The imperative to transform the finance department to function in a more strategic, forward-looking and action-oriented fashion has been a consistent theme of practitioners, consultants and business journalists for two decades. In all that time, however, most finance and accounting departments have not changed much. In our benchmark research on the Office of Finance, nine out of 10 participants said that it’s important or very important for finance departments to take a strategic role in running their company. The research also shows a significant gap between this objective and how well most departments perform. A large majority (83%) said they perform the core finance functions of accounting, fiscal control, transaction management, financial reporting and internal auditing, but only 41 percent said they play an active role in their company’s management. Even fewer (25%) have implemented a high degree of automation in their core finance functions and actively promote process and analytical excellence.
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Topics:
Big Data,
Planning,
Predictive Analytics,
Social Media,
Governance,
GRC,
Human Capital,
Mobile Technology,
Office of Finance,
Budgeting,
close,
Continuous Accounting,
Continuous Planning,
end-to-end,
Tax,
Tax-Datawarehouse,
Analytics,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Performance,
CIO,
Cloud Computing,
Financial Performance,
In-memory,
Uncategorized,
CFO,
CPQ,
Risk,
CEO,
Financial Performance Management,
FPM
The steady march of technology’s ability to handle ever more complicated tasks has been a constant since the beginning of the information age in the 1950s. Initially, computers in business were used to automate simple clerical functions, but as systems have become more capable, information technology has been able to substitute for increasingly higher levels of human skill and experience. A turning point of sorts was reached in the 1990s when ERP, business intelligence and business process automation software reduced the need for middle managers. Increasingly, organizations used software to coordinate activities as well as communicate results and requirements up and down the organizational chart. Both were once the exclusive role of the middle manager. Consequently, almost every for-profit organization eliminated management layers so that today corporate structures are flatter than they once were. Technology automation also eliminated the need for administrative staff to perform routine reporting and analysis. Meanwhile, over the course of the 1990s, the cost of running the finance department measured as a percentage of sales was cut almost in half as a result of eliminating staff and because automation enabled companies to scale without adding headcount. During the last recession, companies in North America and Europe once again made deep reductions to their administrative staffs, relying on information technology to pick up the slack.
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Topics:
Sustainability,
ERP,
Governance,
GRC,
Human Capital,
Office of Finance,
audit,
finance transformation,
LongView,
Tax,
Analytics,
Business Analytics,
Business Performance,
Financial Performance,
Oracle,
CFO,
Risk & Compliance (GRC),
Vertex,
FPM,
Innovation Awards,
Thomson-Reuters multinational
Workday Financial Management (which belongs in the broader ERP software category) appears to be gaining traction in the market, having matured sufficiently to be attractive to a large audience of buyers. It was built from the ground up as a cloud application. While that gives it the advantage of a fresh approach to structuring its data and process models for the cloud, the product has had to catch up to its rivals in functionality. The company’s ERP offering has matured considerably over the past three years and now is better positioned to grow its installed base. Workday recently added Aon, the insurance and professional services company, to its customer list (becoming its largest customer to date) and reported that its annual contract value (ACV - the annualized aggregate revenue value of all subscription contracts as of the end of a quarter) has doubled since the second quarter of this year, albeit from a low base. This is an important milestone because for years the company’s growth has come from the human capital management (HCM) portion of the business, not financials. Workday has around 160 customers for its financials (more than 90 of which are live) compared to more than 1,000 customers for HCM.
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Topics:
Microsoft,
SAP,
ERP,
FP&A,
Human Capital,
NetSuite,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
close,
Controller,
dashboard,
Tax,
Operational Performance,
Analytics,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
Cloud Computing,
Collaboration,
Financial Performance,
IBM,
Oracle,
Uncategorized,
CFO,
Data,
Financial Performance Management,
FPM,
Intacct,
Spreadsheets
Whatever Oracle’s cloud strategy had been the past, this year’s OpenWorld conference and trade show made it clear that the company is now all in. In his keynote address, co-CEO Mark Hurd presented predictions for the world of information technology in 2025, when the cloud will be central to companies’ IT environments. While his forecast that two (unnamed) companies will account for 80 percent of the cloud software market 10 years from now is highly improbable, it’s likely that there will be relentless consolidation, marginalization and extinction within the IT industry sector driven by cloud disruptions and the maturing of the software business. In practice, though, we expect the transition to the cloud to be slow and uneven.
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Topics:
Microsoft,
Predictive Analytics,
Sales Performance,
SAP,
Supply Chain Performance,
ERP,
Human Capital,
Mobile Technology,
NetSuite,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
close,
closing,
Controller,
dashboard,
Tax,
Customer Performance,
Operational Performance,
Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Cloud Computing,
Collaboration,
IBM,
Oracle,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
CFO,
Data,
finance,
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Financial Performance Management,
FPM,
Intacct
Many senior finance executives say they want their department to play a more strategic role in the management and operations of their company. They want Finance to shift its focus from processing transactions to higher-value functions in order to make more substantial contributions to the success of the organization. I use the term “continuous accounting” to represent an approach to managing the accounting cycle that can facilitate the shift by improving the performance of the accounting function. Continuous accounting embraces three main principles:
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Topics:
ERP,
Office of Finance,
Reporting,
close,
closing,
Controller,
dashboard,
Tax,
Analytics,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance,
Cloud Computing,
Collaboration,
Financial Performance,
CFO,
Data,
finance,
Financial Performance Management,
FPM
