Commercial Finance Manager in F500 - Good career?

Hello everyone,

I've done some research,
And I like the idea of becoming a commercial finance manager in a firm. I like the idea of managing a P&L and to be able to advise management on performance of products, what causes losses, KPIs, etc.

My questions:
- Is Commercial Finance manager a good career? I know it's not Finance in the markets sense of the term, but is it a good career track? Where does it lead to? What are the exit opps, etc (I would think its an exit opp itself)

- How do you get to such a role? Would you have to become an accountant and work for BIG 4 Audit first? (Although I don't see this as being relevant to being in commercial finance).

- What is the entry level role in an organization which might lead to becoming commercial finance manager?
What team are they part of? Financial Planning and Analysis? Or is that different?

- Finally is it overall an interesting role in reality?

Many thanks
Nick

 

Here's what I know, as someone not in the industry. Also keep in mind there are probably a lot more options/different paths than I know of - I know very little about commercial finance specifically.

IS IT A GOOD CAREER- That's up to you. It's all about whether you enjoy the work or not. You'll probably be working 50-60 hours per week for your entire career (sometimes less, sometimes more), so if you like it, it's a great career for balance and decent pay.

ACCOUNTING RELEVANCE- Accounting is relevant in every internal corpfin position. Not sure exactly how important it is in comm finance, though.

EXIT OPS- The exit ops are mostly going to be internal corpfin, either at your company or a different one. You can use an MBA to switch career tracks. There is no direct path out of corporate finance that I know of, maybe public accounting if you have your CPA.

WHERE IT LEADS- The ultimate goal (for those that want to rise to the top) is going to be CFO. Though honestly, a lot of people are happy sitting in a $100k/year job. Most F500 corpfin managers will make around that all-in, you'll probably start lower than that and end up higher than that.

HOW TO GET THERE- There are a couple of ways. The first is through an internal Finance Development Program (think similar to GE's FMP - might want to check out WSO's guide, it has a list of companies). If you're a top performer, you could make Manager in 5 years. Really depends on the company. Public Accounting is usually a good stepping stone into corporate finance positions, but for commercial finance I'm not really sure how that works. Might want to do a search for commercial finance manager on indeed or on specific company sites that you're interested in and see what the requirements are.

PATH TO MANAGER- At most companies you start at Finance Analyst -> Senior FA -> Manager. Some companies will be different, but that's generally the path. Expect 5-10 years to make manager at most places. Maybe less if you're exceptional.

TEAM- Not sure, but I think they'll be their own group within the corporate finance department.

INTERESTING- Someone made a great post a while back, which I can't find. It pretty much said every job is going to have boring parts and some bullshit you're going to have to deal with. Honestly, there's only one way to figure out if you like it and that's to try it.

Hope this helps, and make sure you take all this with a huge grain of salt. A lot of what I said is very generalized about corporate finance and commercial finance could be a completely different beast. And also, I can't stress this enough, remember that EVERY COMPANY IS DIFFERENT. Some will be similar for sure, but they all have their differences.

"You stop being an asshole when it sucks to be you." -IlliniProgrammer "Your grammar made me wish I'd been aborted." -happypantsmcgee
 

DM knows what's up. I'd echo most of what he said. I think you're going to need to clarify for us what you mean by "commercial finance" manager. Based on the job duties you're describing, I suspect that you're generally referring to financial management at a company. To me, commercial financial management sounds like being a manager/director at a financial company, but I could be wrong. I'm going to address your post as though you want to pursue financial management. Keep in mind that like DM, I'm not technically in the industry yet. I worked for a year before getting a masters of accounting and will be starting at a Big 4 next year.

Good Career: How do you define good? If good career means making what most people consider great money (at least 6 figures, likely 150-200k if you're solidly above your peers, and much higher if you're lucky enough to reach executive/director levels) while still having a reasonable amount of time for activities, relationships, etc. that make you happy, I think corp fin is a great choice. For me, having time to pursue my interests and family/friends was more important than retiring with millions, and was a big reason why I've almost completely given up the idea of being a banker, even though the valuation/modeling aspects intrigue me. If you genuinely enjoy the tasks you discussed (KPIs, budgeting) and don't mind doing some accounting/reporting, I think it'll be a great fit for you. Don't go in expecting to retire by 40, however.

