Abstract
The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) plays an increasingly important role in corporations. While apparently omnipresent in today’s business practice, research has yielded remarkably limited insight into the role, prerequisites, and key success factors of CFOs. Similarly, practitioner publications frequently provide guidance for CFOs, but generally focus on anecdotal evidence. The present chapter contributes to filling the gap in our understanding of the CFO. On the one hand, it traces the development of the CFO function from its inception to present, linking key changes how the function is perceived and filled to market imperatives. On the other hand, it addresses the current state of the function, in particular the responsibilities the function has grown to comprise and its increasing strategic involvement.
All views expressed in this chapter are those of the chapter and do not necessarily represent the views of The Boston Consulting Group.
The authors would like to thank and acknowledge reseach support provided by Vera-Maria Pitot, Kerstin Hobelsberger, Martin Link, and Dr. Dirk Schilder.
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- 1.
It is noteworthy that Zander et al. (2009) do not find a stand-alone impact of tenure on CFO turnover.
- 2.
The Total Shareholder Return (TSR) reflects the return of a stock to an investor including capital gains and dividends.
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Farag, H., Plaschke, F., Rodt, M. (2011). Evolving Capital Markets and the Changing Role of the CFO. In: Hommel, U., Fabich, M., Schellenberg, E., Firnkorn, L. (eds) The Strategic CFO. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04349-9_8
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