Monday, August 10, 2026

Boards are expanding the CFO’s mandate—with COO duties increasingly in the mix

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Good morning. Boards are pushing CFOs into a bigger operational mandate, and the last two weeks alone have produced three new examples.

—Zoetis Inc. (No. 434 on the Fortune 500) announced on Aug. 6 that James “Jay” Saccaro was appointed EVP, CFO and chief operating officer (COO), effective Aug. 17. The combination of the CFO and COO roles is new at the company. Wetteny Joseph, currently EVP and CFO, who will transition to an advisory role, did not hold the COO role. Saccaro most recently served as VP and CFO at GE HealthCare.

—Jeremy Hofmann, CFO of Zillow Group Inc., is taking on the additional role of COO, the company announced on Aug. 5. The board expanded Hofmann’s role because of his proven track record as CFO and his understanding of operational dependencies across the business during his nine years at the company, according to the announcement. Jun Choo, who has held the role of COO since November 2024, is stepping down immediately to focus on his health.

—At Owens Corning (No. 385 on the Fortune 500), Todd W. Fister, who served as EVP, CFO since September 2023, temporarily took on the combined role of chief financial and operating officer in May. The company announced on July 29 that Fister will now serve as president and chief operating officer, effective Aug. 10. Jonathan M. Collins was appointed EVP and CFO.

There is also a movement toward the fusion of the two roles, leading to formal structural changes. Last year, Salesforce announced the newly created position of COFO—chief operating and financial officer—with the appointment of Robin Washington. A finance veteran, Washington spent decades working on financial and operational strategy, including serving as EVP and CFO of Gilead Sciences, CFO of Hyperion Solutions, and chief accounting officer of PeopleSoft.

The pattern reflects a broader shift in how boards define the CFO’s mandate. CFOs are often expected to assume an outsized mandate that extends well beyond traditional finance, encompassing both business and technological challenges and opportunities, according to Russell Reynolds Associates.

According to L.E.K. Consulting’s 2025 Office of the CFO Survey of more than 100 finance chiefs across industries, nearly two-thirds said their responsibilities now overlap with the COO role. In about 10% of companies surveyed, the positions are fully merged.

Boards are leaning heavily toward C-suite consolidation to drive capital efficiency and tighter data integration, and an experienced CFO can absorb operational frameworks through the lens of resource allocation. The trend of assigning the CFO the additional role of COO, or moving a CFO into a full COO role, continues.

As AI reshapes the office of the CFO into a command center for data-driven decision-making, expect more boards to test just how far one executive’s mandate can stretch.

Sheryl Estrada
Sheryl.Estrada@fortune.com

Leaderboard

Chris Neczypor, EVP and CFO of Lincoln Financial (NYSE: LNC) has decided to leave the company to pursue another opportunity outside of the industry. Adam Cohen, SVP, chief accounting officer and treasurer, has been appointed interim CFO, effective immediately. Neczypor will remain with Lincoln through the end of August for a transition period. Lincoln will conduct a search to identify its permanent CFO that will include consideration of both internal and external candidates.

Kevin Messerle will step down from his current role as CFO at York Space Systems (NYSE: YSS), a U.S. aerospace and defense prime contractor. York has named Brian Frantz, currently chief accounting officer, as interim CFO, effective Aug. 14.

Big Deal

According to Deloitte's Q2 2026 CFO Signals Spotlight report, just 43% of CFOs feel very confident in their organization's AI governance framework.

That means most finance leaders aren’t fully convinced their governance frameworks are up to the task at the exact moment AI is taking on more responsibility across audit, risk, and compliance functions.

Deloitte has introduced ControlCatalyst.AI, an AI-powered suite of services and solutions designed to strengthen internal audit, risk management, controls and compliance through a combination of generative and agentic AI, with human oversight built in.

Going deeper

"How stalled models, missed deadlines and staff burnout led to the unraveling of Google’s DeepMind" is a Fortune article by Beatrice Nolan.

Nolan writes: "On Wednesday, at the end of the day in London, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis had some news for employees. Hassabis, DeepMind’s co-founder and the lab’s longtime steward, was giving up the CEO title and moving to a chairman role, they said. Minutes later, the news broke that long-time chief scientist Jeff Dean and several other prominent researchers were leaving the company." Read more here.

Overheard

“Three nights a week, they’ll go to someone’s house, and they’re in charge of the cooking. Young people now seemingly like to cook. I haven’t cooked in 30 years, but they love it.”

—Corcoran Group CEO Pamela Liebman discussed with Fortune a money-saving trend she's seeing among GenZers. Getting your first home takes sacrifices—but it’s doable, even in today’s pricey market, Liebman said.