Where Do I Find A Great Finance Business Partner?
The answer to this one is fairly straight forward for me….they are right in front of you!
I am a massive believer that the people who make the best finance business partners are already in your organisation. You do not need to go external to get them.
Why? Because the best finance business partners in any organisation have three things in common.
1 They understand the business very well and from a strong commercial perspective. That is hard to learn without months if not years in the organisation spending time with the commercial people in it. So you won’t get that externally, even if you hire industry experience. They may know your organisation theoretically, but its likely that, theory. Without context and deep situational knowledge that theory falls flat.
2 They have great relationships. With that, things work quickly and without friction. And that only develops over a long period of time of trust and relationship building. Again going external, you will be starting from ground zero getting that person to build those strong relationships.
3 They know the numbers, systems and processes back to front and they can source data at will. And if you have ever started a new job you know that takes months if not years to master (unless you have a team that does it for you).
So I say instead of looking external to find that superstar start to develop your internal options first and from a long way out.
They will know the business fairly well if they have been in it for a while. They will know the people and they will know where to get things from.
From that you are simply trying to give them exposure to develop their commercial acumen, and apply some new techniques around persuasive skills to get action from stakeholders. And that can be trained fairly quickly.
And if you are considering going external for a great Finance Business Partner think of Forrest Gump.
“Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get”
Which means you will likely have a 6-12 month lead time before you even know what sort of chocolate you got.