The CFO'S Perspective

Do You Need a Professional Services Firm for an Interim Hire?

When a key employee leaves, hiring a replacement is of paramount importance. But when it is going to take considerable time to find the right person to fill the vacant role or a hired replacement cannot start right away, an interim hire is used to bridge the gap.

So, who do you turn to when you need help with interim employment?

Hiring managers may ask, “Does it matter who we bring in to help us hire an interim position, anyways?” and “Do we need to spend much money to hire someone that we only plan on keeping around for a short time?” The ubiquity of staffing companies makes them an attractive choice for inexpensive hires in individual contributor roles. But what about interim executive leadership roles?

A role like the CFO position needs to be filled with an experienced professional who is ready to lead the organization. As CFO Magazine explains,

“Leadership voids are particularly perilous when it comes to the CFO position. CFOs are the ultimate utility players in an organization — they’re captains of detail orientation. They need to seamlessly interact with all parts of the company to gather and disseminate information. At the same time, they need to be a strategic thought partner with the CEO. Having this seat empty can cause the best of companies to stall. Interim CFOs keep a company in a safe pair of hands. They provide stability by offering critical financial reporting and business intelligence and moving key projects forward. Interim CFOs enable proactive companies to keep the momentum going. They also, maybe most importantly, allow them to take their time to find the right next full-time finance chief (vs. rushing to hire whoever is available at a moment’s notice).”

The importance of the CFO role begs the question, do professional services firms provide an advantage for these types of hires? What sets them apart from staffing agencies? And do these advantages justify their premium pricing?

Topics: Recruiting Hiring HR Change Management Interim CFO Transition

How is a CFO Hired?

Hiring for any executive leadership position can be a complicated process, but a CFO brings its own unique set of challenges. Organizations that downplay the importance of a thorough job description or attempt to rush through the steps can end up needlessly prolonging the search process or settling for a candidate that does not fit their needs.

Hiring a CFO hinges on writing an effective job description for the position that outlines not only the required qualifications for the role but also the expectations for someone acting within the role. And while this is a foundational piece of the search, it is only the first step in the process. Once the role of a CFO is defined, the active process of hiring a CFO begins. Each subsequent step must then be undertaken with an understanding of how it will build on previous steps and make additional progress toward finding the best candidate for the role. From identifying key decision-makers and setting a hiring timeframe to talking to a recruiting firm and evaluating your hire, each step is integral to the overall process.

So, how is today’s CFO hired exactly? Our executive search team answers your most common questions to explain the process.

Topics: Recruiting CFO Hiring HR Leadership Interim CFO

How to Write a CFO Job Description

Have you ever tried to find something when you could not adequately describe what you were looking for?

Imagine going to buy a pair of pants and when the salesperson asks what you are looking for all you tell them is “gray pants.” How long do you think it will take to find exactly what you are looking for? And how likely is it that you will end up getting tired and frustrated settling for something that is not really what you wanted? In this example, the best outcome is that you find the perfect pair of pants after an arduous search, and the worst outcome is that you end up with pants that fit poorly or are too formal or casual for your needs.

Now apply that same scenario to hiring and think about how difficult it is to find the right candidate for the role when you do not have a clear vision of what you are looking for and what your expectations are for the role. The difficulty is ratcheted up and the likelihood of a negative outcome is much greater.

When the role you are hiring for is a senior leadership position a bad hire can derail the company’s strategic plans. A CFO is in an especially critical role to support growth initiatives, making a hire into this role even more critical to the overall success of the organization. As a result, a job description for a CFO should be customized to fit the specific needs of the business and incorporate the nuances of the role.

Topics: Recruiting CFO Hiring HR CFO Responsibilities

What is a Fractional CFO?

When you want to hire a Chief Financial Officer (CFO) you can hire someone on a fractional basis or into a full-time position. But before trying to understand your options for hiring a CFO, you first need to get to the very nature of the role:

  • A CFO is the position at the top-end of the spectrum of financial leadership that is outward-facing and forward-looking.

Once you frame the role in this way, you can start deciding how much time you need someone focusing on that area of your business.

A fractional CFO is basically a part-time or limited engagement CFO. Depending on the company’s needs, a CFO can either perform ongoing high-level financial analysis and oversight on a less than full-time basis, or financial management during a specific challenge or across a predetermined time. However, a fractional CFO may not provide enough support for an organization with more extensive financial needs.

So, when is a fractional CFO a better fit?

Topics: Recruiting Search Services CFO Hiring Leadership

A Roadmap to Hiring a CFO

Hiring a Chief Financial Officer (CFO) is a daunting activity for many organizations. Understanding when to bring someone on board, what kinds of options are available to fill the CFO role, how to look for the best candidate, and what to expect after making a hiring decision are complicated topics that weigh heavy on many CEOs.

This comprehensive guide to hiring a CFO aims to answer the most common questions we hear when working with new recruiting and executive search clients to find a fractional, interim, or full-time CFO.

Topics: Recruiting CFO Hiring Staffing Leadership

The Convergence of Accounting and HR

Companies that understand how finance and HR overlap and foster a relationship between the two are better poised for long-term growth than their less informed counterparts. The reason behind this is simple – knowing when and how to leverage your CFO to assist with hiring and employee retention can improve profit margins, encouraging sustainable long-term growth. Additionally, encouraging collaboration between these two vital areas of the business improves workplace culture across the entire organization.

Topics: Recruiting Finance Accounting Trends Hiring Planning HR Leadership Budgeting Forecasting Strategy

A Practical Guide to Fractional Service Providers

Business owners in the middle market are all too familiar with the task of trying to optimize cost structures – getting the most efficiency and “bang for the buck” out of facilities, equipment, customer relationships, and many other elements of a successful enterprise. People have always been vital and important to businesses, but over the last several years, we have noticed a shift in attention toward people in a different way.

Searching for ways to optimize human capital, while fighting the inefficiencies of talent markets, is an ever-present challenge for businesses in the middle market. The human capital corollary to the engineer’s triangle (fast, cheap, reliable – pick two) seems to be availability, relevant experience, and compensation expectation.

An example could be a stable, modestly growing manufacturing business in a small town outside of a major metropolitan area in the Pacific Northwest. It has just outgrown the capability set of its hardworking bookkeeper and needs some expertise in setting up more robust financial oversight and reporting capabilities, but attracting capable, senior-level finance talent to its town with a handsome compensation package seems like overkill.

Topics: Hiring CFO Responsibilities Interim CFO

Options for Hiring a CFO

When your business gets to the point where it needs to hire a CFO, what are your options?

  • Full-time In-house
  • Interim Outsourced, virtual or in-house
  • Fractional Outsourced, virtual or in-house

These days a lot of organizations are looking to hire virtually, which makes “hiring a virtual CFO” a hot topic. Amidst all the remote work buzz it is easy to lose your focus and forget what you were trying to accomplish in the first place by outsourcing the role.

Topics: Recruiting CFO Hiring Staffing Leadership Growth Interim CFO Transition