In control but not controlling: The fine art of trust in finance

Control has long been a defining feature of finance, associated more with rigour and restraint than with openness or agility. But the role of today’s finance leader is changing. Precision and prudence remain essential, yet the methods have evolved.

CFOs now operate at the intersection of assurance and autonomy. They’re expected to uphold financial discipline while enabling teams to move quickly, make decisions on their own, and drive innovation. This pressure is real. According to The CFO’s Playbook for 2025, 68% of finance leaders say decisions must now be made faster than ever; a shift that demands new ways of balancing scrutiny with speed. This requires a different kind of control, one that’s rooted in trust, not micromanagement.

So, how can finance leaders keep the books balanced without scrutinising every single transaction? How do they ensure financial integrity without stifling progress?

Let’s explore how finance can rethink control by reshaping how trust is built, delegated, and sustained.

Trust, by design: Rethinking oversight in finance

In finance, trust is never blind simply because the stakes are too high. A single mistake—an unaccounted liability, a misrouted invoice—can trigger a chain of scrutiny. This pressure has shaped a culture of vigilance: layered approvals, audit trails, risk-averse defaults. It’s a system built to protect.

Yet control and trust are not opposing forces. Effective oversight doesn’t hinge on checking every detail. It depends on building structures where good judgement is the norm, not the exception.

The CFO’s Playbook for 2025 reveals that modern finance leaders are flipping the script from command-and-control to trust-driven frameworks that prioritise accountability without micromanagement. It’s less ‘check every line item’ and more ‘equip the right people to make the right calls’, which is both strategic and deeply human.

“For CFOs and finance leaders, half the job of a successful financial strategy is communicating it; and being heard. This is the missing link between leaders and business accelerators; between those finance leaders that colleagues feel comfortable hearing from and those they feel comfortable conversing with.” — Martin Cerullo, CPeO, Pleo

That distinction is critical. Trust begins with clarity. When finance leaders communicate purposefully, listen and are listened to actively, as well as engage openly, they create the conditions where trust can take hold and accountability becomes shared, not imposed.

So, throwing oversight out the window is not the point. Reshape it, instead. Tighten the controls that protect the business. Loosen the ones that bog your people down. When teams know where the guardrails are, they move not with caution, but with confidence.

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

• Policy clarity beats paperwork → Clear policies consistently outperform multi-stage approval chains in decision quality and speed.
• Smart alerts over manual checks → Let automation catch the edge cases. People should focus on what matters.
• Empowered teams over constant oversight → Give budget ownership to the people closest to the action, then support them with insight instead of red tape.

Trust is often misunderstood. It’s less about relinquishing control and more about creating conditions where sound judgement can thrive without constant oversight. When the rules are clear and the tools are smart, finance doesn’t need to chase every decimal. It can move faster, scale smarter, and focus on the things that drive value. 

Control, in this context, is about design. Knowing where structure matters and where freedom delivers better results.

How financial control evolves as you grow

In the early days of a business, trust is the operating system. Teams are small, communication is instant, and oversight happens organically. But as organisations grow, complexity scales faster than headcount. What once worked informally begins to strain under the weight of larger teams, wider geographies, and more intricate financial operations.

As a company enters its next stage—scaling headcount, expanding markets, taking on more complex customer and supplier relationships—trust needs scaffolding. Informal checks no longer cut it. Delegation becomes essential, and so does documentation. And so the finance function starts building guardrails: approval flows, budget ownership, reporting structures. The goal is to maintain clarity without losing speed.

At the mid-market level, financial control becomes more distributed. Business units have their own budgets, and decision-making is increasingly decentralised. Here, trust evolves into accountability. Finance leaders focus on designing policies and systems that empower others to act responsibly, ensuring visibility without micromanaging every move.

By the time a company reaches enterprise scale, control becomes multi-dimensional. Trust is embedded not just in people, but in platforms, processes, and shared financial principles. Sophisticated governance models come into play, yet the most effective ones preserve a core truth: control works best when it enables sound judgement, supported by transparency and the confidence that each part of the organisation can operate autonomously.

At every stage, the character of trust shifts—from implicit, to supported, to structured, to strategic. And at each phase, financial control plays a critical role: guiding rather than constraining.

Different roles, different realities

Trust doesn’t just scale with systems. It also flexes with perspective.

What finance defines as control, others may experience as restriction. That’s where tension quietly builds; not from misalignment of goals, but from misalignment of expectations.

• Employees want freedom to move. They want to act decisively, while they also need the confidence to operate within clear boundaries. Without clarity, autonomy feels risky.
• Managers live in the middle ground. They’re expected to make budget-conscious decisions while leading agile teams. They juggle the push for speed with the pull of accountability, often without full visibility into either side’s priorities.
• And then there’s finance. Responsible for the numbers, answerable to the board, and often the last line of defence against risk. It’s no surprise that finance teams lean towards caution. But when caution hardens into control, collaboration suffers.

Trust, in practice, is a cross-functional skill. The data backs this up. One of the biggest barriers cited by finance leaders in the UK is a lack of financial transparency, highlighted by 38% in The CFO’s Playbook for 2025. Trust here goes beyond individual leadership; it’s a structural necessity, especially when teams operate with different definitions of control.

The real opportunity lies in bridging these perspectives, and open dialogue may very well be the connector. When finance explains the why behind policies, when managers share on-the-ground realities, and when employees are given the context behind constraints, trust becomes a shared effort. 

Scaling trust through systems, not supervision

Bridging perspectives is one part of the equation. The other is infrastructure.

Even when teams are aligned in intent, missteps often happen in execution. That’s where systems come in; not to tighten control, but to enable it intelligently. The right tools give each layer of the organisation what it needs: employees get clarity, managers get visibility, and finance gets assurance.

It’s no surprise that 72% of finance leaders, according to The CFO’s Playbook for 2025, say that real-time financial tools are critical for swift, informed decisions, underscoring how technology underpins modern trust frameworks.

Pleo’s spend controls offer a practical case in point. With features like customisable spending limits, flexible approval flows, and real-time budget tracking, they help set expectations before money leaves the account. It’s financial oversight built into the way people work, without messy email chains or end-of-month surprises.

Different teams, projects, and departments can have their own review processes. You can apply card restrictions by time, vendor, or spend category. And with smart notifications and AI-assisted guidelines, employees know where the lines are without needing to ask.

Crucially, finance retains control. Multi-step approvals and final checks from the finance team ensure compliance with internal policies and external standards. When control is designed to work quietly in the background—guiding decisions rather than blocking them—it becomes the most effective kind of all.

That’s what tech should do for finance: reinforce trust without adding friction. Let people move quickly, and let finance sleep well at night.

In the end, it’s about being in control, not controlling

Trust doesn’t take root in oversight alone. It grows in environments where people understand the guardrails, feel equipped to make decisions, and know their judgement is valued.

Finance, more than any other function, holds the levers of both trust and accountability. Its influence extends beyond policy. It shapes behaviour through the systems it builds and the signals it sends.

When those systems clarify expectations instead of constraining action, something crucial shifts. Teams begin to own their decisions. They spend with intent. And they move with assurance because they are trusted, not watched.

The CFO’s Playbook for 2025 makes one thing clear: In the current environment defined by complexity and constant change, finance leaders have a pivotal role to play. Success depends not just on financial precision, but on the ability to adapt, communicate, and empower. This year’s Playbook offers a practical blueprint for CFOs who are ready to move beyond traditional control to lead with agility, build trust across their organisations, and help shape the next era of financial stability.

👉 From spend management to future-ready leadership strategies, there’s plenty more to explore on the Pleo blog.