The future of finance strategies

- Technology and innovation have accelerated in recent years. And that means there are big changes ahead for corporate finance. The future of finance is likely to be deeply rooted in technology, better technology, more technology, faster computers more automation, more AI, more robots. There's even a word for all the finance technology innovation out there and get to come. It's FinTech. But for all the changes in technology, some things will remain the same. Consider that financial leaders of the past may have had much more basic financial tools at their disposal than we have today. They might've only had handheld calculators or slide rules, or maybe even just an Abacus, but the tasks of those finance leaders are not too different than today. They likely had to make important strategic decisions weigh important critical tradeoffs, and motivate their people. The past and present priorities for finance leaders are likely to be the same in the future. This list of important priorities includes; building the right teams, motivating people, making good strategic decisions balancing risks and rewards and planning for the longterm. Of course, as part of planning for the long term finance leaders will also need to be preparing for the future of finance. Future leaders will need to be able to do all their current leadership tasks including projecting leadership and motivating teams. Even if their teams are working remotely and spread across the world. The internet age is giving rise to the remote working age and leaders of the future will need to be able to project their leadership and visibility across ever increasing distances working with remote teams. Future leaders will also need to be able to incorporate new technologies into their strategic planning, but just as most finance leaders might not know how to create an app from scratch or be able to describe how a semiconductor works. There's still literate in how to use apps and technology and computers. Leaders of the future might not need to create AI bots or personally code a quantum computer but they will also need to be technologically literate. And that means leaders of the future will need to be adaptable. As we think about the future of finance, it's important to keep in mind that finance is usually at the vanguard, at the very front of technological innovation. Why? Because well money. Finance innovations have accelerated the speed of payments and transactions. Something economists called the velocity of money and financial innovations have increased access to investments or products while also reducing costs. Since financial technological innovations provide some of the biggest financial benefits and returns on investment, you can bet your organization is going to be adopting a lot more technology in its corporate finance function. As we look ahead, it's really the tools that will change but business leaders and especially finance leaders will need to be technologically literate and able to deploy the most innovative technologies in order to be able to reap the biggest rewards for their companies and to be able to deploy them for the most important strategic initiatives.