The IBM Institute for Business Value states, “CFOs must be both guardians of stability and agents of transformation …CFOs supercharge technology as the transformative force in their organization.” It found that “some CFOs are leaping forward, while others are being cautious.”
What should a CFO do? The report makes several recommendations. These are the ones that stand out to us:
- Apply FinOps across the enterprise to make technology more valuable
- Modernize budgeting, forecasting and chargebacks to reflect costing, agile scenario planning and incentives for shared objectives
- Implement a cost estimation and tracking framework that can help your team understand the costs associated with technology projects
- Foresee possibilities
- Assess, forecast and communicate economic factors, industry-specific competitor actions and geopolitical trends that could impact the organization
- Adapt financial strategies in response to changes in the external environment of shifts in company priorities
- Achieve impact
- Determine the data sources and leverage financial management systems, analytics tools and business intelligence platforms to track your outcome indicators
- Prove business value during regular reviews and report on financial metrics, operational efficiency indicators and market performance measures
- Cultivate a future-focused perspective
- Create dynamic, longer-term forecasts on future cash flows to educate employees on how the market recognizes value creation over time
- Provide long-term guidance to your stakeholders and share the progress toward achieving long-term goals
- View spending through a wide-angle lens
- Invest in the initiatives (for example, sustainability, GenAI) that align with your long-term goals
- Prioritize technology applications that accelerate the transition from piloting to gaining efficiency to driving new growth
- Evaluate and quantify the opportunity cost of borrowing from tomorrow to pay for today.
- Fund the future – flexibly
- Avoid static capital allocation – use a fluid portfolio with each investment focused on outcomes
- Conduct regular investment evaluations to drive capital redeployments and resource reallocations
The 2024 CFO Survey explains the whys and hows of these recommendations, along with other recommendations we did not highlight. It also features the six power moves CFOs must make. Download your copy today.
About the 2024 CFO Survey
In Q1 2024, the IBM Institute for Business Value, working with Oxford Economics, surveyed 2,000 CFOs. The survey respondents span 26 industries and 34 locations worldwide. The organizations also engaged a small group of these executives for in-depth qualitative interviews.
Revelwood is dedicated to helping the Office of Finance succeed through the strategic use of technology. We have a nearly 30 year history helping CFOs and FP&A leaders modernize and transform the Office of Finance. Our approach is to focus on your success, speak business first and to leverage best-in-class technology that suits your organization’s unique needs. Contact us at info@revelwood.com to start a conversation on how we can help your Office of Finance be thes best it can be.
More from our FP&A Done Right Series:
FP&A Maturity Assessment: Where Do You Rank?
Solving Financial Reporting Challenges
