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Russ Porter has been working in the finance and accounting profession for almost three decades. So, when he joined IMA (Institute of Management Accountants) as CFO and senior vice president last year, he brought years of valuable experience to the table. IMA - the worldwide association of accountants and financial professionals in business focuses exclusively on advancing the management accounting profession by offering members opportunities to keep on learning and advancing throughout their careers. While in Amsterdam for a flash visit to IMA’s European headquarters, Russ told us all about his ambitions and the value of staying on track with the latest developments in his profession.
Yesterday, you were one of the key speakers at IMA’s Finance Transformation event, talking about your cross-functional experience in accounting and finance. What was the focus of your message? “I greatly appreciated being invited over to speak, and my message was one of ongoing importance. I talked about how we as financial professionals add value to our organizations, but also about how we need to continue to transform for the future needs of our businesses and the organizations we support. We need to recognize how far the technology in our field has evolved and how intertwined it has become with our work. Also, we need to be prepared for the changes that are yet to come. A lot of the technologies we were using fifteen years ago no longer apply, whereas a lot of the things we’ll need fifteen years from now haven’t been invented yet. So, at IMA, we want to spread the message to not only remain current with the times, but to stay ahead. It’s about looking forward, being prepared, and looking for the risks and opportunities. People tend to think finance professionals are always looking at the risk side, but there are great opportunities in the market for our companies and businesses.”
How can people prepare for all that’s coming? “It’s a volatile world and the future has always been uncertain. One need only look back on the last two years or even two weeks to see how volatile situations can
occur. We as financial professionals always try to look forward at what’s coming and anticipate the variety of futures that may exist in terms of the external and internal factors that might influence us. The best way to predict the future is to create it. That means helping our organizations create the future we want, but also preparing for what may go wrong or the opportunities that can present themselves. That’s one of the key values of finance: studying what has happened, using it as a way to predict what will happen, and then prescribing to our companies what they should do to take advantage. And, let’s not forget: our mission is to continue to expand our profession, and to do so we have to keep our skills current to prepare for the future - for example with our CMA® Certification.”
Russ Porter
This issue, with a spotlight on lifelong learning, is all about education. What are your thoughts on continuing education throughout life? “Not only us as finance professionals, but people in all fields, need to make sure to maintain their education to continue moving forward. It’s essential to stay relevant to the decision-makers in your company. Another perk of going back and relearning some of the things you may have forgotten is that you’re reminded of the value of education. I took an IMA strategy course a while back and found immediate applicability in my company. Learning keeps us from becoming stale or burned out, so I am a big believer in doing this throughout one’s career.”
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