In this era of digitization, making “pocketed” investments — or setting aside investments for future technology projects — is the only way to survive, Presidio CFO Manny Korakis said in an interview with CFO Dive. 

“Tech investments are important long term because it is the only way a company will survive,” said Robert Kim, chief technology officer of Presidio — a global digital services and solutions provider — in an interview. 

Integrating automation into an organization can actually support the work of employees, with recent research findings showing use of AI yields a higher revenue for businesses. Across all sectors, an increasing number of CFOs are investing in IT, specifically, in artificial intelligence (AI) and automation.

Internally at Presidio, the digitization that is happening is going to require the company to upgrade their technology and make investments in order to keep pace with their customers and vendors, said Korakis. 

As the pandemic posed unexpected challenges and the current macroeconomic environment is placing unprecedented inflationary pressures on organizations, “the organizations that are more innovative in the way that they use technology, will be the leaders,” said Kim. 

“The pandemic and what we went through showed us that any future challenge we run into, especially when you think of it in terms of an unprecedented event, the only way that we can provide a solution will be through the use of that technology,”

If companies have the proper technology in place, like automated processes, then when they are faced with unprecedented challenges — like the pandemic and rising interest rates and inflation for example, this digitalization allows them to overcome them, Kim told CFO Dive. Having the correct infrastructure in place before a challenge like the ones cited above arises is key, according to Korakis and Kim. 

Invest now, if you can

Persistent inflation, a looming recession and now, potential stagflation remain top of mind concerns for executives. 

While the benefits from a tech investment may not be immediate, and are certainly not as pressing as some of the inflationary impacts, seen by companies, making investments in tech during times of pressure is how organizations can position themselves for success when inflation eases, said Korakis. 

Besides interest rates and inflation, “there’s also the looming recession and nutty geopolitical issues,” said Kim. Additionally, disasters like Hurricane Ian “are going to continue to happen, so now is the time to make those tech investments. We need organizations to stop thinking short term and start prioritizing innovation,” he said. 

Technology investments also help tactically, noted Kim. Human capital is a very expensive part of organizations, and automation can help mitigate those costs, he said. 

Differently than the economic pressures that businesses face today, the impact of tech investments are not seen immediately. However, investing in technology is a long-term process and it positions executives to be prepared and at the ready the next time these pressures come around, because they will, advised the executives. 

CFO/CIO Partnership

When Korakis took the financial helm of Presidio back in August, he told CFO Dive that his main priorities were going to be looking at automation and AI technology opportunities to improve processes and drive efficiencies to free up capacity to focus on more impactful financial matters. “It’s a never-ending process,” said Korakis on the current state of those goals. 

His first couple of months have been spent overcoming the learning curve related to the company’s processes and seeing how the organization can leverage any technology. 

“In every company I've worked at, and I’m sure other CFOs have seen this too, it is very hard to automate when you don't have consistency in processes,” he said. 

Part of overcoming this learning curve is establishing a partner like relationship with IT, Korakis said. “We’re finance people, but we don’t know the whole landscape of how different automation tools work,” he said. 

This partnership is especially important when it comes to cybersecurity. Recently, more businesses are looking to decentralize cybersecurity leadership to mitigate some security concerns. 

“One analogy I always use is this: there are some people who when looking at a house, will need to see it staged and there are others, who can walk into it empty, see a good structure and good bones and know what needs to be done,” said Kim. 

Similarly, IT leaders can envision what needs to happen with regard to cybersecurity issues and technology investment issues because of their breadth and depth of experience that they have in actually deploying technology.