Example Career: Financial Managers
Career Description
Plan, direct, or coordinate accounting, investing, banking, insurance, securities, and other financial activities of a branch, office, or department of an establishment.
What Job Titles Financial Managers Might Have
- Banking Center Manager (BCM)
- Branch Manager
- Credit Administration Manager
- Financial Center Manager
What Financial Managers Do
- Establish and maintain relationships with individual or business customers or provide assistance with problems these customers may encounter.
- Oversee the flow of cash or financial instruments.
- Plan, direct, or coordinate the activities of workers in branches, offices, or departments of establishments, such as branch banks, brokerage firms, risk and insurance departments, or credit departments.
- Recruit staff members.
- Evaluate data pertaining to costs to plan budgets.
- Oversee training programs.
- Establish procedures for custody or control of assets, records, loan collateral, or securities to ensure safekeeping.
- Communicate with stockholders or other investors to provide information or to raise capital.
- Develop or analyze information to assess the current or future financial status of firms.
- Approve, reject, or coordinate the approval or rejection of lines of credit or commercial, real estate, or personal loans.
- Prepare financial or regulatory reports required by laws, regulations, or boards of directors.
- Examine, evaluate, or process loan applications.
- Evaluate financial reporting systems, accounting or collection procedures, or investment activities and make recommendations for changes to procedures, operating systems, budgets, or other financial control functions.
- Network within communities to find and attract new business.
- Prepare operational or risk reports for management analysis.
- Review collection reports to determine the status of collections and the amounts of outstanding balances.
- Review reports of securities transactions or price lists to analyze market conditions.
What Financial Managers Should Be Good At
- Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
- Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Written Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Information Ordering - The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Mathematical Reasoning - The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
What Financial Managers Should Be Interested In
- Enterprising - Enterprising occupations frequently involve starting up and carrying out projects. These occupations can involve leading people and making many decisions. Sometimes they require risk taking and often deal with business.
- Conventional - Conventional occupations frequently involve following set procedures and routines. These occupations can include working with data and details more than with ideas. Usually there is a clear line of authority to follow.
What Financial Managers Need to Learn
- Economics and Accounting - Knowledge of economic and accounting principles and practices, the financial markets, banking and the analysis and reporting of financial data.
- Administration and Management - Knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning, resource allocation, human resources modeling, leadership technique, production methods, and coordination of people and resources.
- Mathematics - Knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, calculus, statistics, and their applications.
- Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
- English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
- Sales and Marketing - Knowledge of principles and methods for showing, promoting, and selling products or services. This includes marketing strategy and tactics, product demonstration, sales techniques, and sales control systems.
- Law and Government - Knowledge of laws, legal codes, court procedures, precedents, government regulations, executive orders, agency rules, and the democratic political process.
This page includes information from by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the license.