In fact, the two positions CFO and Chief Accountant have many interrelationships in the work. For small and medium enterprises in Vietnam, these two positions are usually held concurrently by one person, so the business will save salary expense. However, for large corporations, these two positions are often clearly defined.
Chief Financial Officer manages the finance department, Chief Accountant manages the accounting department
The main difference between CFO and Chief Accountant is that these two positions will manage two different departments. The Chief Accountant will manage the accounting department to help the company track and implement cost-optimization and credit policies for customers and suppliers.
As for the Chief Financial Officer, the main job is to rely on financial statements from the chief accountant to make analysis and plans to use financial resources for production and business purposes as well as reasonable investment decisions to bring profit to business.
The general tasks between the Chief Accountant and CFO in the accounting work are: Jointly assisting with annual audits, executing financial and management reports, managing budget planning processes, providing financial analysis as well as review of weaknesses in control.
Regarding the financial sector, the Chief Accountant only works with the CFO, which is to provide credit to customers and track the cash flow in the business.
CFO's work in comparison to Chief Accountant is much more. The chief accountant will normally only need to understand the operations of the accounting system, but the CFO not only needs to understand the operations of the accounting system, but also needs to transfer the accounting information to financial information.
The CFO will monitor and analyze this financial information, usually the financial reports to make important financial policies and decisions for the business. Therefore, CFO needs to have accounting knowledge and additional knowledge about analysis and evaluation so that they can build financial statements and financial strategies for businesses.
CFO manages the financial resources while the Chief Accountant manages the accounting operation
The Chief Accountant will take on the role of management of the accounting profession to always ensure that the accounting system of the business is running smoothly. The Chief Accountant will help businesses optimize costs and profits based on statistics and accounting in accordance with the law.
CFO will have a higher level of financial management, but still use financial tools to maximize the efficient use of capital and maximize profits for the business.
These two positions will have different roles. Chief Accountant helps businesses maximize costs and strictly control those costs so as not to cause loss to the business, along with that, the CFO will consider those costs to be used fairly or not? so that there will be timely adjustments to increase efficiency in using those costs.
Do the two positions of Chief Accountant and CFO have a conflict of responsibility with each other?
The answer is no because these are two positions with different roles. The work of each position is clearly different. The CFO will rely on accounting information to control the financial system of the business, while in the position of Chief Accountant, only operate the accounting system to produce reports to help CFO build suitable financial plans for businesses.
These two positions are mutually complementary at work, based on the accounting department's data that the CFO can create investment opportunities for company.