Brian Veloso, Managing Director at SAP Concur Canada
The C-suite is a tough crowd to sway. Each leader in the business expects finance to demonstrate tangible value and earn their buy-in for growth initiatives. As Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) take on new responsibilities – spanning risk management, transformation, and organisation-wide financial direction – they must understand how to appeal to top management.
This year, the annual SAP Concur CFO Insights survey captured perspectives from leaders in finance, HR and IT*. Its findings reveal key C-suite challenges that finance leaders can address through cross-functional collaboration. These are our recommendations for how they can position themselves as strategic partners and win support across the C-suite.
- Sharing responsibility for growth
Canadian finance leaders face pressure from persisting economic challenges like the cost-of-living crisis. According to SAP Concur data, half (50%) rank worsening economic conditions among their top three external business challenges.In response, nearly eight in ten are focused on optimising costs and efficiency to drive growth (80%).
Yet, there’s a disconnect about who should lead that growth. While most global CFOs (81%) believe they are the primary driver, only 9% think growth leadership should be shared. Nearly a third (28%) of Senior Vice Presidents (SVPs) in finance believe the CFO should share responsibility for growth across the C-suite, while one in five (20%) say they should support – but not lead – growth efforts.
A reluctance from CFOs to collaborate could limit the ability to secure buy-in for new initiatives. By broadening ownership of growth across the C-suite, for example, through embedding growth metrics into other teams’ key performance indicators (KPIs), they could engage passive stakeholders. A collective approach to growth aligns departmental priorities and can accelerate initiatives for efficiency, such as new AI investments.
- Strategically supporting talent issues
While finance leaders highlight optimisation, the majority (83%) of Canadian HR leaders rank employee experience as a top priority. Yet only 58% feel they have the necessary resources to achieve it. The assumption for many CFOs is that HR leaders need increased budgets – but SAP Concur data suggests they need more than financial support.
Canadian HR leaders rank strategic support like financial workforce planning insights (75%) and help to develop impact metrics for HR initiatives (50%) as larger priorities than increased budget allocations (50%).
Aligning HR and finance on shared goals and KPIs more often will help businesses overcome collaboration blockers. Half of HR leaders would like to see more cross-functional working groupsand regular meetings (58%). By improving collaboration, finance leaders can become a key enabler of HR’s success – and build stronger cross-functional buy-in.
- Collaborating on cybersecurity initiatives
Businesses are under pressure to strengthen their cybersecurity defences: According to IBM, the average cost of a data breach was $4.88 million in 2024. Canadian finance heads recognise the urgency – with 27 % ranking cybersecurity threats among their top five external challenges.
However, SAP Concur data suggests there’s confusion over who should take ownership of threat mitigation. While 47% of Canadian finance leaders believe cybersecurity should sit solely with IT, 100% of IT leaders believe it should be a shared responsibility with finance.
Despite the potential misalignment, Canadian finance leaders remain confident that their growth plans will proceed as planned(43%) or adapt to cybersecurity priorities (47%). To ensure progress, they must work closely with IT leaders to align security investments with business objectives.
Canadian CFOs can ease the tension by prioritising cybersecurity in financial planning, as ranked as important by67% of IT leaders. They can also implement more flexible budgets for cross-functional projects to strengthen partnerships. This will earn support from Chief Information, Security, and Technology Officers – and drive safer, more sustainable growth for the business in 2025.
The survey’s findings demonstrate that HR and IT leaders want to collaborate more closely with finance – but misaligned priorities stand in the way. And while CFOs are critical in driving efficiency and growth, they can’t do it alone.
By embracing a cross-functional approach, finance leaders can strengthen partnerships across the C-suite. They can also target growth, and tackle talent and cybersecurity challenges as a united front – building a more competitive business in 2025.
*SAP Concur surveyed 350 chief financial officers and senior finance leaders, 115 HR leaders and 115 IT leaders for its latest CFO Insights report.
The research, conducted between December 2024 and January 2025, covered Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Japan, Mexico, the United Kingdom and the United States.
