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Company finance professionals should don many hats since they are required to be up to date not only with accounting but with all major functional areas of the company they serve, according to K. Vidhya Shankar, DGM & Company Secretary, Bimetal Bearings Ltd, Coimbatore.
They also face the onus of converting all data into financial terms since they have to visualise the future of the companies the work for.
Speaking at a Business Line club meeting, sponsored by Tamilnad Mercantile Bank Ltd, Tuticorin, at the A.J.K. Institute of Management here, he said the responsibility of finance professionals was not restricted to activities relating to accounting or budgeting or communicating with the auditors.
He said the task of analysing data and interpreting it correctly to ensure that the company was progressing towards the chosen goal also vested with them.
Vidhya Shankar said it was not enough if the finance managers fulfilled traditional role. They also should act as a "serious critic" of each of the functions carried out by the management.
He conceded that technology has made the job of finance professionals in compiling data a lot easier. However, their responsibility did not end with that. They were also expected to come out with significant value addition to enable the management understand its strengths.
He said the finance managers, apart from being well versed with the operational details of their companies, should also be multi-tasking experts, involved in diverse activities -from conceptualising to auditing. They are expected to don many hats and should not be content with just handling finance-related works that have become "more or less sedentary/routine".
Vidhya Shankar felt that since the companies were rated in terms of financial performance, the finance professionals should be skilled in converting all data into financial terms so that they are able to present a correct picture to their management.
He said they should not be content with keeping a hawk’s eye on financials alone. They should be able to visualise the future of their companies and understand the "nitty-gritty of the business" they oversee.
R. Amuthan, Director, AJK Institute of Management, Coimbatore, and S.S. Subramanian, Branch Head, TMB, Big Bazaar St. Branch, Coimbatore, also spoke.
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