According to a recent survey by Grant Thornton LLP, COVID-19 has forced chief financial officers (CFOs) to become “change agents” and “strategists” — while still overseeing their day-to-day finance responsibilities.
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Grant Thornton collected data for its survey — The 2020 CFO Survey Report — in two parts: It fielded an initial questionnaire in February 2020 when most U.S. workplaces were still open, unemployment was at record lows and the economy was on a positive trajectory; it then fielded a second questionnaire in May 2020 after the COVID-19 pandemic was in full swing.
The second questionnaire in May made it clear that the role of the CFO was expanding in new directions — with 42% of CFOs spending as much as half their time in a “strategist” role. This represents a 13-point increase compared to the February survey.
Moreover, 41% of finance leaders said in May that COVID-19 was causing them to spend as much as half their time serving as a “change agent” who measures and manages processes and performance. This was a 6 percentage-point uptick from February.
In contrast, the number of CFOs spending more than half their time on control and compliance efforts dropped from 36% in February to just 8% in May. Similarly, only 9% of CFOs said they spent more than half their time handling transactional processes in May — a drop from 40% in February.
