2012 donor acknowledgement.

• Author: Hollein, Marie
• Position: Financial executives research foundation

Message to our contributors:

The mission of Financial Executives Research Foundation (FERF) is to advance the profession and practices of financial management through research and education. FERF's research is developed by financial executives for financial executives. Each month, our research committee--comprised of practitioners like you--reviews new research proposals and drafts of new research reports, ensuring that our work can be applied in practice. We value our 68-year tradition of delivering useful knowledge to the finance profession and to the members of Financial Executives International (FED.

Over the years, FERF has adapted its model to develop and deliver relevant research in the timeliest manner. This year, FERF published 40 original, member-driven research reports and magazine articles. All FERF reports are provided FREE to all U.S. FE' members in PDF format. These reports and articles include timely topics that senior-level financial executives should understand, including The Cloud, continuous monitoring, business analytics, "disclosure overload", social media, as well as compensation and audit fees.

More importantly, we have expanded our research beyond the United States. Taking our lead from FEI's strategic plan to provide global thought leadership, the CFO Quarterly Outlook Survey continues to poll CFOs from France and Italy in the second year of its 12 year history, so that we could compare the perspectives of European CFOs to those of the U.S. While, FERF's Benchmarking the Finance Function included senior level financial executives from France and Japan.

This year, to leverage the convenience of social media, we launched a Research Blog, to allow members to comment on recent research reports and suggest new research topics. And to encourage dialogue between practicing FEI members and academic members, we launched the Theory Meets Practice Community of Interest with a discussion on "disclosure overload."

FERF research is made possible through the voluntary contributions of our primary constituents--senior-level financial executives, their companies and the FEI chapters to which they belong. FERF staff, with the guidance of our Development Committee, increased communication of FERF value and provided metrics to chapters on FEI member use of FERF products and services. A number of chapters have increased their support to show their appreciation for this demonstrated value. Moreover, the FEJ Hail of Fame continues to...