Legacy Leavers: Talent, Leadership & the Evolving Role of the CFO

No longer just the ‘numbers people’ who balance the books and report on financial performance, today’s CFOs are expected to shape strategy, develop talent, and drive business growth.

At the recent CFO Magazine A/NZ Melbourne CFO Symposium, James Millen, Group CFO at Dentsu, and Melinda Cunliffe, CFO at BOUNCE, discussed with Bronwyn Wilkie how finance leaders must now mentor, coach, and inspire their teams, while ensuring financial discipline and sustainable growth.

As companies navigate economic uncertainty, talent shortages, and technological shifts, CFOs must now ask themselves: What kind of leader am I, and what legacy am I leaving behind?

Why Great Leaders Create Leaders

In such a competitive market, the best CFOs are stepping into a more well-rounded leadership role—one that combines financial acumen and people skills.

By nurturing potential and providing clear career pathways, they’re maintaining and amplifying an organisation’s edge by preventing their top talent from looking elsewhere.

As Millen, who heads up a finance team of 70 at Dentsu, puts it: “If I can’t promote internally as a leader, I’ve let my team down. My job is to create opportunities where people can step up and stretch themselves—to provide the scaffolding that enables them to grow.”

This marks a clear departure from the past, when finance careers were built on rigid hierarchies and slow, linear progression. Cunliffe sees this playing out in her own team at BOUNCE.

“I’m creating extra layers in my finance team to provide career paths, ensuring people see real development opportunities,” she says. “They don’t want to spend years waiting for their next career move; they want to be developed and progress toward their next role faster.”

Because BOUNCE is a much smaller company than Dentsu—and especially because team members tend to stick around for a long time—there are only so many seats at the leadership table. Cunliffe gets around this by restructuring roles to create sideways career steps and secondment opportunities, keeping employees engaged even when promotions aren’t immediately available.

“While we may not always have clear promotions, we can offer new projects, temporary leadership roles, and special assignments that keep people engaged and challenged,” she says.

Cunliffe and Millen’s approach highlights the fact that providing leadership development in finance is no longer optional: it’s critical for retention and long-term success. And this requires CFOs to foster environments where employees can take risks and learn.

“The moments that shaped my career the most were the ones where I felt vulnerable,” Millen says. “Those sink-or-swim situations bring out the best in people—and that’s why I think it’s crucial to challenge high performers.”

This means trusting people with big responsibilities, supporting them as they grow, and making finance a function where numbers get crunched, not backs broken.

A Modern Challenge: Leading a Workforce That Won’t Settle

Pandemic-era talent shortages sparked dramatic shifts in employee expectations. It’s no longer just about salaries or perks—modern employees want flexibility, inclusivity, and purpose-driven workplaces.

In fact, according to LinkedIn, 60% of Gen Z and Millennial professionals wouldn’t accept a position at a company if its values didn’t align with their own.

“If you don’t know what drives your people—both professionally and personally—you’re already losing them,” Millen says.

During the panel, he noted that most employees now expect—nay, demand—flexible working arrangements. But later he adds that in-person collaboration still matters, especially in commercial finance roles that require close business partnerships. So, he takes a custom approach tailored to the individual demands of each position.

“For my transactional finance team, hybrid makes sense. But for commercial finance, you need face time to build credibility,” he says.

At BOUNCE, the situation is more complex, as venue teams don’t have the option to work from home, so they encourage the support team to spend most of their week working out of the support office or in venue. 

They put a lot of effort into making the support office a place where team members want to be, Cunliffe explains, while still providing flexibility and hybrid work arrangements.

“Most of our support team are in the office for collaboration from Monday to Thursday, with flexibility around start and finish times, and Fridays tend to be optional work-from-home days,” she says. “We’ve created a fun environment in the office with music and podcasts, so we actually find everyone enjoys coming in, which made it easy for us to bring people back to the office.”

Doubling down on values-alignment—through sustainability, participating in Clean Up Australia and National Plant a Tree days, and other causes and initiatives that really speak to its talent base—also helps keep engagement and retention high.

