Sara Nichols

Chief Finance Officer Appspace

Last Reviewed: September 27, 2026

Executive Summary

Sara Nichols is Chief Finance Officer of Appspace, the Tampa, Florida company whose workplace experience platform combines employee communications, digital signage, space reservation and visitor management. She has been Appspace’s finance chief since at least 2022 and has served under two chief executives, first Tony DiBenedetto, a former Arthur Andersen colleague, and since October 2025 Pete Schmied. In interviews she has argued that financial planning can no longer be done well inside the finance department alone, and that finance staff develop best when they are made to learn how the rest of the business works.

Career Highlights

• Chief Finance Officer of Appspace, listed on the company’s current leadership team.
• Reported as Appspace’s CFO by CFO.com in November 2022, leading a finance team of 12.
• Built a development approach for her team that pairs virtual technical training with in-person soft-skills sessions and requires FP&A staff to attend other business functions’ team meetings.
• Advocated in 2023 for closer alignment between finance and the product, sales, people and marketing teams, and for rolling forecasts in volatile markets.
• Earlier worked with Tony DiBenedetto, later Appspace’s CEO and now its board chairman, at Arthur Andersen.

Professional Journey

Nichols has said that she worked with Tony DiBenedetto “many years ago at Arthur Andersen”. DiBenedetto later led Appspace as chief executive, and by November 2022 Nichols was the company’s CFO.

In a CFO.com piece that month she described how she developed her team of 12. Her view was that each person needs a plan covering “their technical skills as well as their soft skills and personal growth skills”. Appspace ran technical training virtually and softer-skills sessions in person, and she required FP&A staff to attend team meetings of other key business functions, so that “everyone in the business” had a component that made them “shadow or partner with other parts of the business”. The aim, she said, was “business-minded finance and accounting folks who can do a better job with financial analysis and forecasting.”

She expanded on that in a September 2023 interview with StrategicCFO360. Describing Appspace as “a global, high-growth company” exposed to inflation, exchange rates and rising interest rates, she said the economic climate had led her to shift priorities rather than reset strategy, chiefly by aligning finance more closely with product, sales, people and culture, and marketing. Financial planning and analysis, she argued, “can no longer be done well in a silo”. She also said she looked to DiBenedetto and to Holly Grogan, then chief people officer, as examples of leaders who communicate well across a global and remote or hybrid workforce.

Appspace changed its leadership in October 2025. Pete Schmied became chief executive, Grogan became President, and DiBenedetto moved from CEO to chairman of the board. Nichols remains Chief Finance Officer on the company’s current leadership team.

Education

No institution or degree could be established from any source read.