In today's business world, it is becoming more and more common to find companies that are promoting their chief financial officers to become their companies' chief executive officer. There are pros and cons of hiring a CFO to be a CEO. The stability of the economy and stock market play a vital role in whether a chief financial officer will make a good chief executive officer. If the economy has slowed down and investors are worried about a companies stability and are taking less risks with their money, most investors will look for a company that has a good financial holding on things with a CEO who knows how to make money and reduce the companies debt, at the same time still making a profit where the investor will make money with little risk. On the other hand if the economy is booming and the market is good, you would not want a former chief financial officer in as the chief executive officer. The reason for this would be that you would want someone who has a vision and can see where the company needs to go, and how exactly the company works and what is the companies limitations by having the extreme knowledge of knowing first hand what each department does by either working in it or dealing with them in a day to day basis. Some one who has not just been a "bean counter" their whole career is going to be a more well rounded leader and not worry about what the effects of what we are doing right now have on us financially but what we can do now to increase our earnings in the near or distant future.
             One of the pros of hiring a former CFO to become the CEO as stated above is that in a down economy when the market is not doing that well investors look much more critically at the business performance and management strengths and weaknesses of the business. As stated in CFO.com, "With rock-solid accounting now a high priority for many companies and a lightening rod for shareholders and regulators, fin...