The Intersection Between Finance And Business Is Where It Got Interesting

So here I am having a landed a new role as a business controller in one of our business units, Maersk Drilling, and I’m starting the month before year-end. It’s not fully clear to be exactly what I’ll be doing due to how I ended up there (read more about that in previous week’s article here).

I try to simply learn from the others and help where I can. It was a quite different job because the detail level and documentation requirements that we should comply with were much more detailed. Still, it gave me an opportunity to learn about the systems, processes etc.

A few months into the role the company goes through a savings round where colleagues also in Finance are let go. It’s never a nice situation to go through and added to a chaotic start. How was I supposed to make all this a success? Well, all I could was to continue to offer my help where I could and be curious about what was going on.

That was key learning really which anyone can benefit from. Regardless of your situation always make yourself useful. Even if what you’re tasked with is not the most exciting task. Doing it well can open doors to more interesting work! 

From Finance to Business 

As I got more into the work it became clear that it was a much more business-facing role. I got to know some of the operations teams and helped during the budget process (my first real one). It lasted from May to November with some interesting visits to the frontline and nice budget dinners. I also learned how budgets were negotiated rather than being derived from a strategic plan.

In my previous role, I had only controlled financials and had little to no relationship with the numbers. This was different! The analyses we could do had a real business impact. For instance, I once did a benchmarking analysis that gave us new insight into spend developments on one drilling rig. It also revealed some questionable behaviour by a former leader of the drilling rig. The financial impact might not have been imminent from the analysis, but it clearly changed how the overall leader for the drilling rigs made decisions in the future.

We did lots of developments during my time there and professionalized our approach to management reporting (as even simple variance to the budget hadn’t been available before). Being able to explain what had happened gave me a real relationship to the numbers even though I was still far away from the action still being in an HQ function. 

No Relationship no Impact 

This perhaps was the most important lesson for me moving from financial controlling to business controlling. As a financial controller (at least in my specific context) you have no impact on the business. You simply report and explain to auditors the soundness of the numbers. To me, that was not that interesting.

As a business controller not only do you get a relationship with the numbers, but you also get the opportunity to impact the business. That’s simply because you’re now relating the numbers to business leaders and finance management as opposed to auditors.

Still, to truly impact the business you also need to go beyond business controlling yet, to begin with, we had no structured way of doing this. So while we had a seat at the table in most instances it was up to the individual to make it count based on their skills and experiences. This severely limited impact. I truly enjoyed the business controller role though and earned a promotion halfway through it.

In today’s finance function you must have an impact otherwise your job scope will be more and more limited in the future. You risk entering a negative spiral where you’re not doing work that really matters. So to have an enjoyable career reflect upon how you can impact the business in your role. If you don’t see a path to impact, then perhaps it’s time to take a chance. How are you impacting the business in your role?

This was the fifth article in the series "My Early Career Lessons From A Decade In Finance & Accounting". You can read the previous article(s) below.

My Early Career Lessons From A Decade In Finance & Accounting

The Purpose Defining Moment In My Finance Career

Are You Looking For A Finance Job Or A Finance Career?

Here's Why You Should Take Charge Of Your Career

You can read a lot more articles about FP&A, Business Partnering, and Finance Transformation below. It all start's with “Introducing The Finance Transformation Nine Box” where you set the ambition for your transformation. You should join the Finance Business Partner Forum which is part of the Business Partnering Institute's online community where we will continue to discuss this topic and you can click here to follow me on Twitter.

Your Journey To Successful Business Partnering Explained

How To Create Value Through Business Partnering

Everyone Can Adopt A Business Partnering Mindset (part of a six-article series about FP&A Business Partnering)

From Business Partner To Working Within The Business (part of an article series where I interview finance professionals about their careers in FP&A and Business Partnering)

Is Your Product Optimized For Value Creation? (part of a toolbox series where we look at what tools FP&A professionals should leverage to drive value creation)

How Business Partners Turn Analysis To Insight (part of case study series where I interview business partners about how they drive value creation using real cases)

The Future Of FP&A: Two Ways To Take The Reins

What Is The Accounting Profession Paradox?

What Defines A Finance Master?

The New Career Path For Finance Professionals

How Finance People Can Be More Successful

The CFOs Roadmap To Transforming Finance

How To Become A Finance Business Partner

Financial Analyst vs. Finance Business Partner

Finance Business Partner Is A Bullshit Job

How Business Partners Keep A Plan On Track

Anders Liu-Lindberg is a Senior Finance Business Partner at Maersk supporting our largest product and I have more than 10 years of experience working with Finance at Maersk both in Denmark and abroad. I am also the co-founder of the Business Partnering Institute and owner of the largest group dedicated to Finance Business Partnering on LinkedIn with almost 8,000 members. My main goal at Maersk is to show how to be successful with business partnering and drive value creation as a trusted partner. I am the co-author of the book “Create Value as a Finance Business Partner” and a long-time Finance Blogger with 39.000+ followers.