Best of 2010: Technology

Histories of information technology will recall 2010 as the year when cloud computing spilled into the consciousness of nongeeks. CFOs, for their part, got engaged in analyses of which computing workloads could be managed more cost-effectively by converting the capital expense of on-premises hard...

By CFO Editorial Staff • Jan. 5, 2011

Be Clear about the Cloud

Companies still face plenty of questions regarding cloud computing. Increasingly, however, the dominant question is not whether to do it, but how intensely.In fact, given the pace at which companies are offloading at least part of their IT infrastructure to public clouds (generally defined as thi...

By David McCann • Dec. 1, 2010

Explore the Trendline➔

The CFO Strategy for Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence’s impact on the office of the CFO continues to evolve, and finance chiefs must be aware of the opportunities it will create for growth. 

By CFO.com staff

What Generation Gap?

While there is little doubt that younger people are more comfortable with a range of technologies than are older Americans, the gap may not be as wide as you might think. A recent survey of 43,000 consumers by Forrester Research, for example, found that, among Americans of working age, computer o...

By CFO Editorial Staff • Dec. 1, 2010

Members Only

While traditional retailers anxiously monitor the holiday-shopping season (which is expected to show slight growth from last year, thanks largely to aggressive discounting), one corner of the retail world expects to flourish: a very specific kind of online luxury-goods purveyor.At first glance, m...

By Kate O'Sullivan and Leah Tedesco • Dec. 1, 2010

What Generation Gap?

While there is little doubt that younger people are more comfortable with a range of technologies than are older Americans, the gap may not be as wide as you might think. A recent survey of 43,000 consumers by Forrester Research, for example, found that, among Americans of working age, computer o...

By CFO Editorial Staff • Dec. 1, 2010

Total Trouble

There’s a generation gap among Microsoft Excel users, and the younger generation is increasingly falling into a trap. It seems that the nearly instantaneous totaling function — known as automatic calculation mode — that’s used to tally columns of numbers is being mysteriously turned off. That cou...

By Marie Leone • Dec. 1, 2010

Members Only

While traditional retailers anxiously monitor the holiday-shopping season (which is expected to show slight growth from last year, thanks largely to aggressive discounting), one corner of the retail world expects to flourish: a very specific kind of online luxury-goods purveyor.At first glance, m...

By Leah Tedesco and Kate O'Sullivan • Dec. 1, 2010

Be Clear about the Cloud

Companies still face plenty of questions regarding cloud computing. Increasingly, however, the dominant question is not whether to do it, but how intensely.In fact, given the pace at which companies are offloading at least part of their IT infrastructure to public clouds (generally defined as thi...

By David McCann • Dec. 1, 2010

How to Work the Angles with Microsoft

Negotiating license agreements with Microsoft is similar in many respects to doing so with any other technology provider, but there are some special considerations related to its size.Although the company is no longer quite the technology monopolist it once was, a typical large or midsize busines...

By David McCann • Nov. 15, 2010

How to Work the Angles with Microsoft

Negotiating license agreements with Microsoft is similar in many respects to doing so with any other technology provider, but there are some special considerations related to its size.Although the company is no longer quite the technology monopolist it once was, a typical large or midsize busines...

By David McCann • Nov. 15, 2010

18,000 Errors and Counting

An initial assessment of XBRL-tagged financial statements reveals thousands of errors traceable to multiple causes, yet both the Securities and Exchange Commission and XBRL US (the consortium of accounting firms, software companies, and consultants that develops the taxonomy, or digital dictionar...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Sensors, Sensors Everywhere

If you think of yourself as a good driver — and doesn’t everyone? — you might have the chance to prove it, and save money in the process. Progressive Insurance’s MyRate program, available in eight U.S. states, outfits your car with a sensor that tracks speed, acceleration, braking, and other driv...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Tablets Get Down to Business

Our suggestion a mere six months ago that businesses might find some productive uses for the iPad, Apple’s much-hyped tablet computer, already looks like a decided understatement.Although seemingly designed to appeal mostly to consumers, and less than perfectly compatible with most corporate comp...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Finance as a First-Mover, Literally

As U.S. companies restructure their finance departments in pursuit of greater efficiencies (see “The Incredible Shrinking Finance Department“), the experiences of one European health-care/pharmaceutical company might be worth a closer look.Like other companies, Copenhagen-based Novo Nordisk was d...

