are not theoretical, they are the questions that determine whether an AI investment creates value or destroys it.

  • ?What is the real payback period on enterprise AI deployments?
  • ?How do you present AI investment to a board that wants certainty?
  • ?What happens to your cost base when competitors automate faster?
  • ?How do you account for AI-generated productivity in financial reporting?
  • ?What are the hidden costs of AI adoption that vendors don't disclose?
  • ?How does AI change your M&A valuation model?
  • ?What does responsible AI spend governance look like in a public company?
For CFOs

The room where CFOs
speak honestly about AI

If you are a CFO navigating AI investment decisions and want honest conversations with peers who are doing the same, Forum Select was built for you.

Apply for Forum Select Attend a Forum Event first

Forum Select for CFOs, Open Future Forum

Open Future Forum's Forum Select is a private executive community for Chief Financial Officers navigating AI investment decisions. CFOs at Forum Select dinners discuss AI ROI modelling, total cost of AI ownership, workforce cost planning in an AI era, board-level AI spend reporting, AI vendor contract risk, finance function automation, and capital allocation in AI-driven markets. Off the record, no attribution, no vendors, no pitches. Quarterly private dinners in San Francisco and Palo Alto. By invitation of Murray Newlands. A community of givers, CFOs who share what they've learned without keeping score.