Change is a cost - until it is an ROI
- Lise-Lotte Helms-Olesen
- 1. sep.
- 4 min læsning
As we proposed in the first article of this series (see article here), change leadership and enhancing organizational adaptability are vital capabilities to induce success in business today.
In this article, we explore the role of CFOs in shaping and accommodating change leadership and how their fundamental approach may need to be reevaluated to foster and support adaptable and resilient organizations.
Too often, we see conflicts of interest or at least divergence in the perspective of what constitutes success,which facets are seen as important, or which indicators are seen as favorable in organizational change.
Why CFOs must inspire viable change with financial logic
For years, CFOs were the stewards of stability - guardians of margin, risk, and return.
Market volatility, digital reinvention, regulatory shifts, and workforce expectations are no longer episodic – they are systemic. While CEOs may set the vision, it is often the CFO who determines whether transformation is viable, fundable, and sustainable.
No transformation is viable without financial logic. But no financial logic is complete without understanding the human engine that drives business performance.
CFOs must step in - not just as stewards of capital, but as co-architects of people’s resilience. This calls for collaboration with the CHRO, who steward the People side.
The CFO and the CHRO each represent what is often seen as opponents, people, and income. People are seen as cost, and organizational change as an investment. That may be true, but what is also true is that only 30-40% of organizational change initiatives succeed and deliver the intended financial return on investment.
If people are seen as cost, and change as investment, then why do most investments in change fail to deliver returns? Perhaps it is time to rethink who holds the keys to transformation?
Change Leadership Needs a Financial Backbone
Resilience is about building readiness into the system. But readiness without resources is just rhetoric. CFOs partnering with CHROs can steward investments in adaptability - leadership development, culture, and capability.
Not just approve them, but fund and measure them.
This means:
Investing in change leadership as a strategic capability, not a discretionary cost.
Track indicators of resilience, not just turnover and headcount.
Help the organization to quantify the ROI of engagement, trust, and leadership.
People & Culture: The Untapped Performance Lever
CFOs may be justified in viewing People & Culture as a cost center. But in today’s disrupted world, it is your frontline defense against organizational failure. You do not need a dashboard to know when support for organizational change is missing.
You must move beyond being the CEO’s soldier - you are the Marshal of the organization. As CFO, you hold the key to real, lived organizational change; the KPIs of execution. No organizational development should be initiated or supported without a clear financial case. But the CHRO should not sit alone to build the case.
CFOs must collaborate and explore their competencies outside of existing banking skills. On the other hand, the CHRO must improve their understanding of numbers and figures and learn how to build a business case, demonstrating control of the people’s performance indicators.
Disengagement does not always show up in metrics, but it always shows up at the speed of execution. Speed and the quality of execution drives - or drains – your transformation and ROI.
Think of the CFO and CHRO as the dual pilots of a transformation aircraft - one navigating the altitude of financial viability, the other steering through the turbulence of human adaptability.
Together, as partners in crime, they reframe:
Culture is not a vibe - it is a vector of behavior.
Leadership is not a perk - it is a performance enabler.
Change is a cost - until it becomes a return on investment.
A Direct Message to CFOs
If you are serious about ROI, invite your People & Culture executive for a dance or two. Not to audit their budget or find savings - but to steward and co-lead the People and Culture function into a new era of metrics that lead to data-driven, and performance-focused impact.
Be clear what is expected of them; to know their numbers and prove their case. If they do not respond to the level you expect, you initiate teaching them the basic and advanced art of analyzing data.
You may ask:
How are we quantifying leadership capacity?
What behavioral data do we have on trust, engagement, and adaptability?
Are we investing in capability building - or simply counting FTEs?
Request of your CEO to publicly champion this alliance - not just endorse it to support you. By convening CFOs and CHROs around shared metrics and mutual accountability, the CEO unlocks a leadership triad capable of driving lasting change.
Think of Satya Nadella at Microsoft, who integrated cultural renewal and financial discipline. Basically, he transformed a toxic disengaging culture made up of ridiculous performance expectations by encouraging learning and collaboration. He did so without compromising sharp financial decisions, such as introducing relentless focus on Cloud. Since Satya stepped in, share price grew by 969%.
The financial case for culture and organizational resilience
Lack of change capabilities leads to disengagement. Let us look at the direct cost:
One disengaged employee on the floor can drive up material waste, delay timelines, and degrade quality.
Multiply that across hundreds or thousands of employees, and the cost of under-performance becomes staggering.
Safety incidents, rework, absenteeism, and churn are not “soft” cultural problems. They are expensive ones.
When People & Culture are alone and underfunded, change and culture becomes costs.
When CFOs co-own the human capital’s agenda, it becomes a multiplier of value.
CEOs must set the vision but also orchestrate the partnership between CFO and CHRO, because financial logic and human resilience are complementary engines of transformation.
What CFOs Can Do Now?
Ask for insight beyond the balance sheet - sentiment, trust, and behavioral data matter.
Pressure-test transformation plans for leadership capacity, not just capital allocation.
Fund the enablers of change - communication, capability, and cultural clarity.
So, how to get started?
CFOs and CHRO should engage in a strategic dance co-owning:
Data-driven decision-making at the executive level.
Fund capability building, not just FTEs and headcounts.
Investment in change leadership training as a buffer against execution failure.
Track indicators of change readiness, not just indicators of hiring and turnover.
In today’s world, change is not just a strategic imperative. It is a financial one.
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