The Gartner 2024 Finance Executive Priorities Survey categorized the chief priorities for CFOs this year into five distinct groups.
Over the past 18 months, international companies actively reduced costs and implemented substantial workforce reductions; it is therefore crucial to analyse the data in light of the following considerations:
- Enforced fiscal restraint and increased consumer and corporate debt have resulted in weakened demand.
- The anticipated (US) inflation rate for 2023-2025 exceeds the average of the previous two decades by 2.9 percentage points.
- About 90% of consumers have shifted to alternative brands.
- The expertise of seasoned colleagues is crucial for nurturing the knowledge base of digital talent within organizations.
Top five priorities for CFOs in 2024
1. Driving transformation initiatives
Enhancing technology efficiently remains pivotal for transformation, yet implementation can be expensive, time-intensive, and disruptive.
Finance teams must collaborate with external consultants and internal IT departments to progress tech projects while managing their core responsibilities.
CFOs who actively participate in digital delivery are more likely to reap its benefits compared to those who delegate or simply cooperate with IT.
2. Assessing and enhancing finance strategy and structure
The evolving digital landscape of finance demands different tools and skills.
Roles like data scientists and engineers introduce new capabilities but also pose governance and organizational challenges.
Developing an effective roadmap to leverage these capabilities while minimizing disruptions is crucial for success.
3. Enhancing finance metrics, insights, and communication
Finance metrics are valuable only if they are easily understood and aid decision-making.
As analytics become more intricate, presenting insights in an easily digestible manner becomes imperative.
Strengthening data visualization and storytelling skills helps convey information in a way that expedites decision-making.
4. Guiding change managemen
Continuous transformation can lead to employee fatigue, affecting performance and commitment.
Balancing sustained momentum in transformation while addressing burnout-related issues is crucial for long-term multi-project plans.
5. Optimizing costs
Assessing the impact of technology investments on productivity and employee capabilities is vital.
However, understanding the connection between digital investments and overall enterprise value remains challenging for many CFOs, with only a minority confident in evaluating their digital investments’ potential to create value.
How Comply’s AP automation rescues CFOs
With Comply Platform, the first and most impactful benefit for CFOs is the end-to-end control of the entire AP process.
Access all the data you need, distributed across personalizable charts, via a unique, at-a-glance dashboard.
Based on this data you can view the status of invoice processing, identify delays and view discrepancies, make decisions and approve payments, but also route invoices or disputes to relevant managers for approval or resolution.
Enabling all steps in the accounts payable process to be monitored, even remotely, while leveraging AI and machine learning support, means solving the five priorities of 2024 in one fell swoop in your AP department.
