The yes men.

• Author: Millman, Gregory J.
• Position: Chief financial officers - Cover Story

Sure, financial executives sometimes have on an endeavor, or decline certain offers. But, as these three CFOs have learned, it's just as important to know when to green-light a project. The knack is in finding the placing your bets strategically.

For the past 20 years, corporate America has been high-stepping to the rhythms of two distinctly different drummers. As the first tapped the boogie-woogie tattoo of the flat, entrepreneurial organization, the second pounded out the steady pull, pull, pull beat of the disciplined oar crew. Their combined message was as clear as the voices in a schizophrenic's head, and almost as contradictory: Abolish bureaucracies, pry decision-making away from the center and fling it our to widely dispersed, entrepreneurial teams, but meanwhile keep the street current, let the analysts know what you're doing at all times - and don't ever, ever miss the numbers.

The pressures of these diametrically opposing demands concentrated most forcefully in the CFO's office. In the bad old days, the stereotypical CFO was the corporate cheeseparer, perpetually obsessive about niggling nothings, the architect of elaborate sluice and baffle systems designed mainly to prevent cash from flowing out. But money is power, and the new age of corporate management demands that power flow out for cash to flow in. So, while the cliche of the CFO as a corporate Dr. No is still pervasive, if the three CFOs profiled here are any indication (and we think they are), it's about as anachronistic as sleeve garters.

Paradoxically, controls are more important than ever. The prescriptive creed of shareholder value commands capital management above all things. But maintaining control now has more to do with saying yes than no. And the ability to say yes depends on fast access to critical, actionable information. These savvy CFOs have made themselves indispensable strategic decision-makers, in no small part because they're the information technology czars in their respective, fast-growing companies.

It's no slur to call them yes-men. Though they abhor surprises, they're no strangers to calculated risk, and they've all bet their careers on a single wild roll of the dice - but not until they made sure the dice were loaded in their favor. They're change drivers in their respective organizations. And what may be most remarkable about their style of financial management is that it seems impervious to distortion as it crosses industry lines. A retailer of Western wear; a cash management technology and contract service provider; and a Silicon Valley powerhouse would have nothing in common at all, were it not that their CFOs have independently discovered the same principles underpin success in each business.

HIS PERSONAL SUPPORT

Larry Carter, CFO, Cisco Systems

When Larry Carter was interviewing for the CFO slot at Cisco Systems several years ago, one of the board members remarked the best CFO the company had ever had was its first one. "He really knew how to say no," the boardie noted with a voice full of admiration. Carter was nonplussed. "I told this board member that saying no was easy. What was difficult was knowing what to say yes to.

"He got the job anyway.

It wasn't the first time Carter had run against the grain of stereotypical expectations. In fact, he'd more or less made a life work of bucking conventional wisdom. Born and raised in the small, copper-mining town of Miami, Ariz., he grew up in a family of miners, and learned early that if he wanted anything, he'd have to pursue it, hard. "We never had much money," he recalls.

Carter started working when he was a boy, riding a bicycle on a paper route. As he grew, so did the jobs; he painted houses for a while, and even helped out in a veterinary hospital...