Clockwork vs. Noise: Building in a Hot Market Without Losing Focus

Every morning, Clockwork founder Fady Hawatmeh looks at a whiteboard in his office that reads “F the noise.” In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, he revealed why this reminder is crucial for building in today’s hyper-competitive financial planning and analysis (FP&A) market.

The Challenge of Market Hype

“Our market right now, forecasting financial modeling fpna is extremely hot,” Fady explains. “There’s so much investment going into this. There’s so many new entrants coming into the space, but they’re all here because they think it’s an opportunistic time.”

The temptation to chase these trends is real. Competitors are “throwing their hat in the ring and seeing if they can get a piece of this flavor of the month,” making noise with funding announcements and aggressive expansion plans.

Building a Different Kind of Moat

Rather than trying to compete on funding or speed, Clockwork focused on something harder to replicate: deep domain expertise. “I know companies that are between one and 25 million in revenue. I know what they are going through,” Fady shares. “You can’t replicate my experience, and you can’t replicate my team’s experience… if you raise $100 million, you cannot repeat that.”

This expertise came from years of hands-on experience. Before Clockwork, Fady was “living the pain that Clockwork solves every single day” through his outsourced CFO consulting firm.

The Daily Battle for Focus

Maintaining this focus isn’t a one-time decision – it’s a daily practice. “It’s an everyday challenge,” Fady admits. “It really is an everyday challenge where every single morning I wake up and I have to be very present on that day and not thinking of all the other stuff that are trying to knock me off my game.”

His solution? “Win the day. That’s one of my mantras with my team… Because if you win the day, then you win the week. You win the week, you win the month, then you win the year.”

Authentic Growth Over Quick Wins

This focus extends to their sales approach. While competitors chase short-term metrics, Clockwork prioritizes genuine problem-solving. “When we get on calls, I love doing sales calls because I get to talk to people and hear their perspective and hear the struggles that they’re going with and legitimately help them fix their problems.”

The strategy is working. In their first full year, they achieved “five X revenue, five X RA” – not by chasing every opportunity, but by staying true to their core mission of “making financial planning and analysis accessible for every business.”

The Long Game

Unlike competitors looking for quick exits, Clockwork is playing a longer game. “This is not a let me get in there and try and exit in a couple of years,” Fady emphasizes. “This is a company that I want to IPO and make an absolutely massive company.”

This long-term vision shapes their entire approach to market noise. As Fady puts it, “We’re definitely one of the ones that are in this, because we know the pain, we know the market, we know the customer, and we’re here to stay.”

The Broader Lesson

For founders building in hot markets, Clockwork’s experience offers a powerful alternative to the typical Silicon Valley playbook. Instead of trying to outspend or outpace competitors, focus on building something that can’t be easily replicated – deep domain expertise, genuine customer relationships, and authentic problem-solving capabilities.

As Fady’s journey shows, sometimes the best way to cut through market noise isn’t to shout louder – it’s to focus more intently on solving real problems for real customers. While competitors chase “the flavor of the month,” sustainable growth comes from staying true to your core mission and expertise.

After all, as Fady notes, “There’s always going to be money. There’s always going to be more well-funded companies… But what they can’t replicate is the focus of what we know.”