Digitisation is often considered a driver of success and organisations of all sizes across numerous sectors are beginning to embrace the change and possibilities that come along with digital technology. This shift has impacted various core functions across the business, not in the least the finance function.
Finance teams have long been characterised as number crunchers and bean counters with repetitive and burdensome tasks, yet with added automation and technology there comes the promise of career progression and liberation from the tactical churn.
Growing pains
In an ideal world, improved processes, aided by tech, should make the shift to operational excellence a seamless one. However, too many finance teams are still facing a myriad of challenges as they grapple to keep up with increased demands and external pressures.
Findings from FloQast’s State of Play survey found that tightening deadlines (36%), inadequate technology (35%), and complex compliance and regulatory requirements (32%) were the three main barriers to achieving accounting operational excellence.
Finance teams are used to changes to regulations, but that doesn’t make them easy to navigate. Tightening deadlines and growing compliance requirements — such as the imminent ‘U.K. SOX’ — are increasing the pressure. This, in turn, is compromising standards and, alarmingly, one in three have doubts about the accuracy of their figures. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that 87% of respondents claimed to have lost accounting staff due to burnout. Stress in the accounting sector is now playing a pivotal role — deterring new candidates and overwhelming existing professionals.
The pandemic has also added its own pressure, with ninety-nine percent claiming that their role has changed. The top reasons are a greater involvement in technology decisions (46%) and a growing demand from the executive team to provide strategic business insights (44%). Today’s CFO is expected to use data-driven insights to make strategic operational decisions that support business continuity. However, in order for this to happen, they need to have reliable, accurate, and current figures to work from.
Uncovering the growth opportunities
Despite the challenges, there remain opportunities for growth and modernisation, but a rethink is required if finance teams are to meet these new organisational aspirations. There is no quick fix, but with a keen focus on investment in people, process, culture, and tech, operational excellence might be closer than we think.
Automation is at the heart of redress. Automating tedious, complex, or repetitive processes will improve accuracy and save time. Accuracy shouldn’t be compromised for speed and finance professionals can’t afford for this to happen. Eliminating time-draining tasks will liberate finance professionals, giving them space to build the strategic insights that business leaders are increasingly seeking.
The ability to communicate and collaborate with other members of the finance team also plays an important role in reliability and accountability. Working remotely has changed the natural dynamic of the workflow, leaving many operating in a silo. The research taps into this with working in an office being cited as the most important factor in making the month-end less stressful – a major, debilitating factor that is intensifying the drain on staff. But, this can be remedied with the right automation. Hybrid and remote teams will soon find their stress levels falling as they enjoy greater visibility across the workflow, better collaboration and easy sharing of information.
To future-proof organisations and secure business continuity, it is imperative that CFOs are positioned to increase the accuracy and reliability of forecasting supported by data-driven insights from controllers. Only in reshaping the finance and accounting function by automating finance specific processes can you then hope to impact operations positively over the long term.
Author: Adam Zoucha, MD EMEA, FloQast
Data used in this article is from FloQast’s The State of Play in UK Accounting Responses were from 500 UK Finance Directors and Finance Controllers.
Feature image by Scott Graham on Unsplash.
