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Five ways successful finance teams use technology to drive collaboration and accelerate performance

It’s somewhat symptomatic of business – often like its data and systems – to work in silos. Seen as a single entity to the outside world, inside organisations are often fragmented and disjointed as departments either push against each other or don’t understand how every element of the business fits into the bigger picture. Without unity, everything stalls. It’s inefficiency at its worst. 

But it’s only by leading the business in collaboration, uniting departments and bringing their people, data and technology together that the CFO and the finance team can move beyond this sticking point. There’s a great deal to be gained on all sides by connecting the finance team and the rest of the business using technology to drive collaboration at every level.

Successful CFOs and finance teams know they can’t create finance collaboration simply by snapping their fingers, and that embedding finance across the business requires the right supporting technology.

So what do successful CFOs and finance teams know about leading on collaboration:

1. They get everyone engaged - there needs to be a balance between collaborating to ensure the right people are completing key processes easily and efficiently - such as invoice, expense and absence approvals alongside reporting in a timely manner too. The right technology can really engage everyone, providing employees just the data that are relevant to the respective role so that they can engage quickly and efficiently.

Posted 21/03/2018

2. They focus their time on the right things - using technology that essentially automates and streamlines repeatable processes, encourages the finance team to direct their attention on matters that actually need resolution and critical judgment.

3. They educate and empower - issues like delays in client billing because timesheets and expenses are submitted late are often caused because people don’t understand the real impact this behaviour can cause. By taking a lead on the education process and getting everyone involved, supported by the right technology, the finance team can significantly reduce the time they spend on routine, mundane tasks so they can focus their attention on areas where they can add business value.

4. They build a 360 degree view of their business - using a technology platform that provides analytics to create a single source of the truth, and reduce data complexity across the business.

5. Ultimately, their business is more profitable - using technology to improve collaboration has a significant impact on profitability - Oxford Economics found that highly profitable enterprises are more than twice as likely to be very effective at travel and expense management and they’re significantly more likely to consider themselves very effective at working capital optimisation.

It’s impossible to plan, forecast or make any kind of decisions that will propel the business forward without first engaging and collaborating with colleagues from around the business. It goes beyond figures and data to building bridges both internally and externally and making sure the mechanisms are in place to share, explore, collaborate and inform. By doing so, everyone can work together in synergy, with a clearer understanding of the business narrative and with greater motivation for the role they can play in business moving forward.