As companies continue to generate more and more data, the role of the finance organization is evolving from simply managing the business to actively driving business strategy and performance. This shift requires finance teams to take greater ownership over data analytics and leverage insights to guide strategic decisions across the entire company.
At Manning + Company, we understand this dynamic well through our experience helping leading enterprises transform their finance organizations. We have seen firsthand how CFOs are expanding their scope beyond traditional responsibilities in response to the data explosion. Our Sourcing as a Service model and deep expertise in financial services enables us to partner with such companies to build out critical capabilities in data, analytics and more.
In the past, finance teams were often solely responsible for reporting and compliance. They consumed data from other departments to provide financial statements, variance analysis, and other backward-looking views for executives. While these functions are still critical, today's leading CFOs are expanding their scope. Rather than just reporting on what already happened, their teams are taking an active role in predicting future outcomes and steering the business accordingly.
This starts with upleveling analytics capabilities within finance. As analytics and business intelligence tools have advanced, finance teams are now able to harness data to model different scenarios, monitor KPIs in real-time, and deliver predictive insights. To enable this, CFOs at many companies have established dedicated analytics groups within finance, shifting their teams from being consumers of data and analytics to drivers and owners.
With more robust data strategies and talent, finance orgs are evolving in two key ways:
Becoming critical strategic advisors. Today's CFOs are trusted partners to the CEO, providing informed recommendations on major growth decisions from M&A to new market entry. Their teams leverage data to model potential moves, forecast ROI, and evaluate risks. Rather than just validating a direction, CFOs can now play a greater role in shaping strategy from the start.
Breaking down information silos. As finance teams enhance their data acumen, CFOs are well positioned to improve synergy across departments. They have visibility into data from sales, marketing, operations—enabling them to connect insights across teams. This allows organizations to link activities more tightly to financial outcomes and long-term goals. Rather than making decisions in isolation, departments can collaborate to drive growth.
At Manning + Company, our FinTech practice group helps CFOs execute on this transformation. We provide talent and advisory services to build or enhance data analytics, business intelligence, revenue operations, and other critical functions within finance. With our pulse on the latest innovations, we can architect finance orgs to become central forces in strategic decision-making.
To support this evolution, many CFOs are expanding their scope and restructuring accordingly. Notably, some CFOs at mid-market companies have analytics, data science and revenue operations teams reporting directly to them now instead of the CTO or CRO. This demonstrates how finance is moving closer to a 360-degree view of the business.
While taking on more responsibility, CFOs must also serve as stewards of data quality and governance. They play a key role in defining processes and policies for data management as usage grows across the company. This ensures different teams are accessing accurate, consistent insights.
The takeaway? Finance teams have a tremendous opportunity to evolve from backward-looking data consumers to forward-looking strategic advisors and partners. As technology continues to advance, CFOs that proactively uplevel their analytics capabilities and talent will be able guide their companies to smarter decisions and faster growth. The finance org has an increasingly critical seat at the executive table—and the most innovative CFOs will enable their teams to own it.