Financial Management and Accounting

Graduate School of Management and Technology

Announcements/News

Tech Knowledge Provides Career Edge

Finance and technology go hand-in-hand in companies today, a new survey confirms. Half (50 percent) of chief financial officers interviewed recently said that other than knowledge of accounting and finance, information technology experience is most useful in their careers. This result is nearly double the response when this question was asked five years ago.

Operations and legal experience also ranked high, with 45 percent and 37 percent of the response, respectively, according to the survey by Robert Half Management Resources. Sales and marketing rounded out the top four list with 26 percent of the response.

"Today's CFOs need expertise in many areas other than accounting and finance, but particularly in technology," said Paul McDonald, executive director of Robert Half Management Resources. "Companies increasingly expect their CFOs to provide insight into the value of new systems, evaluate the outcome of potential upgrades and make recommendations on technology-related investments."

McDonald also commented on the value of operations experience: "Finance chiefs are directly involved in all aspects of strategy and operations, providing direction on pricing, cost cutting and the restructuring of business units."

Source: SmartPros, August 28, 2008

CFOs and IM

The December 2007 issue of Financial Executive states “while businesses rely on the IT department and CIO/CTO for things technical, the CFO should be involved in key discussions associated with creating an information management strategy” (p. 44).  The CFO is responsible for ensuring that the organization’s information asset is organized and managed optimally.  Recommended best practices include:

• Build a study and scalable network
• Integrate business application software
• Secure the system from outside abuses
• Safeguard information from inside abuse
• Implement disaster planning and recovery

An organization’s IT plan supports its business objectives, and the CFO plays a significant role in its successful deployment.