Marketing Story

La finance est le deuxième pôle que choisissent les étudiants après l’ école de commerce. Voici un témoignage d’Alexandre, contrôleur de gestion qui participe à Marketing Story.

A testimony from a Financial Controller, Alexandre, to have a better understanding of this job.

1. Hi Alex, could you describe your job please?

As a financial controller, I am part of a team responsible for monitoring profitability with regards to operating costs and sales. On the one hand, we have the large responsibility of drafting several budgets every year by allocating cash to the business — at hand and future cash flow coming from revenue — and making sure that sales objectives are met.

On the other hand, we are referred to in many transverse operations such as the launch of new products to make sure the decision is profitable with regards to company and regional standards, a change of distributor to forecast the added value of the operation, advice on product mix. The work requires an extensive use of spreadsheets, a financial database and time on the phone. Meetings are necessary on a regular basis, especially with your boss, because the job is very technical and there is a lot of backdrop information to be aware of and tit for tat decision making know how that has to be learned. Conference calls with colleagues from other offices worldwide are also held. Nevertheless, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the responsibilities of a financial controller drastically vary depending on the industry or Company you work in, so it makes it difficult to give a precise general definition of what a financial controller does.

What I talked about goes especially for my position within a very large French international firm in the beverages industry. In French, financial controlling is known as “contrôle de gestion”, wich means just about anything — or nothing.

2. Why did you choose to work in the finance field?

A decided to pursue a Master of Finance because it opens many opportunities in many different fields, wether banking, consulting or the corporate world, which I am working in right now. Generally speaking, finance gives you tools and a solid knowledge of how a company works and sustains itself.

I do not necessarily project to do financial controlling in the long haul, but when I had the opportunity to do this during a gap year spent in China, just before completing my Master’s, I knew it was a valuable experience. Whatever you do, it is good to have basic financial knowledge and skills. Financial controlling gives you solid analysis and quantitative skills.

3. What are the things you like in your job?

What I enjoy the most in my current position is the transverse work I have to do. We have many different tasks and responsibilities, which means that we liaise with many different departments of the company, including many different controlling departments. We get a good picture of what is going on in the company. We really work topline to bottom line on the P&L which really gives us a global approach on the evolution of the financial structure of sales. Furthermore, I really enjoy the international environment of my work.

On a daily basis, I have to liaise with the headquarters in France, zone managers in South East Asia, Australia, Africa, Central and South America etc. This gives you a good picture on what is driving the business. The figures we deal with really mean something. That objectivity forces you to go in depth with your analysis, decipher trends and try to explain what is going on. For instance, the recently was a strike in the ports in France. That affected our business and we had to identify the level of impact.

4. What are the points you don’t like?

Sometimes it can seem repetitive, but the business changes and so do the requests so things are never exactly always the same either.

5. Do you want to do your career in finance or are you thinking about change your working area?

I want to work in finance for a while, then anything can happen.

6. Could you give some advices for students who would like to begin them career in finance?

Finance is a very broad field. There are many different jobs. From financial auditing to investment banking, the jobs are very different, and the profile of people as well.

Make sure you know why you want to work in finance. I think that if your interested in working in the large international firms and working on budgets, product pricing and cost controlling, financial controlling is a solid position for that. However, whatever field you choose in finance, you have to be ready to work long hours, under pressure and have lots of initiative in dealing with your responsibilities. You need to be comfortable with quantitative analysis and have solid numerical skills but don’t need a PhD in Mathematics to be an excellent financial controller either. Before anything else, reasoning, attention and asking the right questions are the key to succeeding in finance.

Thank you for your time Alexandre