Finance leaders aspiring to become modern CFOs are looking to digital transformation in order to become ever more strategic partners of CEOs
In recent years, chief financial officers have seen their role evolve like never before. From their beginnings as historians of financial data and past performance, they evolved into real-time analysts and visionaries with predictive technologies at their fingertips.
Having looked at the past, present and future, where is the next focus for CFOs?
Modern CFOs add ‘mastery of technology’ to their tool kit, redefining their understanding of the trends, challenges and opportunities behind the numbers they have always counted on.
On a par with CEOs, they are now some of the most influential leaders and figureheads, armed with technology-enabled insights to tell the story of their company’s financial health. They are firmly in the driving seat of business transformation. To bring this new identity to life, let’s paint a picture of the modern CFO’s day-to-day work.
AT THE HEART OF THE COMPANY
Today’s CFO are not hard to find. They are highly visible on the company floor, talking to people of all levels, listening, and responding to requests from across the business. They lead from the front.
As the CEO’s indispensable confidant, the CFO can often be found by their side, influencing strategic decision-making with the company’s overall financial data front of mind. With digital technologies at their fingertips, the CFO’s ability to present accurate, concise and relevant financial data supports the CEO to make big decisions in a timely manner.
Yet, the modern CFO is far from an exclusive figure. They interact continuously with teams across the organisation, from sales and customer services to marketing and HR, gaining an understanding of how future investments in technology and talent could elevate teams to reach new levels. Interconnected cloud platforms and applications enable CFOs to immerse themselves in any business function to truly understand their financial performance, challenges and opportunities.
CFOs have found their place at the heart of the company – both literally and metaphorically. This central position is their route to leading better-informed decisions on whole-company strategies and policies.
CONFIDENT DECISION-MAKER
Modern CFOs are not working alone but instead, are bringing their human teams together with emerging technology. AI and machine learning are helping their human colleagues, CFOs included, to predict, project and plan for the future.
The CFO is operating in an environment that can enable fast, efficient, large-scale data processing to produce accurate insights. Not only that, but these technologies get to know the business as they go, becoming more refined and delivering better insights over time.
Critically, CFOs are bastions of long-term strategy and vision. You won’t find them sweating the small stuff. Reading every line in the ledger is out, because AI technologies have the power to do that more quickly and accurately before flagging any anomalies. Only when an anomaly is found will a CFO need to step in and fix the problem.
Being well informed is a sure-fire way to make good decisions. Plus, the time CFOs save on digitalising the proofing of ledger lines and other repetitive manual tasks they can invest in their people. This means they can be part of more customer conversations, colleague brainstorms and shareholder interactions through which they can both develop key relationships and exert their data-inspired influence.
A TRUSTED FORCE IN AN ERA OF DISRUPTION AND CHANGE
The modern CFO has a knack for always making the right decision. Not only that, but people trust their judgement and are happy when they lead.
Why? Because the influence of data-driven insights on CFOs is clear. They have taken into account not only financial data but aggregated data from across the entire business, earning the trust of every department as they go.
This bird’s eye view of the business means that when they want change to happen, it happens fast and effectively across multiple business units. This is not only because they have the right technologies in place to get the job done, but also because the whole business is riding the wave of transformation, together. No team is left in the dark – today’s CFO ensures that everyone understands the drivers for change and is transparent about how they will reach success.
Not all change can be controlled, of course. And when a business is hit by unforeseen changes, the CFO reacts with lightning speed because he or she is already working with a future-focused approach. This is thanks to predictive capabilities, planned contingencies, financial projections and strategies they can see before them in the form of AI-driven insights.
Indeed, when disruption strikes unexpectedly, CFOs have the freedom to consider a responsible approach that cares not only for finances but for people, by carefully managing expectations to avoid panic. They have empathy and understanding, keeping all teams in the loop as to what the change means for them, while also planning ahead to best protect the business from such situations from happening again.
OPPORTUNITY TO SEE THE BIGGER PICTURE
The modern CFO is more visible, more confident and more trusted than those who came before. They have what it takes to lead their business through transformation by relying on quality insights, which empower them to be ever more strategic.
From the past, to the present, to the future and now stepping back to see the bigger picture, the modern CFO is always looking forward, driving the company to achieve bolder goals than ever before.
Author
Jordaan Burger, Vice President Finance, Africa, Middle East and Asia-Pacific at Sage
