CFO Resume Example

Executive positions are extremely competitive, and when it comes to hiring a Chief Financial Officer, companies are looking for the best of the best.

As a CFO, you’ll be responsible for a company’s financial success, so it’s critical that your resume shows employers you have the experience and skills to not only maintain – but improve – their financial standing.

To impress hiring managers, highlight your expertise in financial forecasting, investment strategies, and financial modeling to demonstrate your proficiency in managing cash flow and maximizing ROI.

Here are four tips for writing a CFO resume that’s sure to impress:

Start with a strong resume summary

Your resume summary is the first thing companies look at to see if you’re a good fit for the position, which is why it’s so important to make sure your summary highlights your greatest strengths and accomplishments as an executive.

To write a good resume summary, you need to include your main qualifications:

• Years of experience & job title
• Areas of expertise
• Key skills and accomplishments
• Any relevant certifications

Here’s an example of a strong CFO resume summary:

Colorado CPA-licensed CFO with 7+ years of experience in managing cash flow, taxation and financial planning, with expertise in financial forecasting and strategizing. Proven success in implementing strategic initiatives to drive profitability and increase ROI by 20-30%. Able to motivate and guide finance team to meet stakeholder and executive financial goals and ensure 100% accuracy in accounting.

This resume summary is effective because it:

• Opens with key licensure and experience
• Includes areas of expertise
• Demonstrates primary skills and accomplishments using hard numbers

By starting your resume with a resume summary that communicates your primary qualifications and showcases your achievements, you build a more compelling case for employers to hire you.

Highlight your professional achievements

As an executive, there’s no doubt you have many impressive professional achievements to display. One great way to make sure hiring managers don’t miss them is to list your key achievements in a special section under your resume summary and before your work experience.

Take a look at this CFO achievements section example:

Including a few professional highlights in a unique and prominently placed section on your resume like this example presents the hiring manager with a clear idea of your strengths and capabilities, and makes you stand out as a desirable hire.

Quantify your accomplishments

When applying for competitive positions at the executive level, it’s important to find ways to make your resume stand out from the rest. One simple but effective method is to include quantifiable data to back up your professional experience.

Providing this additional context helps you position yourself as a results-oriented CFO who can drive financial success for the organization.

Your work experience section is a particularly important place to make sure you use quantifiable data. To do this, just add hard numbers to your bullet points.

As someone who works in finance, you have all kinds of data to draw from. Make sure to choose numbers that reflect the role you played in your previous positions and what goals you accomplished.

Here’s an example of a work experience section on a CFO resume, with quantifiable data in bold:

• Use company’s financial data in tandem with financial forecasting to create updated financial plans that maximize profit and improve ROI and IRR, increasing revenue by 30% over 2 years
• Supervise finance department and monitor staff performance, providing guidance and financial strategy and ensuring 100% tax compliance
• Meet with other executives and stakeholders to present data, financial reports, and business strategy
• Spearheaded 3 fundraising campaigns as well as 2 strategies for ongoing fundraising efforts, leading to a 5% increase in annual revenue

This example works because the candidate supports their achievements with hard numbers and clearly demonstrate to a hiring manager what tangible benefits they can bring as a CFO.

Taking the time to add hard numbers to your resume will make it much stronger and give you an edge over the other candidates.

Show off your CFO skills

To be a successful CFO, you need a substantial skill set, comprised of both hard and soft skills.

Expert insight

On your CFO resume, emphasize your skills in Excel and enterprise resource planning software as these tools are crucial in financial analysis and reporting. Also emphasize strong communication skills because communication with stakeholders is vital for presenting financial data and influencing decision making.

Additionally, if you’re targeting a specific position, make sure you scan the job advertisement for keywords that indicate what particular skills a company is looking for in a new CFO, and include those in your resume.

Here are some CFO skills for your resume: