Maybe it won’t help but at least they hired one. There may be something to the strategy of not having a CFO but we’ll be damned if know what that is. Hey, if you’re making money hand over fist and getting the checks cut on time, who gives a damn, right?
Unfortunately for MySpace, their ever-shrinking market share has maybe gotten to the point where some semblance of a financial strategy may be necessary. Enter Mark Rosenbaum who will surely help turn this ship around. Or maybe not, who knows. Good luck man.
MySpace Hires Finance Chief [WSJ]
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Outsourcing Has Yielded Mixed Results So Far, Says Molson Coors CFO
- GoingConcern
- May 20, 2010
This story is republished from CFOZone, where you’ll find news, analysis and professional networking tools for finance executives.
I’m down at the Hackett Group’s best practices conference in Atlanta and just finished a video interview with Stewart Glendinning, CFO of Molson Coors, on the topic of outsourcing.
While the video won’t be up for awhile, I can report that Glendinning wowed the crowd of 250 or so finance executives in attendance this morning with a frank keynote address on the subject.
He essentially warned the audience that outsourcing is hardly the no brainer that everyone – from Wall Street analysts to third-party service providers – makes it out to be.
While the CFO stood by Molson Coors’ decision to outsource most if not all of its information technology, finance and HR functions in 2008, he conceded that the arrangement has yet to live up to billing.
The decision followed the merger of Molson and Coors in 2005, which was expected to produce roughly $180 million in cost savings. And while outsourcing has helped produce some of that, Glendinning – who was appointed CFO of the combined companies two years ago – acknowledged the arrangement with its vendor hasn’t been all smooth sailing. (He identified the outsourcer by name, but I’m leaving that out just to avoid starting an argument between the two.)
As a result of higher than expected turnover, largely in the vendor’s Indian and Costa Rican operations, for example, some of the labor savings that the outsourcer promised have failed to materialize. Glendinning said annual turnover in those two locations has run as high as 100 percent.
As a result, the CFO said the company was “a little shy” of the savings initially projected for the deal, due to project scope and implementation costs. He said that he would have to revisit some of these issue once the contract comes up for renegotiation in 2013. “You have to keep taking cost out,” he said.
In addition, Glendinning said that during the ramp up phase the arrangement produced higher-than-expected error rates in certain financial processes, and those produced an unwelcome payables backlog that threatened the company’s supply chain. And while he said some of the fault was that of Molson Coors, Glendinning noted that the outsourcer failed to bring it to the company’s attention, largely because of what Glendinning described as “reticence” on the part of its Indian employees to challenge their client.
While Glendinning said Molson Coors’ move to outsource was “the right decision nonetheless,” he cautioned the audience that there are a host of issues that finance executives must consider before going forward with such deals.
In particular, he noted that unlike IT or HR, more complicated, “sensitive” financial processes such as pricing and customer management probably should not be turned over to a third party.
“It’s not black and white,” he said about the decision to outsource. “There is a lot of gray in between.”
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Goldman Sachs CFO: Layoffs Are About the Numbers
- Caleb Newquist
- July 19, 2011
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. […] Chief Financial Officer David Viniar said the investment bank could layoff 1,000 employees globally as part of $1.2 billion in cost cuts.
During a conference call with analysts, Viniar said the potential headcount reduction is “as we sit here now and, of course, things can change,” adding that such layoffs would “come over the course of this year.” Viniar said the cuts could be “some senior, some junior people,” but “it’s really more dollar focused than head focused.” [MW]
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Home Depot CFO: We Don’t Want to Blame the Weather But We Are Blaming the Weather
- GoingConcern
- March 30, 2010
This story is republished from CFOZone, where you’ll find news, analysis and professional networking tools for finance executives.
Most investors appreciate seasonality. They get that retail peaks around Christmas and that your big back to school sale will be in August.
Still, some executives like to remind us that their business is busier at certain times of the year than at others. And it’s not uncommon for execs to claim the weather ate their earnings.
All in all, these explanations are pretty lame. Either investors already understand the business cycle or they don’t want to hear the excuse.
Given that, I like the approach of Carol Tome, CFO of Home Depot.
At a retail conference sponsored by Citigroup, “Tome said that while the retailer hates to be one that cites the weather for sales trends variability, Home Depot does experience that, and it has seen ‘great variability’ in weather conditions across the country so far this year.”
So, there you go. Tome agrees that blaming the weather is lame. But, at the same time, you have to agree that the weather this year has been pretty outrageous, right?
Then again, Tome isn’t totally going to hide behind the clouds.
“Nothing has come to our attention that suggests we can’t hit the financial objectives that we’ve set forth,” she said, according to Dow Jones.
In the end, if you’re a Home Depot investor, pray we don’t have a June like last year.
“When the sun is shining, we’re very, very pleased with our performance,” Tome said.