September 2017 - The CIO-CFO relationship is a critical part of achieving IT’s objectives. The CFO controls the purse strings, which can impact the CIO’s ability to honor existing service commitments. In this Executive Brief, Novarica identifies eight practices for CIOs to nurture a better partnership with their CFOs.

The foundation of this partnership comes from establishing regular contact, including discussion of issues relevant to finance in a way that non-technical executives can comprehend. It is possible to build on that foundation by demonstrating competency with long-term plans, implementing strong sourcing practices, and running IT as a business. Additionally, the relationship can be maintained by collaborative decision-making and offering support to finance objectives and operations.

This checklist is designed to help insurer CIOs define and develop a mutually beneficial and collaborative relationship with the CFO in order to advance IT goals and initiatives.

The Checklist

• Engage regularly.
• Speak their language.
• Explain emerging technology.
• Support long-term planning.
• Understand OpEx vs. CapEx impacts.
• Create service-level metrics.
• Support finance’s technology needs.
• Adopt sourcing discipline.