The panel's mission was challenging: Define ways that finance chiefs have become corporate agents of change -- using technology's new tools while evading its new threats."

To truly be a change agent, said Lynn Good, CFO and group executive of Duke Energy, "you build a bridge of trust" from finance to the rest of the company. That calls for spending more time with the operating groups, and tapping them for cost-saving, revenue-raising, and other suggestions, while letting them know that their proposals will be considered.

"There's a wealth of great ideas," she said. "My role is seeing what we can afford."

At last month's ninth annual MIT Sloan CFO Summit, held in Newton, Mass., the "bridge of trust" approach resonated with fellow panelists John Martin, executive vice president and CFO of Time Warner, and Bruce Besanko, CFO of OfficeMax. And so did her suggestion that finance chiefs must be the ones to draw the lines. And all offered examples of how to fulfill both roles.

Chief Skeptics Officer

Indeed, said Besanko, in addition to building up trust with operating groups -- and with the CEO, as well -- he thinks that "being chief skeptics officer is one of my roles" at OfficeMax. When ideas are presented for consideration, the CFO must "make sure there are good business plans behind them," and that they reflect both customer needs and earnings-producing rigor.

"There's a fine line between being a skeptic and being a cynic," he noted. But when he reads of the failures of companies to follow through on great business plans, he said, "I look at the cases and wonder where the CFO was."

Because finance chiefs have command of the company's data, Besanko added, "the CFO is in a unique spot to provide that level of transparency to the CEO," filling something of an "honest broker role." And that's why the finance chief often is well placed to move a company out of a position of inertia. "Sometimes it takes rocking the boat a little bit," he said, "so that's what I like to do."

To get the most positive impact out of any CEO-CFO disagreements, added Duke's Good, "the earlier you can weigh in [with your concerns] the better off you are." She added, "If he gets way ahead of you, and has taken it to the board level, it's going to be very difficult."

Savings at Time Warner

Time Warner, of course, in the last decade has faced more than its share of problems requiring CEO-CFO candor, John Martin noted. In the wake of the troubled merger with AOL, it was forced to take a $100 billion goodwill writedown several years ago. These days, Martin said, he is involved with cost-saving efforts that also involve tapping employees for ideas and support in much the way Lynn Good discussed.

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