FDSeminar Controlling 11 september

1. FD Seminar Controlling
Results on BIMAC Survey
“Evolution in roles and responsibilities of the controller function”
September 11th – Mechelen

2. Reason behind the survey
The world around is changing;
– Companies continue to evolve, based upon internal &
external changes
– Requirements towards processes, skills, activities, rolls &
responsibilities & competences in Finance tend to change
How do Controllers & Financial responsibles look
at those evolutions?
– Do they recognise them?
– Do they subscribe them?
– Do they see further evolution in them?

3. Key questions of the survey
Activities Processes Skills Organisation
How do controllers
divide the time
between the major
activities?
What processes
need to be
improved ?
Soft skills ? Organizational
Reporting lines ?
How much time is
spent on the different
activities ?
Re-active versus
forward looking ?
Hard skills ? Career development
and rewarding ?

4. Who participated in the survey?
• On 31/08, we had 157 respondents in total
157 Respondents
Controllers (76%)
Internal Controllers
(65%)
External Controllers
(33%)
• All sectors are represented
• 53% respondents of stock quoted companies
• 53% respondents have TO > € 500 million
• 11% respondents have TO < €100 million
• 53 % have more then 20 BU’s or Branches
CFO’s (24%)

5. More information
If you would like to receive more detailed statistical
information on the survey, you can
- visit www.controllers-connect.be
- e-mail info@bimac.be
- call 0032 486 04 52 55

6. ACTIVITIES
• Financial Reporting
• Transactional Activities
• Projects
• Decision Support

7. Summary on observations
• Total population
– Reporting and Decision
support are the major
activities
– Transactional related
activities are considered as
minor
• CFO divides his time mainly
between financial reporting
and projects
• Controllers spent most time
on Financial Reporting
• External controllers spent
more time on projects than
internal controllers

8. Detailed activities
• Strategic Planning
• Budgeting
• Cost Calculation
• Management Accounting
• Financial Accounting
• Performance Measurement
• Personnel related work
• Transfer pricing
• Standard Costing
• Reporting
• Improvement of company processes and activities
• Process automation
• Analytics

9. Please give, for every activity, a percentage on how
much of your working
time you are spending on each of
these activities during a typical working year.
Total population
0‐10% 10‐ 25% 25‐ 50% 50 % ‐ 75 % 75% 100%
Strategic planning 73% 17% 7% 1% 1%
Budgeting 47% 37% 14% 1% 1%
Cost calculation 86% 10% 1% 1% 1%
Management accounting 68% 23% 6% 1% 2%
Financial accounting 81% 11% 4% 2% 3%
Performance measurement 77% 19% 3% 1% 1%
Personnel related work 87% 9% 3% 0% 2%
Transfer pricing 95% 3% 1% 1% 1%
Standard costing 91% 4% 2% 1% 1%
Reporting 33% 43% 16% 3% 4%
Improvement of company processes & activities 77% 13% 7% 1% 2%
Process automation (CRP, BI, ERP) 86% 7% 3% 1% 3%
Analytics 69% 23% 5% 1% 2%
Other 91% 5% 2% 2% 1%

10. Summary on observations
on detailed activities
• On the 13 activities, all tend to spent equally their time between 0 and 10%
with the exception of Budgeting, Management Accounting and Reporting.
• For these activities most spent more than 10% and less than 50% of their
time or between 22 and 110 days a year.
• All activities related to costing gets low attention.
• CFOs : spent more time on strategic planning
• Controllers spent significant more time on Budgeting, Management
Accounting and Reporting than CFOs .
• External controllers spend more time on improvement of company
processes and analytics.
Outsourcing of traditional
activities in benefit of focus on
specific activities ?

