Financial Management

1Partner in Driving Performance and Value

“Try not to become a person of success but rather a person of value.”

—Albert Einstein

Financial management, financial planning and analysis (FP&A), and other financial business partners (FBPs) play important roles in the overall success of any enterprise. In this chapter, we will introduce the critical value-add activities that contribute to becoming a “Partner in Driving Performance and Value,” and we will preview the contents of the remainder of this book.

WHAT IS A FINANCIAL BUSINESS PARTNER?

I define an FBP as those individuals or teams that support the business in achieving goals for performance, and ultimately, value creation. In this text, I have chosen the label FBP rather than FP&A. FP&A is somewhat limiting and the role of FP&A varies from organization to organization. Much of what we define as a FBP occurs outside FP&A, for example, merger and acquisition (M&A) support, Capital Investment evaluation, financing, and so on.

Finance wears many hats in most organizations. These include varied responsibilities such as transaction processing, statutory compliance, financial control, and financial reporting. While these areas represent important functions and activities, they are not considered value-add activities by most nonfinancial senior executives (until they break!). This book will focus on the value-add finance roles we describe as the FBP. However, finance cannot function at this level unless the core elements ...