Ernst & Young UK - Chief Financial Officer programme - Ernst & Young - United Kingdom

Based on a review of annual reports for the 2008 year-end period, a survey of over 250 European CFOs and discussions with business leaders of major European companies, this report examines how European companies have responded to the financial crisis in their 2008 year end reporting, addressing the crucial issues of liquidity, asset valuation and risk management. Read Reporting in adversity: financial reputation challenges for European companies  1.86 Mb

On October 2, 2009, The Economist held a one-day event, entitled The Performance CFO: Excellence in an exceptional climate  1.4Mb. With over ten sessions featuring high-level speakers and experts from a range of industries, the attendees considered the changing role of the chief financial officer and examined the outlook for the finance function in an uncertain environment. The articles in this paper highlight the themes and summarises these discussions with practical and realistic advice from top CFOs and leading experts.

Amid signs of economic recovery, we suggest in The future of finance  252K that CFOs establish and implement a holistic framework that identifies weaknesses and potential improvements, and which helps enable Finance to be more effective, lower costs and help deliver more value to the bottom line.

Since January 2009, we have been running our Opportunities in adversity programme to help businesses across the globe act decisively in the economic downturn. Since its launch, we have held some 40,000 meetings with senior executives. We asked them how the downturn was affecting their business, then gathered those insights into Lessons from change. Learn which eight strategic actions companies should focus on now.

In June 2009, we surveyed more than 300 senior finance executives across Europe, investigating the wide variety of actions that they currently are taking to secure, protect and advance the interest of their companies. To learn more, you can read our summary of the key insights and recommendations in our report, The CFO in adversity   958K

Recent research carried out by Ernst & Young and CFO Europe of 300 CFOs and senior executives in major European companies suggests that planning and forecasting processes are under real strain.  In this paper we identify eight common challenges concerning processes, systems and organisational alignment that need to be addressed. Whilst each challenge is important in its own right, companies rarely succeed in creating wholesale improvement without adequate consideration of all of them. Read Planning and forecasting in adversity – A guide for CFOs  900K, July 2009

This year’s analysis of working capital reveals that the 2,000 largest companies in the US and Europe could still have up to US$1 trillion of cash unnecessarily tied up in working capital – an amount which is equivalent to 6% of sales for these businesses. This annual analysis of working capital performance aims to help you reach a better understanding of how you can make your company’s working capital work for you. Download the annual working capital report for 2009.