The growth of automation, outsourcing, and AI, as well as the expansion of the CFO’s role, have changed the conversation around finance talent, according to Tom Hood, EVP of business growth and engagement at the AICPA. Upskilling, he said, has joined hiring and retention as a key concern.

Hood will be speaking on talent at CFO Brew’s live event, Finance Reimagined: The Tech and Talent of Tomorrow on Tuesday. He’ll be sharing insights from the Future of Finance Leadership Advisory Group, a group of finance leaders that includes CFOs from Fortune 500 companies, who get together several times a year to discuss issues around the future of the workforce and digital transformation. Here are a few of his findings:

The geometry of the accounting profession is changing. Traditionally, the accounting profession has resembled a pyramid, with many entry-level staff at the bottom tapering to a few leaders at the top, Hood said. But today, outsourcing and automation are “clipping off both corners of the pyramid,” he said, and there’s less need for a large entry-level workforce. Now, it’s become more important to upskill accountants as they progress.

Finance pros need “T-shaped” skill sets. Upskilling initiatives can focus on creating professionals with “T-shaped” skill sets, Hood said, with a base of deep technical accounting knowledge (the long upright bar of the T) and a plethora of what he calls “boundary-crossing skills” (the horizontal bar of the T). This latter group of skills, which can include “communication and storytelling, collaboration, strategic and critical thinking,” help financial staff “create value for the organization by working as business partners with the other parts of the business,” Hood said.

Continue reading our preview of tomorrow’s CFO Brew live event here.—CV

Here’s one more thing to add to the undoubtedly long list of cybersecurity risks that need mitigating: financial losses that stem from third-party compromises.

In an analysis of 2024 claims data, cyber insurer Resilience found that third-party cyber risk is “driving unprecedented losses.”

When vendors suffer from a ransomware attack or other disruption, it can have a “domino effect” on partner organizations, Resilience noted in a news release.

To drive this point home, Resilience brought the receipts. Third-party risk made up 31% of all claims the insurer received last year, compared with 37% in 2023. But it wasn’t until 2024 that third-party risk was significant enough to trigger incurred, or material, losses on insurance claims. Third-party incidents accounted for 23% of claims with incurred losses for the year, compared with a big fat 0% the year before.

What exactly was different about last year? The third-party incidents, which included the disruptive CrowdStrike outage, disrupted operations at organizations Resilience insures, according to Ann Irvine, chief data and analytics officer.

To keep reading about the rising cost of third party risk, click here.—AZ

At what point does the Trump administration go from trimming fat to cutting to the bone?

The IRS could shed up to half of its 90,000-person workforce, the Associated Press reported last week. This would be on top of the 7,000 workers it already fired last month.

President Donald Trump and his newly created Department of Government Efficiency, led by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, have taken a chainsaw to the workforce at nearly every government agency. As the AP pointed out, the administration has let go of nearly all probationary federal employees. It has also completely shuttered the foreign-aid agency USAID, a move the US Supreme Court recently rejected.

As the New York Times pointed out, it’s unclear when the latest IRS firings will take place. The agency is in the midst of its busy season.

The IRS did not immediately respond to CFO Brew’s request for comment.

Click here for more on potential IRS staffing cuts.—AZ