As chief financial officer of Unilever, the Anglo-Dutch consumer goods group that has about 175,000 employees – some 10,000 of them in finance – Rudy Markham’s job might seem very different from that of Mr Jennings.

However, both CFOs see the role of communication as essential. At Unilever, this is known as “strategic influencing” and involves presenting numbers in ways that allow people to understand what they mean for their particular part of the business.