Traditionally, CFOs have focused much of their attention on financial reporting, which means, in a sense, that they have been looking in the rearview mirror. A financial report summarizes performance over a previous period, or, as with the balance sheet, summarizes the state of the business at the end of a period.

For today’s CFO, of course, financial reporting is still critical. But technology makes it possible for the finance organization to get near real-time information about the company’s performance, and even to gather data on leading indicators—those that show how the company will perform in the future. As Jeannette Wade, CFO of Ascentria Care Alliance, says, “The role of the CFO has changed from being the keeper of the financial information to the driver of business change with financial information.”

A variety of business intelligence and analytical tools can help the CFO slice and dice this information, and even perform predictive analytics through new machine learning technologies. Data lakes and real-time streaming make it easier for the CFO to analyze information across business silos, business units, and even subsidiary companies to gain a complete picture of the enterprise.

The digital CFO takes advantage of all these tools to make decisions and give the other CXOs insight into company performance.