JEFFREY C. LIM, chief financial officer (CFO) of mall developer and operator SM Prime Holdings, Inc., has just been given the toughest job so far in his entire career.

He has been tasked to lead the consolidation of SM Group’s real estate assets under SM Prime, a move that will make it the biggest property firm in Southeast Asia. 

This means that soon, Mr. Lim will be handling a company with double the capitalization. The value of its assets will balloon as it oversees condominiums, hotels, convention centers and leisure developments.

More importantly, investors will be seeing SM Prime, already a local behemoth, going head-tohead with other property giants in the international arena. But having witnessed the expansion of the company firsthand, and having worked closely with SM Group founder Henry Sy, Sr. and his family, Mr. Lim is armed and ready to conquer the new frontiers.

BEGINNINGS

Mr. Lim has been dealing with balance sheets for decades now. He entered SGV & Co. as an auditor shortly after graduating with a degree in accounting from the University of the East. 

After six years in the auditing firm; he transferred to IT Company Unisys Philippines Ltd. to man its accounting and treasury department. He then had a short stint in Hong Kong, still with Unisys, where he handled contracts, pricing and financial planning. 

It was in 1994 when Mr. Lim decided to come back to the Philippines after his former SGV boss Jose T. Sio, SM Investments Corp. chief financial officer, invited him to join the Sy-led conglomerate.

Mr. Lim joined SM Prime at an interesting time. The company, which had just four malls then, was about to go public. He would later on rub elbows with Mr. Sy —now the country’s richest man — to map out SM Prime’s expansion to become the country’s biggest operator and developer of shopping centers. 

“That is probably the highlight of the learning and experience that I had because not so many people are given the opportunity to work with somebody like Mr. Henry Sy, Sr.,” Mr. Lim told BusinessWorld in a recent interview. 

His work with Mr. Sy trained him to think big and plan on a large scale. Today, SM Prime plans to end the year with 48 malls in the Philippines and five in China. It will open in four new locations next year and expand two existing ones with a P20-billion budget.

“I learned to always look at the bigger picture, without ignoring the small details,” Mr. Lim said. A very important trait for a CFO, fiscal prudence is something he also developed while working with the Chinese tycoon.

“If we can save a peso, we will save that one peso, but if we need to spend P100 million, we will spend that P100 million,” Mr. Lim said.

MORE THAN PROFITS

Mr. Lim applies his training or perhaps his natural inclination to look at the bigger picture when dealing with a critical aspect of business: profitability. “When I see that there are some issues in terms of the returns, I don’t out rightly say: 

We cannot. We will have to sit down and study things,” he said, recalling instances when a business proposal with relatively small margins lands at his desk.

“For instance, an entertainment project could have less margins but that could entice more people to visit our malls.”, a blue-chip company on the Philippine Stock Exchange, has been a profitable venture for many years. Last year, its profits surged by 16% to P10.5 billion from a year ago, well above the 12%-13% guidance set by the company.

Part of the credit goes to Mr. Lim, of course. Having been appointed as the officer-in charge for condominium-builder SM Development Corp., Mr. Lim is not a typical finance guy whose focus is only on money. 

He takes on the perspective of a CFO and a chief executive officer at the same time. “For me, the role of the CFO is not just to look after the numbers but also to look after the organization — the sale or the turnover of units and all aspects of the company,” said Mr. Lim, who juggles the five working days overseeing both companies.

His holistic approach in managing the company’s finances involves more than numbers. Dealing with people is just as important. “It is also making sure that everybody is working as a team to make sure that the objectives of the company are met,” he said. 

“You have to work with everyone. “With the managerial and financial caliber he possesses, Mr. Lim has both the guts and the abilities to lead the next phase of SM Group’s real estate venture.

The consolidation process is expected to be completed by the end of the year, pending regulatory approvals. But, the merger is only the start of something bigger for SM Prime, and perhaps something tougher for him as the CFO.

With his training and capability to look beyond the numbers, though, Mr. Lim is sure to take the challenge in stride.

“This consolidation and merger is a big challenge. After this, we will lay down the foundation of growth of the SM Group moving forward,” he said.

Mr. Lim was named CFO of the Year in 2012 by Dutch bank ING and the Financial Executives of the Philippines. — Cliff Harvey C.