Creating a vision for the future
The Future of Finance starts now. With the right insight and skills, we can be prepared to harness the dynamism and unpredictability of our future careers.
We have created this briefing as part of an 18-month global research project, exploring the future progress of the finance profession and its role in the wider organisational ecosystem. Through interactions with finance leaders, academics, and students, we examined and investigated the ambit of finance in a rapidly changing world, highlighting critical factors and the proficiencies necessary to our evolution and advancement as a profession.
Our conversations revolved around transformations that will shape the future of finance. Thus, we explored our participants’ lived experiences with digitalisation, sustainability, and workplace innovation practices. In this report, AICPA® & CIMA®, together as the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants, aim to create a composite picture of the finance function of the future. With more than 698,000 members, students, and engaged professionals, living in 188 countries and territories, we are uniquely positioned to interact with global stakeholders to investigate, analyse, and document how the finance function is changing.
This comprehensive global research initiative brings together evidence from interviews, roundtables, and surveys to offer insight into the evolution of our role in organisations and society. Thus, it illustrates our view on how the finance profession will develop in the future and lead the way to improving organisations and their contributions.
Organisational performance is no longer being judged purely on short-term financial returns to shareholders. Now, an organisation’s customers, workforce, and investors — as well as governments and society at large — all demand greater transparency beyond the traditional financial metrics. Finance functions are stepping up to meet the challenges that a sustainability focus presents. They realise it is no longer possible to continue with the unsustainable model of business as usual. Sustainability is fast becoming the lifeblood of resilient organisations.
Of course, our research indicates that the move to embed sustainability within organisations is not evenly distributed across all businesses, sectors, and industries. Adoption, however, continues to grow, requiring finance teams to fully embrace the sustainable stewardship role.
The sustainability agenda has moved the dial towards a multi-capital view of value and the need for multi-stakeholder interactions. As a result, management accountants must be able to participate not just in reporting how the organisation has created value, but also in co-creation of long-term value. An important aspect of this will be how an organisation measures and manages its intangible value that ultimately drives long-term success and profitability.
The finance function needs to understand that, in managing the business for the long-term, considering the needs of wider stakeholders ultimately generates return on investment to shareholders.
The United Nations Commission on Environment Development defines sustainability as follows:
Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.1
This focus on needs highlights an organisation’s impact on people, the planet, and prosperity beyond its financials and investment returns. Sustainable development and sustainability management are ‘change processes’, so to achieve successful implementation, the following requirements must be considered:
A comprehensive understanding of the sustainability drivers of change
A clear assessment of sustainability challenges organisations face
A vision of the changing finance function performance to meet the sustainability challenges
An understanding of the changing skills and behaviours financial professionals will need to meet the sustainability challenges
