#30 CFO Competency Framework with Dan Wells

GrowCFO has created a CFO Competency Framework that covers the key skills required to become an effective finance leader.  This is rapidly becoming the global toolkit to help finance leaders benchmark their skills and competencies against their peer group.  It also acts as a CFO Readiness Toolkit to help the next generation of aspiring CFOs. During this podcast episode, Dan Wells and Kevin Appleby discuss the purpose of the CFO Competency Framework.  In addition, we discuss how it is helping so many finance leaders to accelerate their learning and development. CFO Competency Framework's purpose GrowCFO noticed that there was a huge gap in the finance leader ecosystem.  Nobody had previously produced a global competency framework to help finance leaders benchmark their existing skills against those required to become a CFO. Senior finance professionals were struggling to identify their skills gaps and to prioritise their most important learning and development objectives.  As many people say, “You don’t know what you don’t know!” Our CFO Competency Framework is designed to deliver many important purposes. Identify the skills gaps to be addressed by the next generation of finance leaders.Assist CFO job applicants to become self-aware candidates with a proper development plan.Help first-time CFOs to become more impactful within your role.Highlight opportunities for the CFO to create value and achieve your company’s vision.Determine the difference between the CFO role and versus Finance Director or Head of Finance.Filter GrowCFO’s activities to help experienced CFOs to fulfil your annual CPD requirements.Map your competency assessment ratings into online courses, lessons and workshops.Benchmark your competency levels against your most relevant finance leader peer group. It is no surprise that many finance leaders are already using the GrowCFO Competency Framework to accelerate your career progression. How did we build the CFO Competency Framework? GrowCFO has a huge network of aspiring finance leaders, first-time CFOs, experienced CFOs, CEOs, Chairs, NEDs, other C-Suite members, advisors, investors and recruiters.  We held focus groups with representatives from these communities to determine the required competencies for the modern-day CFO. GrowCFO also consulted with a huge number of GrowCFO members to obtain people’s views and feedback.  We worked with technology experts, graphic designers and programme developers to build a market-leading digital CFO Competency Framework that operates on a self-serve basis. Following this, we engaged inspirational CFOs to create a huge number of competency lessons that are located within our world-class learning management system.  We have mapped each of our CFO competencies into online training courses and regular workshops.  This allows finance leaders to efficiently generate your tailored learning and development plan to further develop their skills and address their biggest challenges. https://youtu.be/6Kk9Yz2ax5s How is the CFO Competency Framework structured? Our CFO Competency Framework contains three categories: Foundation, Implementation and Impact.  These help you to preserve value, create value and maximise value throughout your role. Each category comprises three competencies, giving a total of nine competencies across the framework.  These competencies are inter-connected and you will often be using many of these concurrently. Each competency contains five different skills.  Therefore, the GrowCFO Competency Framework contains a total of 45 skills that are relevant to a typical modern-day CFO. There is a lot for finance leaders to master and our framework will constantly evolve over time, in line with the ongoing evolution of the CFO role. Foundation category The Foundation category contains three competencies: Governance and Control, Operational driver and Financial Planning & Analysis. These three competencies form the foundation for your future success within the role and are critical towards preserving value within your business. Implementation category The Implementation category contains three competencies being: Strategic Business Partner, Catalyst for Change, and Fundraising and M&A. These competencies represent your ability to deliver the company’s business plan and to create value in your role.  You are likely to be combining your hard and soft skills with a powerful effect. Impact category The Impact category contains the following three competencies: Leadership, Commercial mindset and Soft skills. These contain many of the advanced competencies that really make you stand out as a top-quality finance leader.  These are harder to learn but allow you to maximise the value that you create across your firm. The nine competencies The following section provides more insights regarding each competency: Governance and Control Governance: Deliver your Board responsibilities and produce Board pack reports. Ensure director compliance and conduct.Risk management: Implement policies and procedures. Monitor control frameworks and oversee committees;Compliance: Perform financial and non-financial reporting. Comply with regulatory requirements such as legal, tax, statutory audit and internal audit/reviews;Closing the books: Optimise your period-end close procedures. For example: process journals, form valuations and make judgements; andTreasury: Oversee cash management and treasury policies. Manage foreign exchange and implement hedging arrangements. Operational driver Lead operations: Oversee specific operational activities. For example, Finance, HR, Legal, IT and Facilities;Implement and integrate systems: Identify systems, implement new technology solutions and integrate applications;Optimise processes: Review business processes to determine how best to simplify, automate and streamline their associated activities;Embed finance across the business: Develop relationships across each department and put finance at the heart of the business; andCapture data and create dashboards: Understand what your audience wants. Extract data and report it in the most user-friendly manner. Financial Planning and Analysis Allocate capital: Divide up your company’s financial resources and other sources of capital in a manner that generates the maximum return for your shareholders;Build financial models: Create a short-to-medium term model to forecast your financial performance and KPIs based upon your strategic plan;Create investment cases: Challenge and support investment cases to determine which initiatives to support;Analyse data: Apply your financial perspective and commercial awareness to scrutinise both financial and non-financial data;Manage outcomes: Manage outcomes of budgetary performance during each financial period. Take mitigating action where required. Strategic Business Partner Influence strategies: Deliver data-driven insights, generate new ideas and influence the business plan;Support decision-making: Support your teams and facilitate problem-solving. Provide a financial perspective, create collaboration and drive decision-making;Become a critical voice: Challenge the management team and Board. Also, become an influential voice across the wider firm;Manage stakeholders: Be the main point of contact to internal and external stakeholders. Provide regular updates and generate confidence in your business; andBe the co-pilot to your CEO: Work closely with your CEO to communicate and deliver the business plan across your organisation. Catalyst for Change Identify profit and cash initiatives: Combine your financial knowledge, commercial awareness and business relationships to identify opportunities that improve financial performance;Oversee and drive business change: Lead and oversee change initiatives that deliver the key objectives within your business plan;Finance transformation: Design and implement a medium-term collection of finance projects that deliver a pillar of your company’s key strategic objectives;Restructure business operations: Deliver significant business change such as merging operations and carving out business units. In addition, consider restructuring teams, integrating new businesses and outsourcing processes; andMonitor effectiveness of change: Regularly monitor the impact of change initiatives against your intended targets and implement any mitigating action to deliver the planned outcomes. Fundraising and M&A Identify and evaluate opportunities: Work with your management team to develop your fundraising and M&A strategy. Also, understand the components of value creation, identify opportunities and create investment cases. Accordingly, determine returns on investment and de-risk your activities;Perform valuations: Build valuation models using a range of approaches. Determine valuation ranges and returns on investments. Assess the transaction's impact on your financial model and its value for money;Fundraising: Lead fundraising rounds and negotiate terms. Co-ordinate advisors, manage stakeholders and complete deals;Making acquisitions: Perform a key role in acquiring companies and assets. Lead the deal process, work with advisors and integrate acquisitions; andExit readiness: Implement the necessary actions to prepare your business for an exit and play a key role in the sales process. Leadership Lead your finance function: Determine your purpose, structure your finance activities, shape the team and deliver your responsibilities;Become a C-Suite business leader: Enable the vision and set the right pace. Share the bigger picture, monitor activities, collaborate, keep people informed and help people to succeed;Manage people: Determine your people plan throughout the business life cycle. Accordingly, recruit, manage and motivate your workforce. Align your teams and create self-leaders;Drive the culture: