The world is changing at an ever quicker pace. We all know that. As a CFO, you’re affected by this as well. You’re met with more new demands today than you were yesterday. And let’s not even start talking about tomorrow. This is all part and parcel of steering the company in an unpredictable world. Keeping track of tomorrow’s trends and challenges is a must. Here are our tips and a few things to bear in mind and follow the development of.
As CFO, you play a key role in the company’s future and its ability to manage change. You need to show the way towards new business concepts and ways of working to streamline costs and identify business opportunities. If the company is still going to be around in 10, 20, or 30 years’ time, it’s vital that the CFO knows the company’s potential and the world around it.
By keeping track of the latest trends, you gain ground in the same way that insights and knowledge help you make decisions quicker and develop new initiatives and pairings.
Here are some examples of trends to think about and follow the development of. These are key trends and tendencies that have helped new companies reach new heights and caused scores of established companies to collapse.
The sharing economy is spreading
The emergence of the sharing economy has many advantages for both the B2B and B2C segments. As CFO, you can take inspiration from this in your reworking of business models. You could, for example, start up a development company jointly with another company or use the same platforms as others for product development or marketing. In this way, a number of capacity costs can be halved or reduced.
Drones
Drone technology has also gained a foothold in the market. It seems that drones are playing an active role not just in photography and surveying but also for distribution and health. CFOs should therefore consider whether drones could benefit the business or whether they will affect the operations of the company’s business partners and clients and thereby the company’s own operations.
Automation and bots
The automation trend is powerful throughout the world in terms of both manufacturing and streamlining workflows. Chat bots are an example of how you can optimise your customer service with talking bots that help customers along workflows. There are also bots that manage sickness benefits or approve invoices.
Technology has no value without people. AI, bots, and digital processes shouldn’t replace people but be used by people to make things better for individuals and for the company. To get the most out of technology and bots, it’s necessary to put in place workflows and the human management of them.
If new technology is to work as it should, the company needs to raise its level of digital expertise. Since the CFO is, in many cases, the initiator of new technology, they have – in consultation with the HR department – an important task: to safeguard employees’ skills development so that technical opportunities are utilised to their fullest. Consequently, the CFO plays a central role in digital investment, both internally within the company and vis-à-vis the market.
The flexible organisation
Despite the huge advances of digitalisation, the human factor is still crucial in most companies. This can be a problem now that the labour market is evolving so quickly. Today, employees require significantly more of their workplaces than before. They want challenges and they want to see the potential for development. Their work must also be flexible and meaningful.
In combination with the low unemployment levels of recent years, this trend is giving rise to a number of natural bottlenecks within companies. Companies are therefore increasingly finding themselves in a situation where a key person suddenly leaves their job, leaving a void that can take time and effort to fill. An obvious opportunity comes from hiring in temporary resources to relieve the burden and deliver results quickly.
Digitalisation is another possibility here. Investment can be painful for many companies, but in relation to the fight for employees, technology and bots present an obvious opportunity to solve the problems of bottlenecks while the company develops its business model. A third option is outsourcing certain tasks to a partner.
The new accounts
The climate and the green transition are high on the agenda, with more and more people paying attention to individual companies’ environmental initiatives. Therefore you should evaluate the potential of climate-friendly solutions throughout the organisation. Also consider whether measures and initiatives should be brought together in a separate environment account. More and more customers and investors want companies to be environmentally conscious. Some of the measures you use as a natural part of day-to-day operations could be used in connection with the marketing of the company.
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