CFO William Bontes: ‘The best CFO role in the Netherlands’
‘I have the best CFO role in the Netherlands, at a large and diverse company – a fantastic candy store with a warm culture.’ When William Bontes said that to cfo.nl in 2020, he had only just started as CFO of Louwman Group, the family-owned business that imports Toyota, Lexus, and Suzuki, among others. He immediately felt at home there: ‘The passion of the people in this company is wonderful. That goes for the security guard, it goes for the other 3,000 employees, and it goes for me. At Louwman Group, you do not ‘just’ have a job – you are part of a truly special family-owned business.’
Since joining the company, Bontes has witnessed firsthand how Louwman has evolved from a traditional car dealership into a comprehensive mobility provider. According to Bontes, the future isn’t about cars, but about getting from A to B with ease. ‘Our world used to revolve around selling cars. The new world is all about mobility in all its forms.’ The fact that Louwman is a family business fosters long-term thinking. ‘It is precisely in making such choices that you see how decision-making within a family business can make a difference. Financial performance naturally plays an important role, but it is not the only measure. History, long-term relationships, prior commitments, and responsibility toward employees can also be factors.’
Bontes is a true Rotterdam native. He studied business administration at Erasmus University, served as CFO of the RET transportation company, and spent several years on the supervisory board at Feyenoord. He describes himself as a down-to-earth guy. He therefore has strong opinions about the CFO profession. In the podcast Today’s CFO: Changing the Game, he noted that financial executives make their analyses unnecessarily complicated. Any financial professionals are unable to conduct an analysis in a simple and straightforward way. They use language that a board member does not understand. According to him, a CFO must be able to distill complex matters down to their essence. ‘A CFO must be able to explain what is going on in a single slide or in a minute.’