CFO CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER

The Chief Financial Officer is the person who manages the finances of a company. Traditionally, they are responsible for: administration, accounting and management control, functions that include cash flow monitoring and financial planning, both in the short term (e.g. treasury management) and in the medium term (e.g. investment and resource management).
Going into greater detail, they are responsible for ensuring that the company’s accounting, financial and economic reports are accurate and completed in a timely manner. The CFO must, in essence, “keep everything under control” so that the company’s accounts are in order and comply with the standards set by the top management. In general, the CFO reports to the CEO and plays a significant role in managing the company’s investments, as well as its income and expenses.
The CFO is therefore a managerial function with decision-making power: indeed, they participate in the definition of the company strategy (and its operational modulation), the organisation of financial communication and the relationship with shareholders and investors, as well as the supervision of internal audits.
They are also responsible for financial planning and reporting activities to the Management; indeed, they report directly to the Chairman and/or the CEO – as mentioned above – on all the strategic and tactical issues related to budget management, cost-benefit analysis, forecasts and new financing arrangements.
The role of the CFO is even more important in an economic situation like today’s, characterised by continuous and sudden changes: indeed, staff dealing with the financial aspects of the company must have a broad vision of everything that happens in the organisation, the ability to build connections between the processes and functions that make up the company, offering creative ideas and solutions.
Unlike bygone ways of working in which financial aspects were taken into account only after making decisions, today, the financial function is seen as an integral part of the company, of the team, and of the decision-making process, and its point of view (i.e. the economic-financial impact) is always taken into account on any and all issues, so that each decision is made with full awareness.