Transformation gets talked about a lot. It’s become a bit of a catch-all word, but when it comes to finance teams, it can be a useful way of framing what really needs to change.
Sometimes it’s not a minor fix. It’s actually a total rethink. You might be dealing with legacy systems, manual processes, or a team that’s grown lopsided. Maybe your finance director is stretched too thin, or the data’s not quite right and it’s really starting to show. All of this can chip away at trust in finance. And in uncertain times, that’s the last thing you need.
Why change is pressing now
It seems like things are moving more quickly than ever right now. You can’t avoid conversations on AI, permacrises, supply chain issues, inflation, tax rises. And it’s become more important than ever to have accurate, up-to-date information from your finance team to base decisions on.
Transformation gives you the opportunity to step back and properly assess the whole finance function with fresh eyes – people, systems, data and process.
And here are some examples of what we mean:
Process automation & efficiency
Yep, there are still businesses out there who are manually entering numbers into spreadsheets and can’t work out where the errors are coming from. It’s the classic case of we’ve always done it like this. But it’s time to move on.
Data and analytics modernisation
We’re talking Power BI dashboards & predictive reporting. Don’t worry too much about AI just yet, as the way in which this has been embedded into systems is still in its infancy. But we can already get some amazing insights into where the business makes & loses its money.
Systems and ERP upgrades
Cloud-based finance systems like SAP, Workday, Dynamics and Netsuite are much more intuitive these days, and pull together information from right across the business. If you’re not on top of these, you could be missing out on huge efficiencies.
Don’t expect your existing team to deliver transformation
The key with any transformation is not to expect your existing team to deliver this change whilst doing their day job. We’ve seen far too many instances where a project like a new system implementation has gone horribly wrong because the financial controller was expected to run the day-to-day finances and lead a major project.
That’s wrong on 2 fronts: 1 they’ve been hired to be a financial controller, not a systems expert, and 2 – where are they miraculously finding the extra time to do both jobs?
How we help at Headstar
At Headstar, we work with businesses to reset things properly – whether that’s redesigning the team, automating the basics, or bringing in interim expertise to get things back on track.
As always, we start with the finance team pyramid. We look at the 4 layers which helps us pinpoint where the biggest issues lie. We can then tackle those one step at a time.
There’s a bit more on how we approach that on the transformation section of our website. Worth a look if you’re planning a change and want to do it properly.
