Turning vision into value.

• Author: Thomas, Joe
• Position: Visionary chief financial officers

Being visionary can enhance the profitability of your company - and the trajectory of your career

Conventional wisdom suggests vision is the exclusive domain of the CEO. But given the number of CFOs who have gone on to become CEOs over the last two decades - from Roger Smith and Robert Allen at multibillion-dollar corporations like General Motors and AT&T to Dennis Meteny at $400-million Respironics - a visionary CFO is a visionary CEO in the making.

A look at the best of today's visionary CFOs suggests they share four key attributes: They're long-term, strategic thinkers, not short-term, tactical thinkers. They look outward at external and industry trends to find new competitive space. They're technologically savvy. And they know how to "connect" with key constituents - both internal and external.

Thinking Caps On

Because of the tremendous pressure on the next quarter's results, it's sensible for a CFO to focus on the short-term preparation and presentation of results to management, shareholders and Wall Street. But there's much to gain by balancing this fiduciary responsibility and the role a CFO can play in shaping the company's results for many quarters to come. Ken Iverson, CEO of Nucor Steel, would likely argue that a visionary executive should maintain a constant long-term perspective and financial integrity, rather than an obsession with meeting analysts' expectations. Instead of merely reacting, CFOs can partner with the company's business unit leaders to formulate and execute an over-arching strategy to shape the future. For example, the CFO of a chemical company might determine the firm could improve margins by increasing its market share through a strategic acquisition. With an existing 28 percent market share in the worldwide production and sale of a particular specialty chemical, the acquisition of a competitor with a 12 percent market share would allow the acquiring company to increase prices in the long term. And because the combined 40 percent market share would not constitute a monopoly, regulatory approval would be assured.

Another example: The CFO of an electronics distributor might see that the company could improve sales force productivity by switching from manual order taking and entry to electronic commerce. However, the changeover could render 700 salespeople redundant. A purely tactical thinker would simply downsize the sales force by 700. Instead, a far-seeing CFO would take the long-term view.

First, he or she...