By Janet Kersnar • Nov. 1, 2010

Finance as a First-Mover, Literally

As U.S. companies restructure their finance departments in pursuit of greater efficiencies (see “The Incredible Shrinking Finance Department“), the experiences of one European health-care/pharmaceutical company might be worth a closer look.Like other companies, Copenhagen-based Novo Nordisk was d...

By Janet Kersnar • Nov. 1, 2010

Attack of the Apps

The success of tablet computers (and smart phones before them) has been driven by the fact that people increasingly prefer that information and communications capabilities be available at the touch of a button rather than at the end of a Web search.Having been told endlessly that “there’s an app ...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Attack of the Apps

The success of tablet computers (and smart phones before them) has been driven by the fact that people increasingly prefer that information and communications capabilities be available at the touch of a button rather than at the end of a Web search.Having been told endlessly that “there’s an app ...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Tablets Get Down to Business

Our suggestion a mere six months ago that businesses might find some productive uses for the iPad, Apple’s much-hyped tablet computer, already looks like a decided understatement.Although seemingly designed to appeal mostly to consumers, and less than perfectly compatible with most corporate comp...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Sensors, Sensors Everywhere

If you think of yourself as a good driver — and doesn’t everyone? — you might have the chance to prove it, and save money in the process. Progressive Insurance’s MyRate program, available in eight U.S. states, outfits your car with a sensor that tracks speed, acceleration, braking, and other driv...

By David McCann • Nov. 1, 2010

Spreadsheets: Rein In the Dueling Pivot Table Problem

Editor’s Note: If you would likek Bill Jelen to answer your Excel question in an upcoming column, send an e-mail note to billjelencfo.com. If he chooses your question as a topic for his column, you’ll win a book from CFO and MrExcel.comDipesh M. will receive an e-book copy of Learn Excel 2007-201...

By Bill Jelen • Oct. 28, 2010

Software Blunders Trip Up Businesses

A gathering plague of glitches in software code that is threatening the financial health of many companies will only worsen as reliance on technology inevitably accelerates.So says Jeff Papows, former CEO of two big software companies that are now IBM business units, Lotus Software and Cognos. In...

By David McCann • Oct. 22, 2010

How Well Do You Decide?

No executive would argue with the notion that a company’s ability to effectively make and execute decisions is a cornerstone driver of performance.But most, when asked just how adept they are in this area, admit they simply don’t know, says Michael Mankins, a partner with management-consulting fi...

By David McCann • Oct. 7, 2010

Round-Trip Cost Control

In these days of aggressive cost control, the 1% to 2% of revenue that a typical company spends on travel and entertainment (T&E) looks riper than ever for scrutiny.Simply eliminate unnecessary travel? Sure. But a more lasting payoff from travel-expense management hinges on understanding what...

By David McCann • Oct. 1, 2010

CIOs Called Clueless about Extra Costs

To avoid big overspending by chief information officers, CFOs should order forensic-accounting audits of large information-technology projects, an advocate for data-center efficiency says.Often unaware of finance and accounting considerations, CIOs frequently fail to include the majority of the t...

By David Katz • Sept. 27, 2010

Tech Spending to Jump Next Year

The number of information-technology executives who are expecting budget increases for 2011 is reminiscent of prerecession days, a new survey from the Society of Information Management suggests.Thirty-eight percent of respondents said their budgets will be up next year, a leap from the 27% in las...

By David McCann • Sept. 21, 2010