CFOs tend to look at the current picture of an organization’s finances and make recommendations for how they can improve and optimize them. They also usually make the reports to stakeholders and provide financial guidance by interpreting reports. Financial controllers usually make a determination of a financial situation of a company and look at outside forces acting on that organization to make decisions about ways to proceed in the future. They tend to work under CFOs as part of a finance team, though in smaller companies, they may wear both the hats of a CFO and a financial controller.