About FEI's technical committees.

The following is a listing of key information, contacts and goals for FEI's technical committees. Much of the information from the alphabetical listing below is distilled from FEI's website. For the full text, go to www.fei.org/committees/.

Committee on Benefits Finance (CBF)

Chair: Elliott Friedman, Director, Benefits Finance, Lockheed Martin Corp.

FEI Liaison: Serena Davila

CBF was established in 1966 to study and formulate opinions on existing and proposed legislation affecting employee benefits. This includes pension, health and other forms of employee benefits that affect the design, financing or administration of such benefits.

The committee is empowered to present its findings, recommendations, statements and positions to the members of FEI. It may also communicate its findings to other business and professional organizations, federal and state government agencies, the U.S. Congress and other entities having an interest in these matters.

Mission: To educate members on issues involving benefits finance, retirement security and related legislative and regulatory matters. To develop policy positions on selective legislative/regulatory issues and influence outcomes on these issues with particular focus on retirement plans, including pensions and savings and health care plans.

Also, the committee's purpose is to provide an effective forum for member networking and provide a medium for the committee members to discuss common issues that they face with their work in the benefits sector.

Current Hot Issues: Pension reform, post-retirement medical benefits, holding company stock in a 401 (k)

Meetings: CBF meets quarterly in Washington, D.C., with Congressional staff and industry experts to discuss legislation and timely issues the members are dealing with in the workplace.

Membership: The committee is composed of Directors of Benefits.

Committee on Corporate Finance (CCF)

Chair: Dessa Bokides, Executive Vice President and CFO, ProLogis

FEI Staff Liaison: Mark Prysock

Established in 1980, CCF is authorized to formulate statements and positions on capital markets and the capital structure and financial resources of corporations, including policies, practices, rules, regulations, principles and standards.

CCF addresses issues related to debt and investment management, risk management, mergers and acquisitions, economic and financial analysis, financial communications, annual meetings and annual reports and stockholder and investor relations. The committee maintains liaisons with the stock and futures exchanges, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Congress and other appropriate agencies of the federal government.

Mission: To provide a forum for peer interaction and discussion of issues on corporate finance such as capital structure, dividend policy, credit ratings, accessing capital markets and others; communicate its findings and recommendations to FEI members and others; deliver relevant educational experience for the treasury component of FEI.

Current Hot Issues: Executive compensation disclosure, rating agency reform

Meetings: CCF meets on an as-needed basis via conference call. The committee has met with the Corporate Finance division of the SEC, and meets with Congressional policymakers, as appropriate.

Membership: The committee comprises treasurers from large and medium-sized corporations.

Committee on Corporate Reporting (CCR)

Chair: Lawrence J. Salva, Senior Vice President, CAO and Controller, Comcast Corp.

FEI Liaison: Christine DiFabio

Established in 1966, CCR has become one of the most influential corporate voices affecting accounting and reporting policy among regulators and legislators.

Mission: To formulate statements and positions on matters pertaining to financial accounting, auditing and corporate reporting, including corporate policies, practices, rules, regulations, principles and standards. CCR reviews and responds to research studies, statements, pronouncements, pending legislation, proposals and other documents issued by domestic and international agencies and organizations.

Current Hot Issues: The committee is focused on improving transparency and reducing complexity in financial reporting. It continues to work through implementation issues surrounding Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404 and related rules and standards with the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) and the SEC, including anticipated amendments to Auditing Standard No. 2 (AS2) and new rules for management; providing analysis and feedback to improve the implementation of the rules; working through implementation issues surrounding FIN 48 on Accounting for Uncertainty in Income Taxes with the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), as well as monitoring and responding to FASB Projects on the Conceptual Framework, Fair Value, Business Combinations and others.

The committee has active members serving as representatives on FASB/International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), Financial Performance Reporting Task Force, FASB Emerging Issues Task Force (EITF) and PCAOB Standing Advisory Group (SAG).

Meetings: CCR meets in private, four times per year, and has three active subcommittees that meet separately. These subcommittees are liaisons to FASB, IASB and SEC and PCAOB. Each CCR member must serve on one of the subcommittees. The full committee also meets annually with FASB.

Committee Membership: The committee is composed primarily of controllers of large publicly traded companies.

Committee on Finance and Information Technology (CFIT)

Chair: Taylor Hawes, Controller--Global Platforms & Operations, Microsoft Corp.

FEI Liaison: William Sinnett

CFIT addresses the needs and interests of financial executives as strategic leaders, as they strive to realize measurable and sustainable performance improvements while maintaining financial control. These needs and interests include the development and application of information technology, systems and other methodologies affecting the management of business functions, such as business performance management (BPM) and shared services; through research, surveys, advocacy, conference content and newsletters. CFIT's priorities are driven by key trends in information technology (IT) as identified by the committee.

Mission: CFIT monitors trends and developments in IT for the senior financial executive who, as a member of senior management, uses information for performance analysis and decision support; is the provider and auditor of controls and security for reliability of information; and is the administrator responsible for providing, processing and disseminating information.

