During last February, as Deloitte, we have consulted with eight top recruitment agencies that position over 150 CFOs in a year to new positions in Turkey’s biggest companies and announced the results with a report titled “CFO’s place in Business Careers”. The reason that makes this research special and different from other similar reports lies in the talks we had with CFOs and the experts who work very long hours with them in order to understand how CFOs build their career path. While we published the results of this research in the Deloitte column of Strategy Magazine’s newest issue, I also wanted to share an article in order for you to have a better understanding of the environment CFOs live in. Being a CFO is really a challenging profession. As much as they can get social (they mostly are social characters), due to the nature of their duty and burden of responsibilities on their shoulders, they are lonely people at heart. They know to stand back and look at the greater picture even in a topic they are very familiar with. Sometimes they act more on a business perspective rather than on their finance viewpoint. People do not like the answer no, CFOs usually have to use this answer for the sake of the company. If this answer is addressed to a company shareholder, general manager or to high management levels, the task to handle the process becomes even more complex. On the other hand they live a divided life. They work effortlessly in order to focus on opportunities as well as the risks and keep a balance in between. How to increase revenue and cut expenditures? They are living in a continuous mathematic problem. They know very well that they need to say yes when it is right to do so, even though everybody might oppose them. It is not right to show the CFO position as the sole responsible for every gain or loss however it is undeniable that they affect the company’s destiny. Nearly all CFOs are also executive committee members and surrounded with critical decisions. I would like to underline that this is not the case for all C-level executives. CFOs are also very supportive to the board of members and related committee and councils. In fact lately, it is the board of members that select and appoint CFOs. CFOs are in constant contact with internal audit and risk committees. If we give a corporate group as an example instead of a company, we can say that they hold the member position in the board of members of subsidiaries and other group companies. Usually CFOs tend to handle investor relations themselves or they play a critical role in the process. CFOs no longer are responsible for financial affairs alone, diverse supporting functions can also be appointed to them. However we can say that this is in some way a duty for COO and even further we see the emerge of a new position that is called “Vice General Manager of Corporate Service” which is responsible from a more wide of services. Maybe it is a natural flow for CFOs to become CEO or general manager. CFOs are very active and supportive in strategic subjects such as internationalization, growth, crisis management, public offering, bond issuance, merger-acquisition-demerger operations, institutionalization, law and regulation amendments, finding investors, initiations for strategic business partners, and large investments such as factory-office-machine park, seeking new business fields, change of business model, technology and system transformation, digitalization and corporate administration. Due to the increase of venture funds impact in global economy CFOs are nowadays positioned as the reassurance of company assets, the warrant for the investments in the subsidiaries. CFOs are not limited for this attribute only, they are taking very efficient steps in leadership, communication and management of change in their companies. We can say that they have very innovative profiles unlike the stereotype executive profiles. They have important roles when it is time to represent the company at a high level. All of the facts we have discussed show how rich and lively this position actually is. This is a known fact in for many, since CFOs are very popular and on the spotlight in universities, panels, forums, traditional and social media. Younger generation dream of this title since the early stages of their careers. A path to a high level executive position in finance never loses its attractiveness and popularity. However of course, success does not come on a silver plate. Today when companies appoint a CFO, they would like to see immediate and neat gains. Patience is not a very popular word in these cases. Our global research indicates that the first 180 days are the hardest for a CFO. Their state becomes even more difficult because of facts such as the sharp market fluctuations caused by currency exchange rates, burden of debt or the change in tax and customs tariffs. That is the main reason, why being a CFO takes minimum 10 years of expertise. CFOs also need to nourish themselves on academic levels. They benefit from master and international certificate programs and educate themselves even further. For example today there is a substantial amount of Turkish CFOs enrolled in Harvard Business School programs and comprehensive leadership educations. Shareholders can have their ease of mind, we have now very well-equipped CFOs in our country. This should considered as a very important gain.