Building A Team Of Finance Business Partners
Anders Liu-Lindberg
Leading advisor to senior Finance and FP&A leaders on creating impact through business partnering | Interim | VP Finance | Business Finance
Last week we discussed how to become a finance business partner and now we move on to discussing how you can build a team of finance business partners. This is pretty essential if Finance is to be successful with business partnering. Business partnering is not for everyone and especially for finance people who have traditionally been quite introvert and happy being deeply focused on the numbers rather than the people around them it can be a challenge to become a successful business partner.
Can’t I just hire a group of FBPs and get started?
Obviously, there’s not just one way to recruit or develop FBPs but let’s look at two dimensions. From within Finance vs. from the business and internally developed vs. externally recruited.
From within Finance: In my opinion, an FBP should be a fairly senior position in the finance function and not something you do right out of school. However, with all traditional finance tasks moving out of the frontline and nowhere to learn the basics of finance and accounting companies need to get used to taking in fairly junior people in FBP roles and training them from day 1. Ideally, you would have spent time in more traditional finance roles such as accountant, controller, and even finance manager prior to moving into an FBP role.
From the business: One of the most sought after traits when looking for FBPs is an understanding of the business which makes taking someone from the business into an FBP role a seemingly ideal fit. Typically you find two main challenges related to this 1) you might not be able to convince really good people to move from the business into Finance and 2) even if you are you will either only keep them for two-three years or you’ll be faced with the challenge that they need to obtain a finance degree for a long-term career in Finance. If you can accept those challenges and find effective ways of dealing with them then it’s an excellent choice to have some of your FBPs come from the business.
Internally developed: There’s a clear talent shortage when it comes to finding readymade FBPs (12 FBPs per posted job on LinkedIn vs. 40 for accountants and 59 for financial analysts) which stems mostly from the fact that most companies still aren’t that successful in their business partnering efforts. That also means that you often need to develop your FBPs yourself. To do this well you need to expose them heavily and often to the part of the business they support. Besides being part of all relevant meetings and being in charge of running the performance management cycle this might mean letting them spend two-three months as a sales rep or on the factory floor. Don’t expect them to be successful if they never get out in the business to smell the coffee!
Externally recruited: Now given the talent shortage it means that if you want to hire FBPs externally you’re going to pay big bucks for them. It’s really as simple as that. The companies that currently employ them have already invested heavily in their development and will not give up on these people easily. So if you want to hire them from the outside you should be prepared for a fight i.e. don’t bet on building your whole team like this.
To build a successful team you really need a good blend of all of the above and can’t just hire some FBPs to get you started. This means that you need a formal internal development program, a good perception of Finance internally to lure people from the business into becoming an FBP and great employer branding to attract outside talent.
Is it different from building any other team?
I think there are some dynamics that you need to be aware of when building a team of FBPs besides what you’re typically aware of when trying to build a team. The two main points I think are 1) you want people that are great at Finance (one function) and have a profound interest in the function they support (another function). The ability to apply a dual focus is difficult for anyone. 2) The talent shortage for these roles is not necessarily seen in all other functions although good people are always difficult to come by.
Have you ever tried to build a team of FBPs? What were your main challenges? Do you agree there’s a talent shortage of FBPs? Or perhaps as an FBP you’ve felt the talent war going on for you receiving multiple requests from recruiters or companies all wanting a piece of you? Regardless, I would be keen to hear from you and if nothing else I’ll very much appreciate your likes, comments and shares! You can find them below and you can also click here to follow me on Twitter.
I also encourage you to take a tour of my old posts on finance transformation and not least “Introducing The Finance Transformation Nine Box” which is really the starting point for the transformation. Last but not least, you should join my Finance Business Partner Forum where we will continue to discuss this topic.
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Case Study: Becoming A Finance Business Partner
The New Career Path For Finance Professionals
Why We Need Business Partnering Transformation
How Finance Can Help When Business Is Bad
How Finance Can Become An Analytics Powerhouse
How Finance Business Partners Improve Company Performance
There Is A New Kind Of CFO Needed In Town
Anders Liu-Lindberg is the Head of Global Finance PMO for Maersk Transport & Logistics and is working with the transformation of Finance and business on a daily basis. I have participated in several transformation processes such as a (business) finance transformation at Maersk Line, going Beyond Budgeting at Maersk Drilling and transformed a finance team from Bean-counters to Business Partners. I would love the chance to collaborate with you on your own transformation processes to help you stay out of disruption. Don’t be shy! Let’s get in touch and start helping each other.
How much time is needed to get a business person equipped with sufficient finance knowledge to act as a finance business partner? What would this list of competence or skills be?
With any high performing team it's key to have the right people, FBP included. Several times I've had finance professionals working as FBP leaving the finance team for jobs in business functions and I've been immensely proud. Not only did they excel in their business understanding, they also continued as our our finance ambassadors (partly under cover ;-))
CFO | Leader | ILM7 Qualified Executive Coach & Mentor
7ySome great points from Andy and I agree the mindset needs to be all finance as an "enabler" rather than simply as "do-er / reporter". This can require quite an organisational culture change and therefore needs visionary and articulate leadership from the CFO/FD to gain organisation wide acceptance. It is also important that senior FBPs possess strong "soft skills" so as to influence effectively whilst not being susceptible to turning native.
I train and coach Finance professionals, helping them to grow into business leaders and CFOs with successful, satisfying careers | Former Finance Director | LinkedIn Top Voice
7yI think if we can move towards a culture where everyone in Finance is seen as a business partner, there would be less of a leap for people into roles where business partnering is the core element. If I look at my own career, for instance, I trained in an audit firm and then went to work for Barclays with a job title of "Assistant Finance Manager". But effectively I became a business partner, not because I was told that's what I was, but because a) I was curious about how the business worked (so I naturally built relationships with people in the business); and b) I found it made our lives easier if we talked more with business colleagues. So instead of sending out budget templates, I would encourage the management accountants to go and talk to managers. Instead of just sending out accrual forms every month I asked the accountants to go and find out what each department was doing and what their spending plans were. Instead of the accountants passing "query slips" relating to reconciliation discrepancies via internal mail (yes it was pre email!) I told them to call weekly meetings with the operations team leaders. All of that is business partnering, but it involved the whole team, and I didn't have a single person with the title of "Business Partner".