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For full listing of reports, visit our Research Paper Directory
The Role of Finance in Environmental Sustainability Efforts
March 2008: What role does finance play in environmental sustainability initiatives? Does finance have the tools and frameworks it needs to evaluate, measure, and report on these initiatives? CFO Research Services surveyed 175 senior finance executives to examine the extent of finance's involvement in environmental sustainability efforts, the barriers to improvement in this area, and the benefits realized through these initiatives. Our research reveals that the finance function's most prominent role in sustainability efforts is through decision support, although finance rarely plays a leading role in the management of environmental performance. Finance executives cite a lack of decision making frameworks that take environmental factors into account and an inability to document a link between sustainability initiatives and shareholder value as barriers to finance's increased involvement in sustainability efforts. Our research suggests that as companies begin to realize the benefits of environmental sustainability efforts, and develop the analytical tools needed to evaluate and measure these efforts, the finance function is likely to become more involved in environmental sustainability.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Jones Lang LaSalle
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The Evolution of the Finance Function: Teaming with Business Management to Adapt and Thrive
March 2008: As business units envision and create—or refine and rebuild—business models, finance takes an increasingly important role as their partner. In our survey and interview program among senior finance executives, we found that finance teams are eager to move beyond their traditional accounting and compliance functions and apply their expertise to the core of the business—those activities that are most directly tied to the company's success or failure in the marketplace. Being seen as a full partner in collaboration with business managers is one of the most important factors for success in achieving the most dramatic improvements. This report explores how the finance function works with business managers to demonstrate the value that their informational capabilities and analytical acumen has for improving and expanding the business' core products and services.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Microsoft
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Trust but Verify: Challenges in TV Ad Verification
March 2008: How well do finance organizations validate the delivery of their companies' television advertisements? Through an interview program with senior finance executives at large U.S. companies that spend heavily on television advertising, as well as interviews with advertising agencies, trade groups, and management consultancies, this study explores how finance executives view ad spending and delivery from a financial and operating controls perspective. Finance executives in our interviews expressed concern with the current verification model. Companies can't be sure exactly what is being counted when broadcasters and media agencies true up their attestations that ads ran at a particular time. They also question the value of how make-up ads fit into broader campaign goals of an advertiser's sales and marketing team. From this research emerges an interest in maximizing efficiency of ad spending and pursuing an active approach to improving ad verification, which in turn will increase understanding between marketing and finance.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Eloda
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The Right Stuff-Leadership in Finance
March 2008: What management and leadership skills do the most successful CFOs possess? We surveyed 250 senior finance executives at North American companies on the non-technical business management and leadership skills that finance executives need to meet the demands of an expanded business mandate. We found that the skills finance executives most often cite as critical for success are skills associated with decision making, communication, and collaboration. The most successful CFOs, survey results suggest, not only know how to make good decisions-they know how to make those decisions happen.
Senior finance executives say that the ideal finance leader should be flexible, changing his or her management approach according to circumstances. Being able to adopt a hard-charging, competitive management style or a more relaxed, collaborative style according to circumstances is one part of leadership. But survey results show that the judgment involved in adopting the right approach in the given circumstances is also a quality that defines successful leaders in finance. We found that developing this flexibility and judgment often comes through on-the-job practice and relationships with mentors. In this report survey respondents describe, in their own words, the leadership development steps they've taken that have worked well for them, as well as the steps they plan to take in the year ahead to become better finance leaders.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Tatum
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Paths to Improvement in Accounts Payable-The View from Finance
March 2008: Improvements in accounts payable have customarily been viewed through the lens of efficiency: processing more invoices with shorter cycle times, using fewer employee hours, and with greater accuracy. Our survey of 186 senior finance executives reveals that although finance executives certainly recognize and value these benefits, their interest in AP management extends beyond process efficiencies to include broader issues, such as cash management, contract compliance, and managing relationships with key suppliers.
This research program explores finance executives' priorities, problems, and plans in the management of accounts payable. We found that the finance function's top priorities in accounts payable over the coming year are closely connected with finance's broad priorities-in particular, cost management and decision support. Respondents most often cite a combination of process improvements and new or improved technology systems as the best methods to improve AP. Through a series of open-ended responses, finance executives offer advice to their peers, in their own words, on improving accounts payable and reducing the risks associated with poor AP performance.
Category: Outsourcing, Cost Control & Other Practices
- Sponsored by Ariba
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Getting the Most for Every Dollar—Tools and Strategies for Expense Management at Mid-Size Companies
March 2008: In our sixth annual report on indirect expense management at mid-size U.S. companies, CFO Research Services explores senior finance executives' views on spending data, vendor relationships, corporate card programs, and other topics. Our survey of 402 senior finance executives shows that companies plan to increase spending on items connected to core employee productivity and effectiveness. Although survey respondents report that their companies receive a variety of price and service benefits through preferred vendor relationships, they also agree that there is room for improvement in their companies' use of data to identify spending consolidation opportunities—an important prerequisite to building the spending volume that provides leverage in vendor negotiations. In a series of case studies based on interviews with a dozen senior finance executives, this study documents expense management practices that have worked well for companies pursuing greater savings on indirect spending, from building vendor relationships and negotiating for discounts to enforcing spending guidelines.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by American Express
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Managing Performance Amid Complexity
March 2008: How well equipped is finance to be an effective source of performance management expertise? More than two-thirds of the 170 finance executives surveyed by CFO Research Services expect their companies to increasingly look to finance to serve as performance management experts. Yet relatively few finance executives believe their companies have optimized their performance management systems and information capabilities. Many companies are still awash in Excel spreadsheets and grappling with a "patchwork" of finance and performance management systems. Finance executives at these companies report that their managers are noticeably less satisfied with the performance management data they have available to them, and that complexity in IT systems undermines the timeliness and utility of the data. As finance executives become performance management leaders, they are looking for systems solutions and resources that will allow them to manage the complexity inherent in their own organizations.