Exit Ops: Like DM said, a lot of the exits will be in internal roles within the company. If you're a high performer, the company will be willing to move you around. One of our family friends is high up at a tech company as an accountant and told me that he could likely move into a marketing/finance position if he wanted to (he chose not to because he likes where he's at). Furthermore, once you gain experience, you can transition into other industries and face new challenges. Finally, not all internal roles are the same and they vary across companies.

If, for example, you are doing too much accounting day to day and want more finance, there's a good chance you can jump to another firm and get that exposure you want (assuming here that your firm isn't honoring an internal transfer request). If you are a controller at a large multinational company and want to be a bigger part of the organization's overall plans, you can lateral to being a controller of a smaller company where, by necessity, you'll be a greater part of the organization's overall strategy. Ultimately, the goal is to move as high up within a company as possible, as DM mentioned. If you want to do PE/HF/VC, it'll be tough to make that jump, even with an MBA from MBA business schools ">M7, without deal experience at an IB.

How to get there: As DM referenced, I'd say the best order is FLDP (or equivalent)/Big 4 accounting. I may be biased because I will be going the Big 4 route, but for me, the reasoning was that I wanted exposure to a variety of business models/industries and it'd be easier to do so at a Big 4 than starting out in corporate. Plus, doing the Big 4 would make it easier for me to get my CPA and would give me a great base in accounting, which I believed would be crucial for other roles. That being said, I struggled mightily with my decision.

If you get an FLDP from a company you really like and could see yourself working for long-term, I'd actually argue that is better than Big 4. The reason is that as an FLDP, you'll get to experience a variety of roles/responsibilities within an organization (so it's similar to Big 4 in that regard), but firms generally would prefer to hire a high-performer internally than a high-performer externally ceterus paribus. Both paths, I believe, would lead you to where you want to go, but the rest depends on you and what value you can demonstrate to your employer.

I'll let more experienced people comment on the other questions, but those are my thoughts having made a similar decision not too long ago with your same goals in mind. Hope it helps even a little bit (although I mainly regurgitated what DM said)!

EDIT: Wow, I just wrote my life's story on here. Sorry about the wordiness!

 
Lester Freamon:

For me, having time to pursue my interests and family/friends was more important than retiring with millions, and was a big reason why I've almost completely given up the idea of being a banker, even though the valuation/modeling aspects intrigue me.

Hey, this is off-topic, but have you looked at actuarial positions? Very math intensive and involves a lot of modeling, but only 40 hours a week. However, you do have to pass the exams which may (or may not) take up a lot of your time.

 
Best Response

Sorry, very quickly skimmed the 2 previous posts, so it may be repeated...

First off, based on very limited job opportunities that I've been approached for that are similar to what you mentioned, I don't think Commercial Finance Mgr would be the same as a traditional FP&A/corporate type role, which is not a bad thing. I'm not certain, but it may not even report up through Finance/Accounting -- it may have a separate group or it may be in more of an internal operations group. I get the sense that you would be doing more analyses/strategic-type work for a specific group/product which will likely involve tracking/forecasting specific metrics, opposed to just P&L numbers. I think this is a more common position within a company that has products/distribution... for example, a CPG/Beverage company. Again, just a guess. I'd imagine that if you're interested in that type of role, there are a few paths: 1) start at the company and work your way up (probably your best bet), 2) start in Big4 --> Sr Analyst --> Mgr, or 3) start in another finance-type role and hope to lateral at the Mgr level. #3 is likely more difficult because I tend to find that CPG/Beverage companies tend to favor people with experience in the industry, as opposed to an industry-switcher. Personally, i think it would be a pretty interesting role -- my advice would be to find an industry that you're interested in and try to develop an expertise.

 

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