CFO Series - Part 3 - CFO Scorecard
The 5 Key Dimensions of Evaluating a CFO Published Publicly for the 1st Time.
There is no universal CFO prototype. CFO’s need various evolving capabilities at each stage of a company. I believe the modern day CFO must be assessed across five key dimensions;
Overall Leadership
Strategic Impact
Operational Excellence
Communication and Influence
M&A/IPO Readiness
Each of these dimensions is comprised of a handful of key capabilities; each capability needs to also be weighted based on the importance of the capability at each stage of company.
Bottom line: there is also no unicorn CFO who is strong in all five dimensions. Every startup CFO and even public company CFOs have gaps in their own scorecards.
In my 30 years of leading finance teams in Silicon Valley, I’ve found founders, CEOs, boards, investors, and executive peers struggle to properly assess not just what makes a “Great CFO” but, more specifically, fail to distinguish great (and especially “not great") CFOs by stage of company.
So about 10 years ago, I built my first CFO scorecard when I began assisting CEO’s and their Boards in their CFO interviews. I’m now on version 3 of my personally built scorecard. I’m now using this scorecard in my coaching/board/advisory practice with significant positive feedback from fellow CFOs, CEOs, board members, and investors.
Today, I’m publishing my CFO Scorecard publicly for the first time as I continue to pay it forward. My hope is to finally create a CFO Scorecard standard for companies as well as current and aspiring CFOs. I also find it very interesting that it’s now 2025, and while we CFO’s have “scorekeeping” in our DNA, we remain like the Cobblers children, and haven’t attempted to build a standard CFO Scorecard…until now.
As John Doerr mostly famously wrote about OKR’s in “Measure What Matters”, here are the 5 Dimensions of a CFO that I believe matter not only in today’s CFO Era, but more importantly for the next Era of CFO (Part 1 of this series).
CFO Scorecard: The Five Key Dimensions
Overall Leadership: (Presence, Team, Coach/Mentor, Partnership, Network)
Strategic Impact: (360 Thinker; Chess Master; Poker Player; Risk Master)
Operational Excellence: (Data Mastery; Decision Architect; Owner Key Metrics)
Communication & Influence: (Complex>Simple; Why?; Islands of Safety)
M&A & IPO Readiness: (Audits, Forecasting, Talent, Legal/Compliance, Data Room Ready; Investor Relations)
Summary CFO Scorecard
This comprehensive scorecard evaluates CFO performance across five key dimensions comprised of key capabilities that define each dimension. This is a template only. Notice the % Weight Column and the Weighted Score. This is required since the importance each capability (a.k.a. Weighting) will change not only by company stage but also how your role evolves and when you end up closing the gaps and improving your scores for any given capability.
Easter egg for eagle-eyed readers: You are correct. There is no weighting on the IPO Readiness Scorecard Segment as each Capability is equally important in this one area.
5 dimensions with over 30 key capabilities. That’s a lot! I’m currently sitting in the Operators Guild CFO Summit Day in San Francisco and just presented this scorecard to over 100 CFO’s in the room and it resonated strongly. Current speakers and panelists are interestingly now referencing these capabilities in their respective talks. That’s a strong signal of the need to create an industry standard CFO Scorecard.
The CFO Scorecard Template - Google Sheet
I’ve also translated this Google Doc into an accompanying Google Sheet. After all, you can’t “Score” something without an actual spreadsheet, right?! I’ve used this spreadsheet several times with more extremely positive signals from clients, CEOs, boards, and executive teams over the past 4+ years.
If you want access to this Google Sheet (Template) for your own use, simply become a Paid Subscriber. It’s available as a link in the full version of this post.
Who Should Use the CFO Scorecard?
CEOs: A tool for evaluating whether their CFO fits current and future needs.
Boards & Investors: A way to assess hiring a new CFO or trading up to a new one to better fit your company’s stage.
