Employees with specialized expertise in digital technologies, who can build and maintain system capabilities, are vital to every organization. Finance teams are no exception. Finance staff with critical digital skills actively drive transformation within their department and their organization. CFOs who can retain these employees have a distinct advantage when accelerating digital transformation and capturing the benefits of emerging technologies.

Digital finance talent is relatively rare. Today, 83 percent of full-time equivalent (FTE) staff in finance are considered core finance talent, which is to say that they are experts in finance-driven processes and traditional technologies. Only 17 percent of finance departments' staff represent digital finance talent, holding positions such as finance digital transformation leader, business intelligence (BI) developer, or finance technology lead. As companies are increasingly looking to technology adoption as the key to future success, CFOs want to expand their digital talent pool; on average, they expect digital talent to comprise 46 percent of their finance function by 2027.

However, reaching this goal may be difficult because retaining digital talent poses a particular challenge in finance. These staff have skills that are in high demand, and they are generally willing to explore the job market. Digital finance talent has higher attrition risk than does core finance talent, as they are 63 percent more likely to be looking for another job, and the digitally savvy employees are 69 percent more expensive to replace.