By Business & Finance 
By John O’Rourke, VP of Product Marketing, Host Analytics
In part two of this series, John O’Rourke continues the discussion of finance transformation and modernisation by taking a closer look at the avenues and resources available for charting the path forward.
Transformation is a never-ending cycle, organisations can always find new ways to improve their business processes, but they must also look at modernising the technologies and applications used to support the business processes to truly reap the benefits.
Over the past 10 years, the IT landscape has been shifting to a new paradigm – cloud computing. This is a major technology platform shift, much like the transition from mainframes to client/server systems in the ’90s and it’s having a major impact on business.
Sales and marketing were the early adopters of cloud-based applications, followed by human resources organisations. But in the past five years, the finance sector has gotten more comfortable with cloud-based applications and is now rapidly adopting cloud-based ERP, EPM, payroll, purchasing and other systems.
Cloud-based applications offer a number of advantages over on-premises applications:
- Faster deployment
- Autonomy from IT
- Rapid innovation
- Lower cost of ownership
- High scalability
- Security
Finance transformation and modernisation go hand in hand and are essential for driving innovation in finance, as well as across the enterprise
On the last point, security, there’s growing recognition that security of cloud-based systems is actually stronger than most on-premises data centres. All of these attributes make cloud-based applications a great choice for rapidly growing companies as well as established companies looking to standardise and centralise business processes, while reducing costs.
According to a recent study by PwC, 78% of US CEOs and 61% of global CEOs say they are concerned about the rapid pace of technology and change as they are continuing to make investments in technology as a way to further innovation and efficiency.
And, to really be seen as leaders – in the eyes of the CEO and the rest of the company, CFOs need to lead the way and set an example for the rest of the organisation.
TRANSITION STRATEGY
Today’s modern, cloud-based applications offer a new opportunity for the CFO and finance to lead the way and take control of their destiny. It provides finance with newfound agility to rapidly deploy new systems in a matter of weeks, as opposed to months or years.
It also allows them to quickly scale the system to support more users, more departments, turn on additional modules, and harness the ‘big data’ that’s available to make better, faster decisions. And by having access to cloud-based applications anytime, anywhere through web or mobile interfaces – finance can further transform their business processes to gain new efficiencies and support the changing workforce and new skill sets they bring to the table.
The adoption of today’s modern cloud-based applications doesn’t have to be done in a ‘big bang’ approach. Cloud-based applications can be adopted incrementally as an adjunct to on-premises applications in what’s known as a ‘hybrid’ model.
For example, an organisation may have several on-premises ERP applications, but wants to implement EPM applications for financial consolidation, reporting and planning. The EPM applications can be deployed in the cloud, integrating data from on-premises ERP systems initially.
Then as the ERP or other applications are migrated to the cloud, the EPM applications can integrate this cloud-based data and consolidate it along with data from on-premises systems.
CONCLUSION
Transformation feels like a big leap for CFOs who may not readily embrace transformation and modernisation, and who aren’t confident about the return they can gain from these investments.
Yet, they must continue to rethink their business processes, and modernise their technology infrastructure to reduce the drudgery that many finance staff spend their time on, and free them up to provide better support for the business.
Finance transformation and modernisation go hand in hand and are essential for driving innovation in finance, as well as across the enterprise. Having efficient business processes, and leveraging technologies that can support those more efficient business processes is critical to creating and supporting an agile organisation that can navigate to success in today’s rapidly-changing business environment.
Image (above): A Health Blog
To read part one in this series, click here.
About the blogger
John O’Rourke is vice president of Product Marketing at Host Analytics.
With a background in accounting and finance, John has over 30 years of experience in the software industry, including over 16 years of experience in EPM product marketing at Hyperion Solutions and Oracle.
He has worked with many customers and partners on financial reporting and planning initiatives and has spoken and written on many topics in enterprise performance management.
John has also held positions in strategic marketing and product marketing at Dun & Bradstreet Software, Kenan Systems and Decisyon. John has a BS degree in accounting from Bentley University and an MBA from Boston College.
