As real-time business and faster, more data-intensive systems increasingly become corporate necessities, CFOs and treasury professionals are seeking greater transparency and visibility in payment and cash management systems.

For finance leaders, introducing new payment channels or solutions is a balancing act: on one hand, they want to reduce manual work for their teams—which is increasingly a source of friction; on the other, "they always have concerns about their system resilience," said Richard Dooley, vice president of product commercialization at payments company The Clearing House (TCH).

"The less friction in the process, the better—whether it's payment processes, liquidity visibility processes, or accounts payable (AP) and accounts receivable (AR) processes, this is always a top concern for executives," Dooley told CFO Dive when discussing how executives think about innovation. "How can they get more clarity on what they're doing and what's happening?"

Advocating for visibility

Based on Dooley's experience, the core need treasury staff have for payment channels is visibility, he said—deeper insights into payment data help companies distinguish whether a funding issue is a timing problem or a liquidity problem, he cited as an example.

"If a company really has to pay in a certain way and they lack clear visibility into their liquidity, it's often not a solvency issue but a timing issue. We want to help solve that," Dooley said.

New York-based TCH operates payment infrastructure in the U.S., including its Real-Time Payments (RTP) network. According to its website, the network processes nearly $2 trillion in payments daily, covering wire transfers and ACH.

According to Dooley's LinkedIn profile, he joined TCH in March and assumed his current role. He said his first four months on the job involved "really diving deep into payment technology areas not previously covered," including working with TCH's sales and product teams to refine its go-to-market capabilities.

Before joining TCH, he spent about 16 years in corporate banking, including five years as a volunteer member of the Accredited Standards Committee for the U.S. ISO 20022 Market Practice industry forum. His background also includes roles as a senior treasury sales specialist at Fifth Third Bank and a treasury management sales consultant at Regions Bank.

The pursuit of transparency in payment systems or channels reflects finance and treasury executives' growing need for control—if "you have more control over your systems, you gain greater visibility, allowing you to execute your strategy more precisely," he said.

Don't fall behind

Beyond enhancing control, finance and treasury professionals may also be evaluating new payment tools to ensure they don't get left behind by competitors. CFOs and corporate leadership don't necessarily need to be early adopters of new technology, but "they definitely don't want to be the last to act," Dooley said.

"When the industry starts moving in a certain direction, and that direction is truly the trend, companies don't want to be caught off guard," he said. Companies "don't want to be difficult to work with when competitors make transactions more convenient. So there's a constant questioning in the market about how to innovate and improve," he added.

Dooley noted that TCH's primary clients are banks and financial institutions, not corporate clients, but CFOs play a key role in business adoption of new payment channels, such as the RTP network or TCH's exploration of tokenized deposits. In June, TCH announced it would operate a digital payments initiative with several leading banks aimed at more closely integrating traditional payment channels with blockchain-based financial transactions, according to a press release.

"I think CFOs will guide direction from a more macro strategic perspective, but they must listen to the teams facing new market innovations, then bring that feedback back and decide 'where we want to adopt this,'" Dooley said.

Take tokenized deposits, for example—as the concept gains more attention and understanding in the market, and "as details start feeding back to the CFO office, I think you'll see more interest and deeper understanding, along with thinking like: 'What scenarios does this apply to? Why would we use it?'" he said.