Korn Ferry recently surveyed over 700 Chief Financial Officers globally to discover the major trends impacting the finance function. In the top themes highlighted, two stood out as most relevant to the journey to World Class Finance: The need to focus on continued transformation in finance, and the inexorable rise of analytics and business intelligence in finance.

The report reveals interesting findings: roles in the finance function that require the highest level of business acumen are the ones that need a transformation, whereas the more technical roles score lower on the scale of necessity to transform. It can be inferred that these technical roles are already being transformed by the latest waves of technology and automation. The report also highlights that CFOs are combining roles within the finance function, with 28% putting this down to the need for efficiency, automation and process improvement.

When it comes to execution and leveraging data, an overwhelming majority of CFOs (84%) reported they are leveraging data, with 36% using it to evaluate risk to advise on appropriate actions – “CFOs have the opportunity to drive key business decisions if they have the tools, data and team to interpret. Data and BI can be a huge differentiator in edging out the competition,” says Korn Ferry.

We highly recommend reading the full report for further interesting statistics and insights. You can find it here.