The forum brought together 65 speakers, including finance directors and company executives, to explore management strategies for uncertain times. Topics included macroeconomic forecasts, digital transformation, tax and currency risks, ESG, risk management, investment and talent development.
Shevtsov presented a Metinvest case study, “The CFO as a driver of transformation: how to reduce costs and increase business efficiency”.
According to him, since the start of the full-scale war, the Group has lost facilities in Mariupol, Avdiivka and Pokrovsk, and its workforce has fallen from 110,000 to 50,000. Nevertheless, Metinvest has restructured its operations for a wartime economy and remains one of the country’s largest corporate donors: support provided to the state since 2022 totals UAH9.7 billion.
Metinvest’s iron ore mining segment comprises three mining and processing plants in Kryvyi Rih employing 10,500 people. To accelerate decision making, the Group has appointed a single management team to oversee all three assets.
“We wanted not only to take decisions quickly, but to implement them just as quickly. We set out to consolidate expertise in a single technical centre, overcome internal resistance and establish synergistic process management. The goal was to improve product quality without increasing costs, while managing the resources of the entire Group effectively,” said Shevtsov.
He added that the labour shortage is acute for industrial companies: the business currently has around 4,000 vacancies.
“The government’s decision to allow young men aged 18-22 to travel abroad has deepened the problem. The absence of a transparent system that would let us ring-fence the maximum possible share of our key specialists creates difficulties for big business. In turn, this affects our ability to operate steadily, pay taxes and support the state,” he noted.
The main task in consolidating Metinvest’s iron ore facilities under a single management team was to maintain production volumes, improve quality and reduce unit costs through energy efficiency, synergies and operational improvements. The CFO’s mandate was to optimise costs, ensure supply-chain stability and manage resources effectively to sustain profitability and continuity of production.
“The role of the CFO is to drive change through people. Build transparent communication channels with your team and key functions, because without a shared vision and close cooperation no transformation will happen. High-quality working-capital management is also key to healthy competition and the functioning of your business,” Shevtsov emphasised.
The CFO focused on benchmarking, cost optimisation and raising efficiency through collaboration between companies. By pooling the management of resources, maintenance and personnel, the Group has cut costs, extended equipment life, eased staff shortages and sped up decision making across the business.
“The change in the management model has improved interactions with stakeholders. Communication with auditors and banks has become faster, more transparent and more efficient: rather than multiple contacts with different legal entities, counterparties now receive consolidated responses from a single centre. This has accelerated audit processes, simplified work with credit lines and built trust in the Group,” added Shevtsov.
The transformation has strengthened the CFO’s role as a business partner. The finance team is increasingly embedded in operational processes and technological detail, working alongside production departments to take decisions. “It’s like a KPI you were already meeting, but now with greater impact on the business,” noted the CFO of Metinvest’s iron ore mining segment.