Does finance really need enterprise software

Editor's Notes

1. All of these issue impact the CFO and his team{BUILD}So more than ever, the CFO has to balance between sound stewardship and value creation, walking the proverbial fine line - always balancing between entrepreneurship and caution, between the big picture and accuracy in the details. {BUILD}Fulfilling the stewardship role by ensuring regulatory compliance and effective risk management – but no CFO is going to be recognized or rewarded for just doing that{BUILD}The expectation is that they add value by helping the organization to outperform stakeholder‘s financial expectations – generating more profit in the private sector or achieving more cost effective outcomes in the publicsector (Performance Management){BUILD}And while doing so he/she needs to satisfy the requests from the organization for even higher service quality at further reduced cost.{BUILD}It is a real struggle with increasing pressuresand while there is nothing fundamentally new with that picture, the stakes and challenges have gotten significantly higher in past years. Including the personal consequences of failure.Financial Risk Management - Embedded risk management and controls from transactional processing to financial reportingBusiness Enabler - Embed a 360° view of enterprise performance with agile budgeting and actionable profitability reporting with a view of riskOperational Efficiency & Effectiveness - Streamline financial functions and provide self-service reporting and analysis
2. So what are the best practices that customers are deploying in order to achieve the successes that we know are possible?To ENSURE REGULATORY COMPLIANCE AND EFFECTIVE RISK MANAGEMENT (FINANCIAL RISK MANAGEMENT), customers are looking to embed risk management and access and process controls all the way through from transactional processing to financial reporting. They are looking for specific compliance functionalities in core financial and performance management systems and they are implementing new solutions to address specific pain points.- Manage every step of the financial close for timely and accurate regulatory reporting- Quicker and cost effective compliance by embedding content including IFRS, XBRL and internal controls- Effectively manage the risk of credit, debt and financial instruments When it comes to OUTPERFORM FINANCIAL OBJECTIVES AND CREATE SUSTAINABLE VALUE (PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT) the best in class organizations have designed a 360 degree view of both financial and operational performance across their organizations so managers can take better decisions more quickly. Kaplan and Norton often refer to the Execution Premium process, I’ve been know to refer to closed-loop performance management but essentially this is about breaking down traditionally siloed performance management processes and increasing alignment, insight and the ability to take action.Cascaded strategy and KPI’sEfficient and effective planning and budgeting that gives the agility needed to cope with uncertaintyDetailed and accurate reporting of costs and net profitability to support decision makingQuick and easy scenario analysisAnd finally by streamlining all financial functions (from transaction processing right the way through to disclosure management) and by leveraging self-service analytics, built in content organizations are able to DELIVER SUPERIOR SERVICE AT REDUCED COST (OPERATIONAL EFFICIENCY & EFFECTIVENESS).Complete end-to-end solutions for processing financial transactions enabled within a unique shared service framework Seamless treasury and credit management operationsPervasive business analytics for self service reporting and analysisMake efficient use of cash and capital