With the advent of technology, the role of a CFO has grown vastly more than just being a keeper of money. While understanding the company’s finance and accounting is important, it is also essential for the ambitious CFO to have a firm hold over emerging technologies to offer insightful business suggestions and take strategic decisions.

Smarten Up

Success is all about seizing an opportunity when it comes knocking. Being a Technology CFO, having a clear and concise grasp of the modern CFO skills and competencies can work wonders for your career. Be the finance executive who takes the lead in the transformation and sets CFO trends in 2017.

There are various techs in the market right now, and new ones keep getting added to the list. The four biggest fintech trends in the market to keep an eye on are:

• Big Data Platforms: Enormous amounts of data are generated because of Information Technology being a part of almost everything. If the underlying pattern and trend are used to understand the opportunities, it could result in decreased costs and potential revenues.
• In-memory Computing: This improves data processing time. Used in Finance Technology, it can report and process in real time. This can be a breakthrough in how financial planning and forecasting is carried out.
• Data Visualization:Visualisation is making data graphic. When companies tap into data from various sources and bring it together at one place to be easily accessed by operations, sales, and finance, then it has the power to drive change and improve results.
• Mobile Everything:CFO’s have the greatest technological power in the form of their smartphones. People are on the go these days and having access to data will help achieve agility in business and economic competitiveness. Focus on everything mobile like laptops, tablets, etc. can give that special edge.

Effective Innovation is Prudent and Practical

In my opinion, a CFO needs to push his Chief Integration Officer (CIO) to find the most efficient way to fit new technologies to enhance or replace the existing system. He also needs to partner with the CIO in exploring new trends.

One of the biggest trendsetters affecting the financial domain is SAP. This technology is currently positioning as the ‘digital core’ of modern business. SAP CFO, Arlen Shenkman states that “the role of a CFO today is not just to know about the current technology that their business relies on, but to also be attuned to how their competitors are dealing with the new offerings.”

Digitisation is speeding up, and this is how SAP is keeping up

• S/4 HANA Finance

Also known as SAP Simple Finance, this is an ERP financial software that runs on SAP HANA in-memory computing platform. It is instant and real time for better decisions.

• FIORI

A collection of apps in FIN area, it helps yo improve the user experience. It aids in making the finance tool easily understandable because SAP understands.

• ABAP, CDS and Solution Manager

Hierarchies help business analyse their data. This add-on feature helps segregate vast amounts of data in tables and column to analyse them better.

• SAP and CLOUD

Imagine finance for the digital age. The use of cloud technology shifts a big chunk of the company’s fixed costs to variable costs providing better control over operational costs.

Over time, technology is changing the way businesses are run. There is a fast growing demand for investment in the most suitable tech. You as a CFO need to be ready for this ‘Technolution’!

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