While the ERP system will be phased in over time, it is nonetheless a very large project, representing what Ellyn calls "the creation of a virtual company into which we'll merge all of our operations over time." To help it stay on track, the CEO, CFO, and CIO visited a number of companies and came away with some useful lessons. "One thing we decided," says Meador, "was that the project should not be led by finance or IT, but by a line executive, with us acting as a kitchen cabinet."

Finance and IT also worked together to develop a standard template for technology proposals, one based on risk-adjusted returns. Projects that meet a certain threshold win funding, while those that don't are dropped. "It creates a certain tension," says Meador, "but it also fosters respect."

Cross-pollination among finance, IT, and the business units takes several forms: business-unit controllers work with vice presidents to develop business cases for IT projects before they are presented to senior management, and one of Ellyn's staff members works with a controller in much the same way. She has also had IT staff leave her group to go into corporate audit and other finance roles. "Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between who's in IT and who's in finance," she says.

That's also true at Sun Healthcare Group Inc., an Albuquerque, New Mexico-based operator of long-term and postacute care facilities and related products and services. While CIO Bruce Stabile reports to CFO Kevin Pendergest, he also has daily contact with controller Jennifer Botter. "I bless the day she came," he says, "because she brought financial prowess to the implementation of two major software packages."

In fact, Botter joined Sun Healthcare as an IT staffer in charge of those finance-software rollouts, a multiyear effort complicated by the fact that the company entered Chapter 11 shortly after the project began. Despite eliminating the company's international operations and reconfiguring other aspects of the business, the project managed to succeed (as has the company, returning to profitability this year). Both Botter and Stabile credit that success to having finance and IT staff that each understand the other side of the business. "Jennifer is very tech-savvy," says Stabile. "She understands how data flows work and how to improve them."

For her part, Botter says the flexibility provided by the new software is made more powerful by having IT and finance staff that understand what the business is trying to accomplish. Because Sun Healthcare comprises several subsidiaries, each with unique systems needs, rolling up financial results is complex, but essential. "There was a time when finance thought that IT 'owned' the data," she says, "and if there were any problems, it was IT's fault. We changed that. We made sure that IT understood the implications and uses of the data and that each side has a full picture of what the other side is all about."

"The term partner is overused," says Stabile. "You have to do many things before you can claim to be partners. You have to build trust, maintain respect, and work through conflict. Those core issues have to be resolved first."

While the companies we spoke to were unanimous about the quality of their finance-IT interactions, they often had the benefit of the CFO having hired a CIO he felt confident with. Saucony's Umana and Ward had worked together previously at Andersen, so they have a particularly high comfort level. The question for other companies will be whether CFOs and CIOs who are thrown together can quickly build the trust and respect that, as Stabile says, underlie true partnerships.

Scott Leibs is the editor of CFO IT.

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