‘Everyone wants more from finance. The business wants a strategic partner with flexible processes and interoperable systems, and… the Financial Planning & Analysis wants to be the team that leans into the business to apply finance acumen and drives decisions’ (according to a 2019 FP&A APQC report).
In summary, the report found that
‘FP&A teams spend just 25% of their time on analysis, with the rest spent on data collection (42%) and process management (33%). The main issue is inadequate systems and tools.’
That meant that in 2019 the average highly skilled FP&A team is spending 75% of their time NOT doing FP&A!
The report concluded
‘Automation frees up time for strategic tasks, eliminates data silos, and provides real-time insights, allowing teams to focus on forecasting, modelling, and reporting for better decision-making and growth.’
But that was 5 years ago… so everyone has automated these spreadsheet-based processes by now – surely?
Unfortunately
Despite the Enterprise Performance Management industry being about USD 6 billion in 2024, the reality for most #CFOs of the world’s 55,214 listed companies (and of the millions more unlisted businesses), is that hardly anything has changed.
If your #planningprocess is #spreadsheet-based, maybe you (and your CFO) are unaware how quickly you can automate these processes?
Just imagine
Your #FP&A team ‘leaning into the business to apply finance acumen and drive decisions.’
Now, wouldn’t that change how your CFO feels?
#EPM #financialplanning
