The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) have set up a strategic collaboration to encourage closer working links between the finance and HR professions, and also to share their CPD offerings.

The two bodies will run a programme of joint research on areas such as 'big data', integrated business reporting and shared services for HR and finance.

Critically, the professional bodies will also make their existing relevant training and continuous professional development (CPD) offers available to members of both organisations.

One of the first joint research projects will focus on human capital measurement. This is designed to address a shared concern that organisations are not consistently good at valuing the contribution of people to their performance and worth, or assessing the risks to business success that poor people management can bring.

Charles Tilley, chief executive of CIMA, said: 'When talking about property value, the adage often used is "location, location, location". When thinking about the driver of any business, we should be saying it is "people, people, people".'

'By working together, we hope to show that accurate and relevant reporting on an organisation's people, as well as on its financials, provides real insight into the true health of the business, on which sound investment decisions can be made.'

In light of recent financial failures and the on-going impact of the recession, the collaboration is recognition that financial acumen is not the only over-riding issue of importance.

Peter Cheese, chief executive of CIPD said: 'We know that people are critical to business success. But you get what you measure, and many of the recent crises affecting business can be traced back to failures of culture that could have been picked up if longer-term people-related metrics had been given more weight instead of a myopic focus on short-term financial results.