11. Variance between External and
Internal Controller
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
‐5%
‐10%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
‐5%
‐10%
‐15%
‐20%
‐25%
10‐ 25%
10‐ 25%
External Internal
0‐10% 0‐10%
Strategic planning 83% 75%
Budgeting 57% 41%
Cost calculation 83% 78%
Management accounting 65% 63%
Financial accounting 70% 76%
Performance measurement 78% 69%
Personnel related work 78% 84%
Transfer pricing 91% 92%
Standard costing 91% 80%
Reporting 39% 25%
Improvement of company processes & activities 65% 78%
Process automation (CRP, BI, ERP) 83% 84%
Analytics 57% 63%
‐15%
0‐10%

12. Observations for the future
• Strategic Planning, Performance Measurement,
improvement of processes and automation will
get more attention.
• Budgeting, HR related work and reporting will
get less attention.
• Shift in activities from internal to external
controllers (budget and HR work).

13. Observations for the future
Controller CFO
Strategic planning 15% 14%
Budgeting ‐5% ‐14%
Product cost calculation 4% ‐5%
Management accounting 4% 5%
Financial accounting 3% 0%
Performance
measurement 16% 32%
Personnel related work 0% ‐14%
Transfer pricing 4% 5%
Standard costing 1% 0%
Reporting ‐6% ‐9%
Improvement of
processes 19% 36%
Process automation
(CRP, BI, ERP) 20% 14%
Analytics 4% 9%
Other ‐1% 0%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
‐10%
‐20%
Change in focus in 3 years
Controller CFO

14. FOCUS ON PROCESSES

15. Optimatisation of
Finance Processes
4%
24%
47%
25%
0% ‐ 15 % 15% ‐ 35 % 35 % ‐ 50% > 50%
Observations on
focus of processes
• +/- 50% of the population believes that processes are
optimized for 35 to 50%!
Optimatisation of Finance
Processes
6%
22%
22%
50%
0% ‐ 15 % 15% ‐ 35 % 35 % ‐ 50% > 50%
Total population
Total CFO group
Total controller group
0% ‐
15 %
15% ‐ 35
%
35 % ‐
50% > 50%
Optimatisation of Finance
Processes 4% 24% 46% 25%

16. Observations on
focus of processes
• Deployment of strategy needs to be improved
• The CFO wants
– to improve reliability of planning & forecasts
– on-time MI availability
– reduction of budget and forecast cycle time
• Controller wants :
– focus on advanced automation
– improvement of processes and centralisation
• External controllers will be hired for deployment of
strategy and centralisation
• Clear shift to use more pro-active information besides re-active
information

17. In your opinion, which of the following processes
does your organization need to improve over the
next 3 years?
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
‐10%
‐20%
‐30%
2 2 3 1
Advanced automation Efficiency in process
(O2C/ P2P /R2R / F2I)
MI on time availability Strong centralisation Reduce cycle time
budget / forecast
Increase reliability opf
budget / forecast
Deployment of
strategy
What needs to be improved in the coming 3 years
Controllers CFO Varriance in opinion
3

18. In your opinion, which of the following
processes does your organization need to
improve over the next 3 years?
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
‐10%
‐20%
‐30%
Advanced
automation
Efficiency in
process (O2C/ P2P
/R2R / F2I)
MI on time
availability
Strong
centralisation
Reduce cycle time
budget / forecast
Increase reliability
opf budget /
forecast
Deployment of
strategy
What needs to be improved in the coming 3 years
Internal External Variance in opinion

19. How often (%) are you relying
on reactive management
information and how often
do you come up with pro-active information?
CLEAR SHIFT TO USE MORE PRO-ACTIVE INFORMATION BESIDES RE-ACTIVE
Evolution in usage of pro‐active versus re‐active
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Re‐active 3 years <
Re‐active now
Pro‐active 3 years <
Pro‐active now
MI
0 % ‐ 25 % 25% ‐ 50% 50% ‐ 75% 75% ‐ 100%
0 % ‐ 25 % 25% ‐ 50% 50% ‐ 75% 75% ‐ 100%
‐22%
18%
4% 1%
‐5%
6%
18%
‐20%
Evolution Now compared to 3
years ago
Pro‐active Re‐active
INFORMATION

