TurboTax Parent Intuit Names New Finance Chief--Update
August 22 2017 - 7:18PM
Dow Jones News
By Tatyana Shumsky and Ezequiel Minaya
Intuit Inc., the maker of TurboTax and QuickBooks, said Tuesday
that Chief Financial Officer R. Neil Williams will step down from
his post next year after spending nearly 10 years with the
company.
He will be replaced by Michelle Clatterbuck, a senior finance
executive at Intuit.
Mr. Williams is slated to step down in January, with Ms.
Clatterbuck taking the reins Feb. 1.
She is currently senior vice president of finance for Intuit's
consumer tax group and acting finance leader for the company's
small business group. She joined Intuit in 2003 from General
Electric Co., according to her LinkedIn profile. Compensation
details weren't immediately available.
Mr. Williams joined Intuit in 2008 after serving as CFO at Visa
USA Inc., a subsidiary of Visa Inc., according to Intuit's
website.
"Neil has decided to step away and embark on a new chapter,
freeing him up from full-time employment to pursue other personal
goals," Brad Smith, Intuit's chief executive, said in a
statement.
During his time at Intuit, Mr. Williams "built a deep bench of
strong financial leaders," Mr. Smith added. Just last month, Ned
Segal, the company's senior vice president of finance for the $2.5
billion division that delivers QuickBooks to customers, was named
CFO of Twitter Inc.
As for Ms. Clatterbuck, Mr. Williams said, "she's ready for the
role."
"I'm leaving Michelle with a very good team, but this is another
place where she will put her own stamp on things," Mr. Williams
said in an interview with CFO Journal Tuesday.
And he is ready to move on.
"It's time...I'll be 65 in January and I've got a bunch of other
things I want to do," he added. "It's been the best job of my
career but I'm about three years past the normal shelf-life of a
public company CFO."
The average age of sitting CFOs is 52, according to the
Crist|Kolder 2017 Volatility Report, which measures various
demographics across the C-suite. Less than 10% of finance chiefs
are over age 60. Mr. Williams's time at Intuit also exceeds the
average tenure of finance chiefs in the S&P and Fortune 500 --
at 4.9 years -- according to Crist|Kolder. The average tenure of
technology CFOs is 4.5 years.
Mr. Williams said he plans to participate on boards and spend
time with immediate and extended family. "I'm not going to do
anything else full-time," he said. He is currently on the boards of
software solutions company RingCentral Inc. and renewable products
company Amyris Inc.
For its latest quarter, the company posted adjusted earnings on
a per-share basis of 20 cents, better than the 17 cents expected by
analysts cited by Thomson Reuters. Revenue for the period rose
11.7% to $842 million, better than the $804.6 million expected by
analysts.
A repeat of strong financial performance next year could be a
potential challenge for Ms. Clatterbuck as she takes over the
reins, Mr. Williams said. Ms. Clatterbuck also will need to spend
more time getting to know the investors and analysts that cover
Intuit.
"She's not an unknown entity by any means," Mr. Williams said.
"But clearly there's opportunity to spend more time for people to
get to know her better and her views and opinions without me
sitting in the chair next to her," he said.
Write to Tatyana Shumsky at tatyana.shumsky@wsj.com and Ezequiel
Minaya at ezequiel.minaya@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
August 22, 2017 19:03 ET (23:03 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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