As tax moves from a back-office function to an integrated and strategic position, tax professionals must have a data-driven, business, and security mindset. Watch onDemand by using this link: https://goo.gl/8trFsv

1. Building the Tax Team of the
Future to Successfully Navigate
the Regulatory Storm
The webinar will begin shortly

2. 2
• Leader in tax compliance software for over 30
years
• Trusted by more than half of the Fortune 500.
• 5,000 clients operating in 120 different countries.
• Regulatory analysis leadership tracking over 15K
global jurisdictions in 185 countries
• Certified by the Streamlined Sales Tax
Governing Board and CO DOR
• Headquartered in Boston with offices in Atlanta,
Denver, Minneapolis, London, Amsterdam, Sao
Paulo, and Santiago Chile
The global leader in tax compliance
and business-to-government
reporting software.

3. Multiple Compliance Solutions. One Platform.
Indirect Tax
1099 Reporting
Beverage Alcohol
ACA
AEOI
Sales Tax Filing
LatAm Compliance
VAT Reporting

4. Building the Tax Team of the
Future to Successfully Navigate
the Regulatory Storm
The webinar will begin shortly

5. Building the Tax Team of the
Future to Successfully Navigate
the Regulatory Storm
October 24, 2017
Matt Walsh – Principal Indirect Tax Solutions
Mark Christenson – Director, Product Marketing

6. AGENDA
• What is this storm we are talking about?
• Characteristics of the Tax Professional
of the Future:
• Business Acumen
• Data Analytics / Problem Solving
• Global Perspective
• Technology
• Actions to improve
• Q&A

7. Are you feeling
the storm?

8. Technology is Disrupting your Business
• Customer demands
• Increased competition
• Global expansion
• Investment in R&D and M&A
• Product innovation
• Rapid change

9. Technology has also Changed How
Governments Regulate
Aggressive Rapid Response Borderless
• Data transparency
• Increased audit frequency/
scrutiny
• Jurisdictional reporting and
documentation
• Technology / AI / Data
mining
• Pre-Clearance
• Pace of change
• Evolving regimes
• Spanning regions
• Information sharing

10. Trends
Audits are on the rise:
60% of manufacturers and
50% of retailers anticipate
that trend to continue
through 2021. With
countries around the
world beginning to
automate auditing
processes, we can expect
an even bigger increase in
audit frequency in the
coming years.
Source: Aberdeen Group

11. 45% of CFOs say increasing compliance costs
are the #1 barrier to growth.
– Grant Thornton Bi-Annual CFO Survey
“I’ve been in tax for 30 years, and I’ve
never seen in my professional life such
evolution of tax at this pace, ever.”
– Chief Tax Officer
“One mistake in my e-invoicing workflow
and my business is down for days – or
weeks.”
– Global Manufacturer
“Right now it’s the wild
west.”
– US Ecommerce Exec
You will need to provide data to the
authorities a couple of days after invoices
have been issued or received. That's
incredible.
– European VAT Executive

12. Performance
Metric Performance
Number of audits over the past 5 years Over 30
Number of audits over the past 12
months
3.1
Days to prepare for and complete an
audit
10.6
Average penalties paid when audited $55,070
Percentage of revenue spent on
penalties due to filing errors
2%
Returns that were 100% accurate over
the past two years
60%
Filings that were late over the past two
years
24%
Employees used to manage compliance 13.9
Source: Aberdeen Group, April 2017

16. “A successful tax professional
of the future will be highly
proficient in data analysis,
statistics, and technology, as
well as process improvement and
change management.”
PWC – The Tax Professional of the Future
Business Acumen
Data Analytics /
Problem Solving
Global Perspective Technology
Tax Pro of
the Future

17. • Understanding and connection to
business strategy
• Ability to adapt to both business
and regulatory changes
• Work effectively across teams,
countries and lines of business
• Effective communication skills
and ability to influence
Business Acumen
Data Analytics /
Problem Solving
Global Perspective Technology
Tax Pro of
the Future

18. This…

19. And this…
“In a lot of
organizations, there is
broad recognition
that they are behind
the curve … in talent
management.”
David Collings -
Professor of Human
Resources
Management, Dublin
City University

20. “With the global trend toward
increased transparency, there is
a need for tax professionals to be
exceptional communicators and
brand ambassadors.”
Jane McCormick - Global Head of Tax, KPMG International

21. How would you rate yourself / team?
• Not involved / last to know
about business changes
• Works with others reactively
only when needed
• Focused on tactics
• Difficulty with change
• Limited technology expertise
• Team is aware of and involved in
business strategy
• Works proactively and effectively
with business leaders to influence
positive change
• Engaged in process improvement
• Ability to obtain needed resources
to support business strategy
• Highly adaptable
Reactive 1 5 Proactive2 43

22. • Data driven mindset – Embraces
role as a “tax technologist”
• Ability to access organize, combine
and manipulate data
• Translate data into insights and KPIs
to measure, monitor and improve
• Proactive focus on opportunities
and risks
• Passionate about measuring
improvement
Business Acumen
Data Analytics /
Problem Solving
Global Perspective Technology
Tax Pro of
the Future
Only 55% of respondents had established KPI’s for their tax
compliance process. Aberdeen - 2017

23. “The ability to analyze data in real time has a significant
impact on a company’s business performance and is quickly
becoming a necessity for tax.”
PWC - Reshaping the Tax Function of the Future
“If [tax executives] can obtain tax-ready information, they will be able to
devote the bulk of their time to strategic tax analysis.”
Richard Suhr - EY
“The linchpin for real transformation is data. How data
issues are solved will shape process change, which in turn
will drive the resource model and the opportunities for
value-added activities that contribute more strategically to
the business.”
PWC - Reshaping the Tax Function of the Future

