Quickest Route to CFO or CIO
What is the quickest route to a CFO or CIO position (preferably at a Fortune 500 Company)? Is a financial analyst or treasury analyst position a good way to begin this pursuit, or would it be better to work in IB, ER, or Asset Management? What is the best qualification(s) for these positions: MBA, MSF, MSE, CFA?
Quickest Route to CFO or CIO (Originally Posted: 06/11/2010)
What is the quickest route to a CFO or CIO position (preferably at a Fortune 500 Company)? Is a financial analyst or treasury analyst position a good way to begin this pursuit, or would it be better to work in IB, ER, or Asset Management? What is the best qualification(s) for these positions: MBA, MSF, MSE, CFA?
CFO and CIO are very different.
I can only speak to my perception of becoming a CFO. I say perception because I'm not a CFO, but am in finance at a F500 company and have worked with a few F500 CFOs.
In my opinion the best starting points are probably: - Big 4 - Treasury Position - Management Consulting/IB - then transition to management (the transition to financial management may be tough) - Tax analyst - Financial Analyst
You can definitely become CFO from any position, but if I were targeting CFO these are probably how I'd approach it. I would approach financial analyst last only because you are at the lowest level with hundreds of competitors, you're chances of rising all the way to CFO seem exceptionally slim.
Note: I may be over valuing the treasury position due to recent experiences because our last 2 CFOs came from a treasury background.
The only qualifications that I'd bother with are CPA and MBA.
ER, Asset Management, CFA, etc... aren't extremely relelvant to being a CFO. You may be able to transition to a corporate role from these, but they're not directly relevant.
Again, this is only my $.02. Note that becoming CFO will require amazing success and a good amount of luck. You are literally be the top finance person in the entire F500 company and must play politics well along the way.
CIO is way different dude. I had a professor that is friends with a CIO... the CIO's job is to make sure data centers are running smoothly, working with suppliers to buy machines/servers/software, managing IT, implementing new projects, working with exec team to understand IT needs, working with IT team to understand IT's abilities. You'd probably need an IT/IS/Project Management background. Maybe an MBA to learn how to manage people. (again this is all from what my professor told me not from real world experience so take it with a grain of salt)
You are talking about a Chief Information Officer whereas the original post was (presumably) speaking of a Chief Investment Officer. Most companies have the former, typically only funds have the latter.
I would start by checking out cfo.com
Its respectable that you have such high ambitions, but how about you first focus on graduating school and then finding a job. After this, concern yourself with waking up every morning and doing well every day in your current role. After several months or a year or 2, then you can start to look at promotions and additional opportunities.
No offense man, but saying "I want to become CEO or CFO" of a F500 firm is probably not the best way to approach such success. That is a lofty goal that will require lots of skill and a little bit of luck. Follow the ancient proverb of in order to build a wall, you need to lay the first brick. If you keep stacking your bricks day by day, maybe you'll miss the CFO and find yourself a CEO instead.
Nice to have a long term goal/plan, but life typically doesn't follow according to plan. The most successful people will realize this, react to set backs, and learn to become dynamic individuals.
Best of luck,
great post
I imagine the path to CIO is something along the lines of investment management analyst -> PM -> CIO... My friend worked at a FoF last summer and he mentioned the CIO there started at GS, then did Pensions, the became CIO of the fund...
A ridiculously large number of CFOs in UK (or Finance Directors as they are called here) are ex-Big 4. The standard route here is:
3 year accountancy training at Big 4 -> Finance staff of companies -> Financial Controller -> FD of small company -> FD of big company -> FD of FTSE100
If one wants to be a CFO... (Originally Posted: 04/24/2011)
Hi,
I was wondering, if one eventually wants to become a CFO or other financial manager/executive at a F500 company, is I-banking or Big 4 accounting te way to go? Contrary to what I thought, someone I spoke to who is a controller at GE said that accounting is actually a solid entry into industry FP&A/financial management positions, plus, since controller is a common stepping stone before CFO, a lot of CFOs are former accountants. However, I-banking is typically more prestigious and leads to plenty of non-PE/HF exit opps in finance as well, so I was wondering if I-banking is still the way to go, if the Big 4 is better, or if they're roughly equal.
Why don't you look up the bios of CFOs of companies you like and see what they usually have?
I can see either as being viable. To be honest, I think accounting might be better.
Agree with Alexpasch. Look up bios. You'll find a good number of CFO's, controllers, and other high ranking finance professionals for Fortune 500 companies come from all sorts of different routes. However, it isn't a bad route to have an ivy league undergrad and be a partner at the Big 4 to become a CFO.
One of my professors said that when he moved from being a Senior Manager at the Big 4 to GE Capital that there was no one above him that wasn't from the Big 4.
less money in f500 than in PE and HF. keep that in mind
Because everyone in the world will be able to work in PE and HF... why discourage someone who wants to do something different... wouldn't you think he already knew this.....
