As today’s businesses navigate an ever-more competitive market on top of large external factors such as the global pandemic, Brexit, and growing environmental pressures, it’s no wonder that many job roles are evolving.
For finance this is no different. The role and expectations of finance teams have dramatically changed and will continue to evolve as CEOs increasingly look to finance leaders to play a key part in defining the company strategy.
With growth high on the agenda, companies strive to reduce operational costs, increase efficiency and output, but still need to remain on point for innovation and identifying new growth opportunities.
Digital transformation is globally recognised as a necessary step for growth. By investing in technology and automating manual processes, companies are more efficient, money is saved, and teams can deliver more value. But how do CEOs actually achieve this?
Finance leaders are uniquely placed to be able to work alongside the CEO and drive digital transformation across the whole company. Not only are they well placed to do this, but a recent article cited that many CFOs believe it is “in their remit to drive business-wide operational transformation.”
Here are three ways they are driving company-wide digital transformation:
- Data and analytics
More CEOs now rely on business intelligence to make informed data-driven decisions about strategy and growth. As gatekeepers of company data, finance teams play a critical role in analysing and interpreting it, and presenting a centralised view and smart insights to the CEO.
Any investment in digital technology begins with assessing your current process and setting out your objectives for automation. Having the right data in a business case makes it informed and accurate, so finance leaders can help drive the case and influence the CEO with data-backed insights.
Access to this data also provides an important benchmark for effectively measuring and reporting the ROI on any solution chosen.
- Future finance skills development
Attracting, developing and retaining the right talent is critical for any team to be effective. Finance teams need to manage the operational finance tasks well, but with automated processes in place, they have the space to take on more value-add tasks (such as financial planning and strategy, deeper data analysis, and problem solving).
Not only does this motivate team members but it also provides a better service to the wider company.
In our recent 2022 finance leadership survey, three of the top five finance skills for future leaders were related to data insight and analytics, and technology skills and understanding.
People management and communication skills came top of the poll, and the main strategic priority in the next 12 months for 69% of respondents is upskilling their teams.
3. Business partnering
Finance leaders are becoming advisors to other departments on process improvement, reporting, cost reduction and performance efficiencies.
Sharing best practice around process automation can benefit other functions, and boost overall company output and performance. Through using the data and business intelligence, CFOs offer real value by providing insights and practical advice to enable other teams to make smarter and more informed decisions.
CFOs who have successfully delivered digital transformation in their own team can lead by example. By applying and scaling their own automation strategy, they can support other teams who need to do the same.
They can provide a reporting framework to help other teams measure performance, analyse data, and in turn assess how the team impacts overall business efficiency.
CFOs working in tandem with the CEO as an advisor to departmental heads brings every team in line with the overarching company digital strategy, so they can contribute most effectively to the growth.
Leading by example on finance digital transformation
With automation being top of their agenda, finance leaders are leading by example across the business. They are seeing first-hand the benefits of automated processing as the numbers simply do not lie.
Finance teams can use this smart data and knowledge to make a unique contribution to their company strategy and become recognised ambassadors for company-wide digital transformation.