Quick read: Day in the Life of Finance Professionals, Role by Role

About this page

In brief: Each of the 28 roles has a recognizable daily shape set by its cadence: the close, the cutoff, the committee or the client.

What you’ll cover

A sample of the entries (181 terms on the full page)

Access person — An adviser’s employee who sees nonpublic client trades, holdings or recommendations, and so must report personal holdings and trades under the code of ethics (C.14: The Chief Compliance Officer).

Assets under management (AUM) — The market value of the money an asset manager runs for clients; fee revenue is AUM multiplied by the fee rate. (B.7: Asset Management Firm)

Break-even volume — The transaction volume at which two cost options are equal; for outsourcing, (in-house cost − outside base fee) ÷ fee per transaction. (D.1: Stage One — One Person Doing Everything)

CASS resolution pack — The records a UK firm holding client assets must be able to retrieve within 48 hours of an insolvency so that client assets can be returned (E.4: Client Assets and Safeguarding (CASS Oversight)).

Chief accounting officer — The senior accounting executive, often between the controller and the CFO at large companies, and often the acting principal financial officer if the CFO leaves (A.4: How CFOs Are Made, C.1: The Controller).

Compliance certificate — The annual certificate a listed Indian company’s CEO and CFO give the board under SEBI LODR Regulation 17(8), covering the financial statements and internal control over financial reporting (A.4: How CFOs Are Made).

Credit memo — The written case for a loan (ratios, downside case, rating, collateral, covenants, recommendation) on which credit decides (E.10: Credit Analysis).

Deferred offering cost — A specific incremental cost directly attributable to a securities offering, held as an asset until the offering and then charged against its proceeds (F.3: The IPO Is Six Months Away).

Drift — The decline in a model’s accuracy when the data it sees changes from the data it was built on (G.2: Where AI Is Used in Finance, and Where It Must Not Be).

Employee stock ownership plan — In the US, a tax-qualified retirement plan that must invest primarily in the employer’s stock; not the same as the Indian ESOP (C.10: The Head of Stock Plan Administration).

Fast close — Closing the monthly books quickly and accurately, often within 3–5 business days; treated as a marker of finance-function maturity (C.1: The Controller).

Fund administrator — A third party that keeps a fund’s books, calculates its NAV and handles investor records. (0.1, C.12: The Head of Fund Accounting)

Human in the loop — A control design in which a named person reviews and approves an automated output before it takes effect (G.3: Controls Around AI and Automation, Role by Role).

Intracompany transferee — Under US L-1 rules, an employee with one continuous year abroad in the same employer group within the prior three years who transfers to a US managerial, executive or specialized-knowledge role. (H.2: Pathways in India)

Knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) — A third-party firm doing skilled back-office work, such as reconciliations or fund accounting, for several clients, unlike a captive GCC. (H.2: Pathways in India)

Material weakness — A deficiency, or combination, in internal control over financial reporting giving a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement will not be prevented or detected on time (F.1: The Month-End Close Fails).

Net stable funding ratio (NSFR) — Available stable funding divided by required stable funding; must be at least 100% (E.9: Treasury and Asset-Liability Management (ALM)).

Pillar Two — The OECD/G20 15 percent global minimum tax on large groups. (C.6: The Tax Director)

Regulation FD — The SEC rule that bars selective disclosure of material nonpublic information to analysts or investors without public disclosure (C.4: The Head of Investor Relations).

Section 302 — The Sarbanes-Oxley provision, implemented by SEC Rules 13a-14 and 15d-14, under which the principal executive and principal financial officers certify each 10-Q and 10-K (A.1: What Every CFO Owns, Universally).

Standalone selling price — The price at which a good or service would be sold separately; ASC 606 allocates a contract’s price in proportion to these (F.4: A Revenue-Recognition Issue Surfaces).

Three Lines Model — The IIA’s 2020 framework that replaced the “three lines of defense”. (C.5: The Head of Internal Audit)

Valuation designee — Under SEC Rule 2a-5, the party, usually the adviser, that a registered fund’s board designates to determine fair value under board oversight (C.13: The Head of Portfolio Valuation).