Especially for CFOs or Aspiring CFOs. Use this early and often as you evolve your own skills. This scorecard is your personal self-assessment guide to identify areas of improvement and ideally work with a coach to turn it into a career development plan based on the feedback results
Hint: If you are looking for a CFO Coach - hit me up here: BenchBoard Coaching with Jim Cook. During the course of any given year, a few slots open up and/or I develop a short waiting list as needed.
How to Use the CFO Scorecard
Preparation:
Self-assessment: The CFO should reflect on each capability within each section of themes and provide an objective/honest self-rating between 1 (needs significant improvement) and 6 (outstanding). This is the CFO’s chance to self-identify your gaps to develop an action-oriented leadership development plan.
360-degree feedback: Gather input from executive peers, direct reports, your CEO, and a few board members/investors to obtain a well-rounded view of current performance.
Create a list of 6-8 feedback participants (Raters): Script an email asking for their help in your ongoing development and improvement as a CFO and your leadership. Give everyone a high-level overview of the process, and how long it will take (15-20 minutes of their time). My strong recommendation for a CFO candidate is to collect feedback from the CEO, 1-2 board members or investors, 2-3 executive team peers, and 2-3 direct reports.
Ideally, partner with a 3rd-party coach/mentor or a people partner to assist you in collecting the information and to help you hold yourself accountable for evolving/growing. Shameless plug again… BenchBoard Coaching.
Scoring:
Rate each criterion: Assign a score from 1 to 10 for each evaluation criterion and leadership behavior question.
Provide comments: Offer specific examples or observations to support each score, highlighting strengths and areas for improvement.
Analysis:
Identify strengths: Recognize areas where the CFO excels, ensuring these strengths are leveraged for organizational benefit.
Highlight development areas: Pinpoint lower-scoring areas and develop targeted action plans for improvement.
Independent person collects and scores the data:
Ideally, this would be the person’s coach or in-house people team partner.
Independent person spends 30 minutes (in person or on Zoom) collecting valuable narrative data and context behind the scoring of each feedback participant.
Independent person calculates the final weighted scoring and curates the narratives into themes and examples for each section.
Action and 12-18 Month Development Plan Creation:
Set goals: Establish specific, measurable objectives to address development areas.
Candidate summarizes their feedback learning, communicates the summary action plan and thanks the feedback participants for their valuable time and continued partnership toward their growth.
Monitor progress: Regularly review progress against goals, adjusting strategies as needed to ensure continuous development. I strongly recommend a 12-18 month feedback/development plan horizon with at least 1 (ideally 2, possibly 3) additional follow-up surveys (every 6 months).
This “system” of establishing and scorecarding capabilities, collecting feedback, and creating career action plans is a dynamic tool that evolves not only by company stage (the template has “weights” for importance) but also by the CFO leader’s own evolution and progression.
How Do I Access the Google Sheet Template?
The full, interactive CFO Scorecard and several bonuses will be available to paid subscribers ONLY. This is what you could unlock by becoming a paid subscriber:
✅ The Complete CFO Scorecard in Google Sheet form for your personal use - accessible NOW to paid subscribers!
✅ The full CFO Roadmap 3-part series in a single, shareable PDF (complete with a summary of capabilities, behaviors, and scorecard) - coming up next week!
✅ A Google NotebookLM - Audio podcast I created of the entire 3-part series for your listening pleasure (if you get tired of reading this long series - or if you want to share this series with your CEO/Others) - also coming next week!
✅ Access to my upcoming Live AMAs (Ask Me Anything sessions) covering this series as well as other live AMAs (such as going deeper on my recent podcast topics and anything else you can think to ask) - since it’s a live AMA after all. I also look forward to possibly launching an experimental “Office Hours” at a set weekly time on Zoom for any drop-ins of my paid subscriber base.
✅ Bonus “Best Of” Links. I will begin sprinkling the exact source documents I’ve collected over the years in every post going forward.
✅ A paid subscriber chat channel here on Substack to learn from your fellow executive leaders.
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