From Finance Chiefs to Future CEOs

While discussing how the role of CFOs is evolving into one of strategic planning, growth acceleration, and even CEO succession, Millen describes his cohort as “business architects of value”.

“Many years ago, CFOs were purely numbers-focused. Now, they’re shaping the future of the business, influencing investment decisions, and ensuring sustainable growth,” he says.

Cunliffe agrees, adding that, “The CEO has a vision, but it’s the CFO’s job to assess whether it’s actually feasible. We’re like the moral compass, stepping back and saying: Can we actually do that as an organisation? Do we have the resources—whether in terms of finances or team members?”

A knack for this sort of thinking has seen more and more CFOs transitioning into CEO roles, particularly in the current rocky economic climate, where financial discipline is key.

In such uncertain times, companies can’t afford to burn cash inefficiently. But they also can’t afford to cut so aggressively that they damage long-term growth. Modern CFOs must therefore blend financial expertise with commercial insight, ensuring that the business remains profitable, scalable, innovative, and resilient.

As Millen puts it: “CFOs are getting promoted into CEO roles because they understand the balance between growth and risk.”

Balancing a growth mindset with financial discipline—what Millen calls “ambidextrous leadership”—requires the versatility to lead effectively in a complex, fast-changing environment while navigating competing demands. That could mean using AI and automation to drive smarter efficiencies, freeing up capital for strategic investments rather than wasteful spending that leaves the business behind.

On the subject of AI, Millen sees it as an enabler of human decision-making, while Cunliffe highlights its practical benefits in finance operations.

“We’re already using AI to automate reconciliations, speed up reporting, and reduce manual tasks,” she says. “Anything that gets data into the business faster is a win.”

But while AI enables smarter finance functions, today’s CFOs must also apply greater scrutiny to how capital is deployed across the business—since, obviously, every dollar counts in this economy.

“The cost of capital has gone through the roof for everyone, so how you deploy it is really being scrutinised,” Millen says. “There’s a lot more focus and rigour around deploying capital and that’s where the CFOs play a really important part to make sure that we’re getting the appropriate return on investment.”

Again, Cunliffe is on the same page, emphasising that CFOs must challenge businesses and boards to think about efficiency differently—i.e. it’s not about ‘slashing budgets’, but ‘redeploying capital in smarter ways’.

“It’s all about reframing the message,” she says. “We don’t want people thinking: ‘Oh no, we’re in a downward spiral!’ That’s not the takeaway we want them to have.

“We want them to walk away thinking: ‘Oh, look, we’re on this growth trajectory—and we’re going to spend over here, but we’re going to be smarter about how we spend over there.’ It’s not ‘cost-cutting’ or ‘budget-cutting’; it’s reframing the way people are thinking about spending.”

From ‘Hero’ to ‘Host’: The Best CFOs Put Others First

Perhaps the main takeaway from our conversation was that the most effective CFOs don’t lead with ego: they build strong teams, and set them up for long-term success.

“I want my legacy to be making sure the finance team—and the business—is in a stronger position when I leave,” Cunliffe says. “That means developing financially literate leaders across the organisation, not just in finance.”

For his part, Millen draws inspiration from the book Legacy, by James Kerr, which explores the culture of the New Zealand All Blacks.

“Every single player who puts on an All Blacks guernsey has a responsibility to uphold the tradition and culture of excellence, discipline and humility, and they have a responsibility to everyone else who has ever worn and will ever wear that uniform,” Millen says. “That’s what this CFO role is all about—leaving behind a strong foundation so future finance leaders can succeed.”

He adds that this is the difference between a “hero” leader, who rushes in, guns blazing, and takes all the credit, and a “host” leader, who empowers others.

“The best leaders understand that their role is bigger than them,” he says.

Business strategies change. The numbers go up and down. But the best CFOs leave behind something more valuable: a company that’s stronger, more resilient, and ready for whatever comes next.