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Whether internal or external, structured or unstructured, data is fast becoming the lifeblood of any company. Quality data sets, after all, generate information, which provides knowledge and wisdom to make more informed value-adding business decisions, said Bob Osho, FCMA, CGMA, managing director of Metrofile Nigeria, a Lagos-based document storage and information management company. He spoke recently at the CGMA Africa Conference 2019: Finance Transformation in the Digital World in Cape Town.

With the digital revolution in full swing, the growing importance of data is forcing financial professionals to think outside of the box and beyond figures to solve problems. “As a financial professional, you need to understand the data you have at your disposal and how to work with it, over and above the problem you intend to solve and what value you want to create with that data,” Osho said in an interview after his presentation. “If the data is unstructured, you need to know how to structure it. This is where your problem-solving skills come in.”

Secondly, being able to see the finer details as well as the bigger picture and bring them together whilst communicating this across multiple departments in a way that everyone understands is key, too.