20. SKILLS

21. Soft Skills
• Creativity
• Solve Problems
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Flexibility
• Responsibility
• Global Picture
• Convince
• Negotiation

22. Observations on soft skills
• Clear evolution in importance
of soft skills
• Dominant soft skills recognized
by CFO & controllers :
– Communication
– Teamwork
– Solve problems
– Knowing the global picture
– Responsibility
• Less dominant soft skills
– Creativity
– Power to convince
– Negotiation
For the CFO
responsibility
and solving
problems are
most important
Major > 3Y
‐8%
‐7%
6%
‐2%
‐9%
‐10%
4%
‐3%
‐2%
Creativity
Solve Problems
Communication
Teamwork
For the controller Flexibility
communication
and global
picture are most
important
Responsibility
Global Picture
Convince
Negotiation

23. Hard skills
• Cost Accounting
• Accounting Standards (IFRS, IAS, …)
• Management Reporting
• Transfer Pricing
• Planning, budgeting & forecasting
• Organizational structure
• Performance Management & KPI reporting
• Strategy definition & Balanced score carding
• Legal
• Modelling (statistical forecasting & trend analysis)

24. Observations on hard skills
• Major required hard skills for the future :
– Strategy Definition & Balanced Scorecard
– Performance Measurement & KPI’s
– Modelling (statistical forecasting & trend analysis)
• Minor required skills for the future :
– Accounting standards & IFRS
– Cost accounting
– Legal

25. Evolution in importance of
major skills in 6 years
Total population
Major < 3 years Now > 3 years
Cost accounting 64% 51% 54%
Accounting standards (IFRS & different GAAPS) 40% 36% 43%
Management reporting 58% 81% 83%
Transfer pricing 15% 32% 38%
Planning, budgeting & forecasting 58% 88% 86%
Organisation structuring (profit center, cost center structures) 40% 61% 61%
Performance Management & KPI's 34% 70% 87%
Strategy definition & Balanced Scorecard 20% 50% 77%
Legal 13% 18% 27%
Modelling (statistical forecasting & trend analysis) 21% 48% 70%
CFO’s & Controllers share the same opinion

26. Organization, Ambition and Rewarding

27. Organization
Matrix
Direct line
Dotted Line

28. Observations on Organization
• Different view between CFO and Controller
• CFO wants direct line
• Controllers
– matrix organization becomes more important
– matrix organization with direct line to CFO prevails
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
< 3 years Contr. now Contr. < 3 years CFO now CFO
Solid line reporting to the CFO Matrix structure: dotted line reporting to the CFO Matrix structure: direct line reporting to the CFO Other

29. Observations on Organization
• Collaboration with Operations, Sales & Marketing becomes more
important
• Collaboration with internal audit and legal department seems less
important
• Collaboration with IT is important but less than operations and sales
and marketing
• CFO has stronger view than controller but both confirm same trend
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
Overview collaboration witrh other departments in 3 years
Operations IT Sales & Marketing HR Legal & Risk Inernal Audit
Minor Normal Major

30. Ambition

31. Observations on Ambition
• 1 on 3 controllers make
it to FD / CFO
• To be successful two
criteria seems to be
dominant
– Being a business partner
– Translate strategy into
execution
– Compliance with regulation is
less conceived as critical
success factor for career
development

32. Rewarding

33. Observations on Rewarding
• 89 % expects to earn minimum € 3,500 gross salary up to more than €
6,500
• Majority of CFO expects gross salary > € 6,500
• Majority of controllers expect to earn between € 3,500 - € 6,500
Exepcted Evolution of Salary in
6 years
> 6500
5000 ‐6500
3500 ‐ 5000
2500 ‐ 3500
‐11%
‐16%
4%
3%
19%
< 2500
‐20% ‐15% ‐10% ‐5% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%

34. Thank you for your attention
BIMAC vzw
The Belgian Institute of Management Accountants and
Controllers
www.controllers-connect.be