Go big or go home.
EDIT: After reading OP's post I think he knows what he wants and it isn't PE/HF/$$$+.
I hope we are able to help him work for F500
deleted
After the 150k level, I really don't care much about money. PE seems interesting, but I also want to have a life outside work and it would be tough to do that in i-banking at senior levels or PE. Plus, there was one thread that said PE sucks unless you become the big boss and is more mind-numbing work with long hours till then, so I'm not sure how appealing that is. I have absolutely no interest in investing professionally, so hedge funds are a big no-no for me. Corp finance seems like a good compromise: decent pay, fairly interesting/important work at more senior levels, and better work-life balance.
accounting seems to be the most logical way to go
keep in mind, bios are fine, but they are backward looking and not as informative for you. the cfo of the future will not be a company's former controller (in fact the chief accounting officer role is distinctly separate nowadays).
As part of his/her activities, the current cfo takes a very active role w/ capital sources (equity/debt investors, ibankers, bank lenders, etc) and corporate investments/M&A. As processes become automated, the role of internal strategic advisor will supersede controllership. Strategically important growth initiatives (of paramount importance given the US's maturing economy/demographics/challenging macro "bau" external factors) that have value augmenting ramifications are the cfo's domain and will continue to be as likely no one else in the org can articulate effectively how a chosen path will be reflected in tomorrow's valuation of the company. This is evidenced by the many examples of ex investment bankers becoming cfos, without any accounting related intermediate step.
there's harvard business review articles on this whole trend away from controllership...
Do you have the name of the article(s)? I wouldn't mind reading it.
Thanks
Big 4 roles for a few years and a good MBA is never a bad way to go for CFO type stuff, especially for smaller companies.
Big 4 can give you great experience in just about every aspect of the CFO silo.
Big 4 is definitely the most common track. A few companies have internal tracks (eg GE and the Corporate Audit Staff), but Big 4 work experience is incredibly common, mostly audit. Actually, becoming the CFO of a medium sized company is one of the more common Big 4 exit opps.
I've seen executives come from a wide variety of backgrounds. I would say many of them have been with the same firm for over 30 years, though. So I think how long you've worked there is more important than what you've done in the past. Obviously, for a CFO position, you would have to be doing finance related work (not engineering, etc.).
You may want to consider TS/FAS at a Big 4. In my opinion, it's possible the best of both worlds. You get strong finance experience, but have the Big 4 name and can get a CPA. That's why I chose it over other options. The work can be pretty interesting depending on what group you get in.
So looking back, it seems like there are two common themes on this thread:
Big 4/Accounting can make you become CFO and its fairly common
CFOs come from a variety of backgrounds.
Since the later seems to be the greater trend, maybe it is best for me to still shoot for banking/consulting then since it will allow me to maybe become a CFO while still keeping my options open? I know for sure that I can't stay in high finance for a long time because I'm just not cut out for the hours over a >5 year term and I just don't care about making tons of money. Don't get me wrong, I'd definitely be willing to stick it out for 4-5 years to kick off my career, but it would be tough to maintain that. So would you recommend still gunning for banking/consulting? I didn't get into any BBs though, so does anyone know of any boutiques that might be looking at people or where I can look for the summer? All my local boutiques basically said no or that they aren't taking juniors
Before getting into this I have to ask, why are you so sure you want to be a CFO?
Both of those statements are correct, there are literally tens thousands of CFOs in the US (not to mention divisional CFOs at larger companies), and they have a wide range of backgrounds. Banking and consulting (especially consulting) are appealing to a lot of people because they allow flexibility in terms of exit options, however, management consulting to CFO is not actually a track I've seen. You've also glossed over a management/financial track in industry, which seems like it might fit what you're looking for. This mindset makes no sense to me. The first 4-5 years in finance are objectively the worst, hours-wise, and if you think you can't hack the hours later, why put yourself through it now if not the money? Knock yourself out, but you should make sure you apply to some "saftey jobs" like accounting, management tracks, etc. Not to be harsh but if you didn't get any offers this summer, you're fighting the odds for next year too, and there's no guarantee you'll get a Big 4 offer either. The name recognition of a lower boutique bank is not going to be as strong outside of finance as a Big 4 accounting firm, either.F500 CFO by 30? (Originally Posted: 04/27/2015)
Hi monks,
What's the best path in achieving this?
I will be completing a F500 internship this summer that will set me up to be hired for the company's FLDP program.
You would be lucky to be a director by 30, even CFO by 40 is very ambitious.
Basically impossible unless you somehow were a founding CFO of a start up, it grew wildly, IPO'd, made it to the F500 and you stayed as the CFO, which would be odd in itself because there's a big difference between a start up/VC stage CFO, one that could take it public and one that's a CFO for a public company.
