With business acumen and deep skillsets, the modern CFO and the financial team are strategically poised to lead the charge toward data-inspired strategy. By recognizing and acting on new data opportunities, they are ready to drive enterprise-wide growth and business performance.

1. The Data-Inspired Transformation Continuum
Integration of Assets/
Transactional Data
Foundational
Business Insight
Predictive Insights
On-Demand
Insights in Action
Enterprise-Wide
Truth and
Meaning
from Data
Driver of Data-Inspired Insight
and Enterprise-Wide Growth
The New CFO
Deal size
growth
Increased
retention
shorter
sales cycles+15%
increased
sales opportunities
+32%
Increased sales productivity
improved
customer service
+5%
Transparency
& Foresight
By recognizing and acting on new data opportunities,
they are ready to drive enterprise-wide growth and
business performance.
With business acumen and deep skillsets,
the modern CFO and the financial team
are strategically poised to lead the charge
toward data-inspired strategy. No longer
limited strictly to financial oversight, CFOs are
operational and efficiency experts and the
proven commanders of systems and data.
THE CFO’S DATA CHALLENGE
In today’s competitive and global economy, an effective data-driven strategy is a
necessity. Successful CFOs understand the value of enterprise-wide data, but many
of their companies still struggle to connect the dots.
THE CFO’S DATA OPPORTUNITY
Embedding data insight into the workflow, and making it accessible
enterprise-wide, is what enables growth and drives results across all business functions.
of companies are
challenged to find new
sources of growth.
86%
of companies qualify as
“Highly Mature”
data users.
2-5%
THE CFO’S MISSION:
Data-Inspired Strategy for Enterprise Growth
CONNECTING THE SILOS:
Linking Data-Inspired Relationships
The new CFO must proactively build a data-inspired strategy
that will deliver real business growth and a compelling ROI. CFOs
must align the overall business benefits with a validation of
resource commitment, while bringing stakeholders together, prioritizing
opportunities and providing a framework for decision-making.
Data-Inspired Growth: Key Components
Building a Data-Inspired Business
Strategic
New capabilities
and improved
competitive position
Financial
Costs, benefits and
impact on business
performance measures
Technical
Benefits to
IT infrastructure
and support for
technology strategy
Operational
Process
improvements
Discovery Process
Documentation
Organizational
Alignment Meeting
Present your plan
to other leadership
STEP 1 STEP 2 STEP 3 STEP 4
(Aberdeen Study for Dun & Bradstreet, May 2012)
By leveraging strategic collaborative relationships, the CFO can link data-inspired
connections across the enterprise to unleash new and unified opportunities for growth.
CEO
Combine intuition, data
and sound business
strategy to mitigate risk
and realize the best
opportunities.
HR
Merge systems knowledge,
operational efficiency and
analytics to better engage
company culture, while
improving training and
managerial decision-making.
Sales
A shared commitment to
profitable customer
relationships and revenue
generation. Use data and
analytics to focus on
growth opportunities while
avoiding slow-paying or
low-value deals.
Marketing
Exchange product and financial
insight with customer and
prospect data, providing for
powerful campaign results and
segment forecasting that will
drive growth and profitability.
Supply
Collaborate to utilize
mutually available data
sets that can create
superior insight to select,
maintain and invest in
the highest-value
supply relationships.
IT
Maximize value and
growth ability by uniting
toward data-inspired
decision-making, efficiency
and automation, while also
ensuring technology is being
used to its full potential.
Dun & Bradstreet is your partner on the data transformation journey. We deliver compelling
insights to solve your most pressing business challenges and help you find more ways to grow.
Visit www.dnb.com/cfo to learn more.