24. How would you rate yourself / team?
• Siloed data viewed of data as
means to an end
• Time spent manipulating data and
fixing errors – often need IT
assistance
• No established KPI’s
• Difficult supporting audit defense
• Execute the process
• Stay in your lane
• Systems and processes provide “tax
ready data”
• Holistic view of data as the
foundation of compliance and audit
defense
• Established KPI’s to measure and
monitor process metrics and identify
gaps
• Time spent monitoring risk and doing
proactive planning for audits
• Tools to easily work with data in real
time
• Empowered to drive positive change
Reactive 1 5 Proactive2 43

25. • Global mindset with local
expertise
• Systems and processes to expand
globally with minimal risk
• Centralized control and oversight
• Foresight to prepare for rapid
growth
• Flexibility for multi-jurisdictional
requirements
Business Acumen
Data Analytics /
Problem Solving
Global Perspective Technology
Tax Pro of
the Future

26. 26

27. 27

28. 28
SAP
Oracle
Net-
suite

29. 29
Sales and Use
E-Audit
GST
VAT
Sales Tax / VAT
E
R
P
E
R
P
E
R
P
E
R
P
E
R
P
E
R
PE
R
P

31. EY – Tax Insights for Business Leaders
“Too often Tax functions rely heavily on individual
teams from multiple jurisdictions working
independently to focus on their own in-country
operations. This work features manual processes,
little standardization and even less technology.”

32. How would you rate yourself / team?
• Teams working independently
• Various inconsistent processes
• Local knowledge centers with
limited global view
• Every change is a “major event”
• Not looking beyond the front
door
• Global mindset with local expertise
• Expertise and systems to expand
globally with minimal change and
risk
• Easily adapt to change for rapid
growth
• Flexibility for multijurisdictional
requirements
Reactive 1 5 Proactive2 43

33. • Agile infrastructure
• Global capabilities
• Centralized platform with single
transaction database
• End to end process tools to
automate the entire workflow
• Reporting and analytics to
empower teams to mange KPI’s,
management reporting and audit
defense
Business Acumen
Data Analytics /
Problem Solving
Global Perspective Technology
Tax Pro of
the Future
Manufacturers saw an average reduction of 50 hours per employee
dedicated to technology infrastructure maintenance and updates with
automated sales and use tax compliance.
Aberdeen 2017

35. How would you rate yourself / team?
• Little centralization
• Single purpose point
solutions
• Patchwork of technologies
and manual processes
• No unified source of data
• Limited analytics tools
• Centralized control and
oversight
• Single data warehouse
• Solutions with workflow
designed for end to end
process management
• Local and international
capabilities
• Full reporting and analytics
Reactive 1 5 Proactive2 43

36. How did you do?
<5 6 - 14 15+
Reactive Proactive
Ready for the storm!
Raising our game
Just getting by

37. Actions to Improve
Team Health / Performance
• Establish a future vision and set of principles for your team
– recognize the storm, implications and develop a strategy
to overcome
• Develop “persona” of the ideal tax team profile – define
the qualities you are looking for, develop question set to
ensure hiring profile
• Establish organizational KPI’s that are rigorously monitored
(audit hours, # per year, late filings, penalties, etc.)
• Partner with department heads to develop rotation
program to give team career growth opportunities and
broader organizational vision
• Encourage innovation culture by developing recognition
programs to motivate and reward engaged team
members
• Give them tools to remove manual processes and errors so
they can focus on proactive risk monitoring, process
improvement and audit defense
Technology
• Work cross functionally to enable transactional
data to be received in a “tax ready format”
• Centralize tax data in data warehouse or data
hub
• Explore modern technologies the provide end to
end workflows to centralize processes, improve
data quality and drive efficiency
• Enable your team with enterprise reporting and
analytics tools
• Provide a platform that enables rapid change
with minimal business interruption

38. Results achieved:
53% hours per employee dedicated to
technology maintenance/updates
30% hours on reporting and analysis
17% Hours on reverse audits and recovery
16% Researching tax rates and rules
15% Preparing for and managing an audit
13% Time related to data reconciliation
Source: Aberdeen Group, April 2017

39. Parting Thought
Click here for brief
video overview

40. Q&A
Stay Informed
Subscribe to our Regulatory Feed for the most up-to-date state and
country regulatory changes that could impact your business:
tax.sovos.com/regulatory-analysis-sovos
Subscribe to the Intelligent Compliance Blog Weekly Digest for news and
insights to excel in today’s regulatory landscape – and don’t miss the
Webinar Recap with Webinar Poll Worksheet to compare your team with
peers: learn.sovos.com/blog
Follow us on LinkedIn and engage with peers on the topics that matter
most: www.linkedin.com/company/sovos/
View onDemand Webinar

41. Thank You!

42. Appendix
The following resources were used for this presentation and are being
provided here if you would like to learn more:
• http://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/EY-tax-insights-the-rising-importance-of-tax-
talent/$FILE/EY-tax-insights-the-rising-importance-of-tax-talent.pdf
• https://betterworkingworld.ey.com/trust/how-tax-teams-can-innovate-to-keep-up-with-
disruption
• https://www.pwc.com/us/en/tax-services/tax-function-future/assets/pwc-tax-function-of-
the-future.pdf
• https://learn.sovos.com/sales-tax/sovos-aberdeen-sut-compliance-report-for-manufacturers
• https://assets.kpmg.com/content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2016/11/global-tax-benchmarking-
survey.pdf
View the full onDemand Webinar