CFIT will then: provide oversight to the development of programs and services targeted to meet the strategic needs of FEI members; provide articles to Financial Executive magazine and other FEI publications; and provide IT content for FEI conferences through active participation on the conference committees for FEI's Annual Summit, Current Financial Reporting Issues Conference (CFRI), Private Company Forums and other professional development programs.

Current Hot Issues: eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL); Systems Controls, particularly as required for Sarbanes-Oxley compliance; Corporate Performance Management (CPM); Business Process Outsourcing (BPO); and the CFO/CIO relationship

Meetings: CFIT meets quarterly in different locations around the country. Meetings include a half-day update on committee business and a full day of presentations by technology experts.

Membership: The committee consists primarily of senior financial executives with an interest in the use and application of IT.

Committee on Government Business (CGB)

Chair: Vic Avetissian, Director, Government Acquisition Initiative, Northrop Grumman Corp.

FEI Liaison: Mark Prysock

CGB was established in June 1963 to focus on federal legislation and regulation that affect government contractors. In particular, it has focused on government activity that impacts financial practice standards, accounting principles, record-keeping and reporting and financial rules followed by private business enterprises.

Mission: To maintain liaison with private sector and governmental agencies; to provide information about government contracting issues; to ensure that industry views are considered when the government addresses contracting issues; to provide a forum for peer interaction and discussion of issues; to be a leading advocate of industry views; and to meet the professional needs and enhance the skills of financial executives.

Current Hot Issues: Government contracting reform, accounting implications of pension reform, "commercial item" recognition.

Meetings: CGB meets quarterly in the Washington, D.C., area with speakers from the Department of Defense, Capitol Hill or other government contracting regulatory agencies.

Membership: The committee is composed of directors and VPs of government acquisition.

Committee on Private Companies (CPC)

Chair: A. Merrill Ayers

FEI Liaison: Serena Davila

CPC was established in June 1997 to address the professional needs of financial executives employed in private and closely held companies and to provide a voice for their interests within FEI. CPC is also authorized to formulate FEI position statements on matters affecting private and closely held companies and to communicate those positions to appropriate sources, internally and externally.

Mission: To promote and provide oversight to the development of programs and services targeted to meet the needs of FEI members in privately held companies and to promote and provide oversight to the development of articles for Financial Executive magazine and other publications that serve the FEI membership at-large.

Also, CPC tracks and responds to government activities, meets with legislators and their staff on Capitol Hill, as needed, and responds to media inquiries and other developments directly impacting private companies on behalf of FEI.

Current Hot Issues: GAAP hierarchy; estate tax; Sarbanes-Oxley impact on private companies; impact of Subchapter S tax regulations on growing businesses that are closely held or private; private/public GAAP and small business health plans.

Meetings: CPC holds two forums per year (open to all), which include subcommittee meetings. The three subcommittees are: program, standards and policy.

Membership: CPC consists of about 60 members, mostly CFOs of private companies that vary in size, industry and number of employees.

Committee on Taxation (COT)

Chair: David A. Heywood, General Tax Counsel, Lockheed Martin Corp.

FEI Staff Liaison: Mark Prysock

Established in 1962, COT is authorized to formulate FEI statements and positions on matters pertaining to tax legislation, policies, practices, rules and regulations. COT addresses: economic and social implications of taxes, domestic and international; tax simplifications and administration and tax and accounting relationships. The committee communicates its positions to both the executive and legislative branches of the federal government. The committee has two subcommittees: International Tax and Federal Tax.

Mission: To identify, evaluate and communicate legislative and regulatory issues of interest to senior finance executives; to represent the views and opinions of FEI members on issues pertaining to tax policy; to provide a forum for peer interaction and discussion of tax issues; and to facilitate FEI members' understanding of tax laws, regulation and administration and their dealing with tax authorities.

Current Hot Issues: Extending temporary tax provisions that have expired, modifying transfer pricing services regulations, repealing withholding tax on payments to government contractors, corporate tax reform.

Meetings: COT meets quarterly, usually with representatives from the U.S. Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). COT also meets with professional staff members from the House Ways & Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee.

Membership: The committee is composed of tax directors and vice presidents from large multinational companies.

Globalization Oversight Committee (GOC)

Chair: David Morris, Owner, Morris Consulting

FEI Liaison: Grace Hinchman

GOC was launched to create a global forum of financial executives, initially from both sides of the Atlantic, willing to share best business practices, to engage in a business network, to follow a common code of ethics and to play an advocacy role in front of regulatory bodies.

Mission: To develop a strategy for international growth; identify products and services to support globalization of FEI; and to determine governance and organizational structure for a globalized FEI.

Current Hot Issues: International audit and accounting standards, issues related to the global convergence of financial accounting standards and small and mid-sized enterprise (SME) accounting concerns.

Meetings: GOC meetings are held at the request of the committee chairperson.

Membership: The committee comprises about 20 members from companies with global business interests.