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Develop an Action Plan for Your Fast Close Project
A fast close project, like any other corporate initiative, requires a structured approach with a methodology that is supported by people, processes and technology, is manageable, and has clear but realistic objectives. In other words, you need a detailed plan of action that enables you to leverage fast close software to improve your close processes and overcome barriers, such as intercompany reconciliation and poor data quality. Your plan should involve a three-step approach that allows you to create a vision, review your technology and processes to identify potential “quick wins,” and develop and implement a blueprint for “big wins.”
Three Steps to Fast Close Success
Step 1, the visioning process, is in itself a two-part process and some of the first questions your company has to answer are “what’s the target?” and “what is it worth to us?” Here, it is essential to gain internal sponsorship on objectives and the resources required to achieve them. You should map the close process to identify bottlenecks on your critical business reporting path. For example, you might look at the time it takes your reporting units to submit their data packages, the time to complete the financial consolidation process and the time to announce the final consolidated figures.
The second part of Step 1 is the implementation of quick wins. These are benefits that demonstrate near-immediate timetable reductions and put people in a positive frame of mind for delivering bigger wins. Significant gains can be made easily, provided your consolidation systems are robust and flexible enough. The trick is to determine which projects will require the least amount of effort but have the greatest overall impact on your bottom line.
Example quick wins include:
• Taking intercompany processes off the critical reporting path
• Developing mechanisms within your consolidation tools for the validation of data at the source
• Improving the performance of consolidation applications without sacrificing detailed audit trails
• Resolving data transmission bottlenecks and data submission policies during the close process
• Managing the close process by using the workflow capabilities of your consolidation tools to identify best and worst performers and make improvements
Step 2 is where you design and implement big wins. Big wins require greater resources and more time, but often lead to huge reductions in the close process. Example big wins include:
• Implementing a standard chart of accounts (SCOA) across the entire enterprise
• Implementing new financial consolidation software where existing applications were unable to deliver quick wins or provide a sustainable infrastructure for the fast close
• Harmonizing packs and processes across reporting cycles to reduce discrepancies and timetables
In Step 3, you roll out systems and embark on a campaign of continuous evaluation to determine which processes and technologies best support, or challenge, your close processes.
Evaluate Fast Technology for a Successful Fast Close
Consolidation engines such as Cartesis Finance, the world’s fastest statutory consolidation and management reporting solution, offer numerous advantages and make big wins possible. Large global corporations such as Nissan and Roche use Cartesis Finance to achieve a fast close by streamlining their financial and management reporting processes and reducing their close times by 23 and 15 days, respectively.
Additional modules such as Cartesis Intercompany, the world’s leading peer-to-peer intercompany reconciliation application, enable business units to reconcile intercompany balances in real time, removing the process from the close cycle’s critical path to allow for a faster close. Groupe Société Générale, a leading European financial services company with over 768 entities, employs Cartesis Intercompany to reconcile its intercompany amounts. Since May 2002 when the solution was rolled out, intercompany discrepancies have declined significantly and the group has cut its reconciliation process by 10 days.
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