Interim Chief Financial Officer — Recovery

Discipline that arrives before the plan does

Planning cycles reward whoever arrives with the most confident numbers, which is rarely the same as whoever has the best ones. The purpose of this interim appointment is to change the ground on which the next cycle is fought: to make cash and performance the common language, with measures that everyone accepts before the bidding starts rather than after. That is a timing problem as much as a technical one. Discipline introduced during a planning round is experienced as obstruction; discipline introduced months before it becomes the rules of the game.

Answerable to the Group Chief Financial Officer, the interim CFO holds executive authority over finance. That covers the rules for finance decisions, the sums local teams may commit without referral, and the measures that steer capital, people and control. You will rule on which commitments go on, are held or end, and stop any proposal whose cost or risk has no one answering for it. Spending requests that do not show how the change will be adopted, what it depends on and what the bad case looks like will be declined. Approval of the finance leadership structure and of how problems are raised sits with you; so does refereeing disputes with the heads of the business and deciding how often the board sees progress, exceptions and unresolved questions.

In asset management, the judgement is often about distinguishing necessary local practice from variation protected by history. One team's different treatment of a cost may reflect a real difference in how its products are distributed; another's may simply be how it has always been done. You will need to tell the two apart quickly and explain the difference in terms the business accepts. Good practice protects the controls that work, puts a cost on every exception, and leaves behind a stronger finance bench.

From agreement to a planning cycle run differently

By day ninety, you and the Group Chief Financial Officer should have settled who owns cash, how performance is measured and how finance decisions are made. Around month nine, commitments should have been tested against cash evidence ahead of the planning cycle, with those that cannot be supported paused or ended. By month 12, the next planning cycle should be run on the agreed cash and performance discipline, with exceptions and what they cost reported to the board.

A finance leader who reads local practice well

You have worked across four or more countries and can separate necessary local judgement from protected variation; the businesses concerned had revenue of at least $730 million and 1,000 or more people. You can explain unresolved gaps to the Group Chief Financial Officer without letting uncertainty become a delay. Selection will probe your record in culture reset, professionalisation and succession, and look for capital allocation at level 4 with risk judgement, FP&A forecasting, and controls and reporting each at level 3. If you would hold a finance commitment open until every national head approved its closure, or want influence without 12 months of accountability, this is not your seat.

The Group Chief Financial Officer meets you first, privately and on video, during the opening week. The Audit Committee Chair takes week three, working through the finance agenda with you; in week five a group of executives, one from each function, meets you in person; and week seven closes with the full board in session. Each stage is answered within three working days.