To be a CFO you need to spend time in the various aspects of the finance department and see how things work, then manage people and processes and just get deep experience. If you don't know what you're doing and don't have the experience it's a really tough role. We've acquired multiple private companies that had CFO's who weren't much more than a chief controller who could deal with local banks but once the company gets to the big leagues you need to install a professional CFO.
Maybe shoot more for a divisional CFO role by mid to late 30's. I'm sure it's happened but I'd have to imagine it would be nearly impossible to be a F500 CFO before 40.
How about completing the FLDP then b school then start up CFO. After a couple of years jump over to F500
There are obvious exceptions to this, but generally no. Most people who rise to a CFO position do so from within the company at the F500 or other large company level (leave aside IB types of companies, that's just a different beast). Not always, but most of the time. Or they lateral from another company and jump up a level with regard to the size of the company. The CFO position of a large ongoing public company is more of a technical job (yes, obviously with strategy involved) where the skills are learned by working in finance/acct for a long time and learning how it works, and often how it works in that particular company. Most of the time someone's first CFO job is in a company that they worked at for a while and are internally promoted. I'd say it would even be odd for a Big 4 or MBB type to go right into a CFO role (maybe a step below with the promise that they're up next for the role) unless something were fubar'd and the CFO needed to rescue the company or they were very high up at the Big 4. But I don't really work with F500 types of companies but we've hired guys from F500's who didn't get the CFO role and left (were the Treasurer or a divisional CFO and the other guy got it, and they know that guy's going to be there for 10 years with no realistic shot of getting that CFO position).
As for start up CFO to an established public F500, not likely and they probably wouldn't want to. It's a different skill set. A private VC backed company needs a different type of finance person and personality than a big, already public company. They need to be able to establish the finance and acct departments, know how to implement processes, procedures and controls in a newer company, interact with VC's and raise capital and negotiate with them, be familiar with running a company with the capital structure a VC backed co has (for instance, rarely is there debt, which a public co CFO will almost always have), get a company ready for sale/IPO, be someone who can be an IPO roadshow guy (or sale roadshow and be familiar with and know how to sell a company) and be able to handle hockey stick style growth (hopefully). And that's exciting and the guy who thrives in that is most likely going to want to do it again and not just join a large established company. This is more of a role an IB or PE type would excel in, not that every start up CFO was a banker. And if the start up is successful, they probably cashed a decent check upon exit and can and want to stay in the VC world, don't need a large paycheck and are willing to work largely for another shot at a big exit. And VC's will want that guy back because it is a specific skill set and type of finance person. VC's usually push to have this guy hired not in the very beginning but after a couple of years when the company is a little established and they see an exit coming in a couple of years. If it's an IPO exit, they'll typically want a guy who has been a CFO who's gone public before and that the market knows and trusts. They'll bump off the guy who was the previous CFO or VP of Finance. And often that CFO will leave after a little while and let a public company CFO take over. Partially because it's a different skill set and also because that guy isn't excited by running a public company. There's a whole subset of CFO's who specialize in PE owned companies as well who don't expect to work there after an exit. Finance is a cost center, not a profit center, therefore it's more expendable.
One of the cool thing about being a VC backed CFO is that you can generally stay in the same area, most likely the Bay Area, Boston, NYC, Austin, etc. If you're a F500 CFO and the company is bought and you're out of a job or just want to leave for a bigger company, and therefore paycheck, there's a good chance you're uprooting your life and moving to another area because there are only so many F500 in any given area. That may not seem like a big deal when you're 22 but when you're 35/40 or older, are established personally in one area and have a wife and kids, it's a big bonus.
But like I said, this is all just "generally." There are many exceptions.
Second this, divisional CFO is doable (though definitely on the fast-track)
You'll have much better odds of becoming a lottery winner by age 30.
For fuck's sake, it blows my mind how old some you must think 30 year old people are.
ha i remember how far away 30 seemed when i was a youngin..
maybe he could start his own c-corp, name it "F500", and appoint himself CFO
yeah, that's a pretty absurd goal. The youngest CFO's i've met are late 40s, and the vast majority are in their mid-50s or older. this is an end of career role for very experienced ppl.
This has got to be a troll post
Not quite F500, but Burger King's exec's are extremely young - obviously the exception and not the rule.
This is the only guy I know of that actually made it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nanula
But what's more interesting is what followed his ridiculous success (as CFO of Disney and Amgen). Google at your own risk.
I forgot about him and hadn't seen the porn stuff. Why the fuck do guys do things like that?
Re the Burger King guys, they entered through 3G. Not that that's not impressive (probably more impressive, or at least from my finance bent pov), but it's very different from rising through the ranks of corp fin or a management training program and making it to the c-suite at their ages. I know the former CFO of BK (he left in 07 so I don't know what corporate iteration of BK that was) and he's about 107.
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