Our Cloud Power Series tour ended last week and what a tour it’s been. In addition to salesforce.com, we joined our friends Xactly and Concur for these multi-city breakfast events, playing host to financial executives looking to know more about the cloud and how it can help their businesses. We were encouraged by the aha moments and enthusiasm from the audience as we shared real-life cloud success stories. We also learned quite a bit from our audience with their insightful questions and the powerful discussions that ensued. From Boston, to Chicago, to Philly, to San Francisco, Atlanta and NYC, below I list some of my biggest takeaways.

1. CFOs are getting more involved with cloud strategies at their companies.

They’ve come to these sessions to learn and get ideas on how they can improve their businesses with the cloud. Love it.

2. We’ve turned the corner on the cloud’s value proposition.

Most now see the cloud as a strategic way forward, not just a way to reduce costs.

3. Some companies will inhale the whole cloud while others will take small steps.

Small and midsized companies tend to take in the whole cloud, while larger companies are looking for ways to step into the cloud incrementally by joining up specific functions with existing cloud apps e.g. billing apps for Salesforce.

4. Choosing a cloud platform is one of the most strategic decisions a company can make.

Cloud platforms are a foundation and source for all of a company’s business apps, operations automation and competitive differentiation going forward.

5. Companies are tired of the barriers between departments, especially between sales and finance.

Old stereotypes and departmental business silos can be broken down as evidenced by the three apps discussed – which all run on the Salesforce Platform including accounting, billing, sales commissions and expense management.

This post originally appeared on the FinanceForce Blog.