Category: Performance Management
- Sponsored by Cognos
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The Finance Operating Model Matters
February 2008: How are leading finance organizations in global banks adapting their functions and structures to fulfill expectations for serving new, more strategic roles across the enterprise? CFO Research Services conducted a series of interviews with senior finance executives at some of the world's largest banks to gain insight into effective finance operating models. Bank finance officers discussed the ways in which they are deploying increasingly complex variations of a centralized/decentralized operating model and earning enterprise credibility with a mindset of innovation and capability for leading change.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Ernst & Young
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M&A in Challenging Times
February 2008: As the broader economy continues to weaken, CFO Research Services found in this recent study that the M&A market among middle-market companies may continue to show some strength in the months ahead, as companies with strong balance sheets seek growth and competitive advantage through acquisitions. A substantial number of senior finance executives, however, tell us that recent changes in the credit and capital markets will change their approach to M&A. Certainly it seems likely that continued economic weakness will bring even greater discipline to deal evaluation in the coming months.
Category: Strategies For The Finance Function
- Sponsored by CIT
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Sizing up salaries: 2008 Salary Guide
November 2007: This report, prepared by Ajilon Finance based on data gathered by CFO Research Services, discusses salary data and employment trends for 2008. The Salary Guide provides salary ranges, by region, for the most common accounting and finance jobs, plus insights into CFOs' top priorities, their views on compensation and employment opportunities in finance, and their forecasts for hiring in the coming year.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Ajilon Finance
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The Renewed Finance Function—Extending Performance Management Beyond Finance
November 2007: Finance faces competing demands: Business managers want the finance function to play a more active role in supporting their planning and decision making, while regulatory pressures pull finance toward a turbocharged controllership role. Senior finance executives in this study reveal a desire for closer collaboration with business unit management in developing business strategy, but struggle with their counterparts' lack of knowledge of financial concepts. This report argues that by implementing performance management systems throughout the organization finance and business unit managers will have better information for developing strategy. By doing so, they will contribute more effectively to the business activities that satisfy stakeholders.
Category: Performance Management
- Sponsored by SAP
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Preparing Finance Staff for the Future
November 2007: As companies come under increasing pressure to deliver sustained, profitable growth, it is critical that individual performance align with enterprise-level performance. When individuals lack necessary skills, enterprise performance can suffer. Our survey of senior finance executives reveals that professional development programs in finance are not only welcomed by staff—who view training as a privilege—but also yield positive results for both the individual and the organization as a whole.
Category: Strategies For The Finance Function
- Sponsored by ACS
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Driving a More Valuable Contribution from the Corporate Tax Function
November 2007: What steps are companies taking to align the tax function with broader enterprise objectives? While over 200 senior finance and tax executives who took our survey reveal a desire for tax to collaborate more effectively with other functions, especially with business operating units and their managers, this research identifies a shortfall in tax's ability to provide decision support to business management. The results of our research suggest there are organizational steps that companies can take that will yield a more effective tax function.
Category: Strategies for the Finance Function
- Sponsored by Deloitte Tax LLP
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The CFO Technology Summit: New Tools and Techniques to Drive Management Productivity and Precision
October 2007: The CFO Technology Summit explored the role of information technology, the corporate finance function, and how they can work together to effectively boost corporate productivity and raise shareholder value. The conference conclusion paper summarizes the insights heard from leading CFOs and the successful case studies shared at the conference, which centered on how leading companies put technology to work in order to deliver better performance, lessen risk, achieve strategic advantage, and ultimately generate value for the business.
Category: Conference Conclusion Papers
- Sponsored by SAS
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Look Closer, Look Further: How to Build a Better Business Case for Improving Information Capabilities
October 2007:Too many companies lack the management information they need to make business decisions confidently—that was the main finding in 2005's IQ Matters: Senior Finance and IT Executives Seek to Boost Information Quality. This report brings a new and more encouraging message to CFOs and CIOs: It doesn't have to be that way. In this study, our survey and in-depth interview program among senior finance executives around the world offer insight into how a broader view of information investments yields greater satisfaction, effectiveness, and understanding of the true cost of management information.
Category: Finance and Technology
- Sponsored by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu
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Releasing Resources to Support Growth—The Long-Term Benefits of Finance Transformation
October 2007:In recent years, finance has worked hard to drive cost, complexity, error, and risk out of its routine business processes. Our survey of senior finance executives reveals that the finance function has freed time and resources to pursue high-value activities like decision support and financial planning and analysis as a result of transaction-processing automation.
Category: Finance and Technology
- Sponsored by Concur
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Corporate Performance Management: How Finance Can Implement a Winning Strategy
June 2007: The eighth Corporate Performance Management (CPM) event from CFO Conferences explored the new direction of CPM and its evolution as the role of the CFO expands beyond reporting, measuring and forecasting, into understanding enterprise-wide performance drivers and making strategic decisions. The conference conclusion paper summarizes the insights heard from leading CFOs and the successful case studies shared at the conference.
Category: Conference Conclusion Papers
- Sponsored by SAS
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