While unions attempt to hold back the automation revolution sweeping the software and hardware running the business world, one category of management has welcomed it with open arms: senior financial decision-makers.
A new study released this week reveals that 89% of CFOs in SA medium and large businesses welcome automation taking over more of their day-to-day accounting tasks.
This finding has emerged from a research project entitled “CFO 3.0 — digital transformation beyond financial management”, conducted by World Wide Worx for global financial software provider Sage. The research highlights the impact of digital transformation on SA businesses of all sizes, revealing a radical shift in the role of senior financial decision-makers as drivers of strategic change.
A similar proportion of CFOs — 86% — believe that financial management technologies can help their businesses discover new opportunities and better manage risk. It is no coincidence, then, that almost the exact same proportion of respondents, 87%, play a role in their organisation’s initiatives for digital transformation.
Not all questions received such unanimous answers, but almost all added up to the picture of growing confidence in new technology. Most senior financial decision-makers report direct productivity benefits of technology, such as automated compliance reporting and making real-time decisions about risks and opportunities.
It’s not only about where they are right now, however, but where they’re headed, that paints the picture of the evolved CFO: two-thirds expect emerging technology to audit results continuously and to automate period-end reporting and corporate audits, reducing time to close.
Three core technologies are driving this productivity in the finance function: data analytics, cloud-based accounting platforms, and compliance automation.
Relishing new powers
Combine this with the prospect of businesses interfacing more and more with open banking systems and automated taxation processes, and one can foresee a time when companies may no longer wait for quarterly, half-year or annual reporting deadlines, but will have the ability — if they can handle such transparency — to be permanently open to scrutiny. Once regulators catch up to that ability, it may even be required of large organisations.
For now, CFOs relish their new powers, with fully two-thirds saying they are able to spend more time analysing data than they do gathering and processing it. This symbolises the movement from what the report calls CFO 1.0 to 2.0, a shift from a role as the “historian” looking backwards at company performance to the “real-time analyst” using financial management technology to automate the finance function.
The next evolution is natural: CFO 3.0 will be the “visionary”, using data and emerging technology to create a vision of the future.
Pieter Bensch, executive vice-president at Sage Africa and Middle East, says the research highlights how the role of the CFO has evolved from managing compliance and accounting activities to providing strategic leadership and driving digital transformation. “As finance enters the CFO 3.0 era,” he says, “CFOs need tools that enable them to deliver on their core competencies, and to be confident in driving the digital agenda throughout their organisation.”
CFOs relish the prospect: three-quarters say their organisations are ready for even more automation in the future.
• Goldstuck is founder of World Wide Worx and editor-in-chief of Gadget.co.za.
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