A new Finance Trends survey by Protiviti, released yesterday, confirms what many CFOs already know — that data means everything in finance. The specific data priorities this year, however, are revealing — the security and privacy of financial data has climbed to priority number one, a concern no doubt driven by increased use of finance cloud applications. It is followed in importance by financial planning and analysis and enhanced data analytics — a natural tandem, as finance executives seek to harness the volumes of data produced by digital systems for improved planning and forecasting, often through the use of new technologies like machine learning and artificial intelligence.
We will be analyzing the findings in deeper conversations with our experts in the coming months. Meanwhile, we encourage you to read the survey and think how your finance organization’s priorities compare to those in our survey.
For a quick look at top trends, click on the infographic below or watch our video.
Learn about Protiviti’s Finance Transformation services and read related blog posts on The Protiviti View.
I’m curious to what extent this trend will [continue to] affect curriculums at forward-looking universities.
Is it enough to incorporate data analysis into finance classwork and offering deeper dives as optional electives, or should there be a baseline of courses dedicated to topics such as data manipulation methods that serves as a pre-requisite for obtaining one’s degree?