Gartner CFO & Finance Executive Conference Sydney: Day 2 Highlights

We are bringing you news and highlights from the Gartner CFO & Finance Executive Conference, taking place this week in Sydney. Below is a collection of key announcements and insights coming out of the conference.

On Day 2 of the conference we are highlighting  how to build effective data and analytics governance in finance, an alternative delivery model for FP&A, and common mistakes organizations make when trying to speed up their accounting close. Be sure to check this page throughout the day for updates.

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Presented by Valeria Di Maso, Senior Director Analyst, Gartner

Data and analytics (D&A) success in finance relies on effective D&A governance. Yet, many organizations still apply outdated approaches that result in failure. In this session, Valeria Di Maso, Senior Director Analyst at Gartner, explained the key pillars for healthy D&A governance that FP&A leaders need to know.

• "Poor data quality undermines the consistency and accuracy of finance reporting, inhibits AI adoption, and drives mistrust in data."

• "Finance leaders should make sure they define the right roles and responsibilities for their finance D&A governance team."

• "Finance leaders should collaborate with peers to set up the D&A governance strategy, define key cultural expectations and prioritize D&A initiatives."

• "Connect D&A governance with the business outcomes organizations seek to achieve, as well as strategic and operational drivers of those outcomes. This enables finance to scope and prioritize only the data that generate key insights to drive value."

• "At the beginning, finance leaders should focus on technologies that help scale D&A governance while remaining within finance’s reach to avoid technology misalignment."

Journalists can receive additional information and/or request an interview with the Gartner expert by contacting Rob van der Meulen at rob.vandermeulen@gartner.com.

Presented by Randeep Rathindran, Distinguished VP, Research, Gartner

Using in-person business partnering to get FP&A’s insights to the business isn’t reliably providing the advanced decision and planning support needed. In this presentation, Randeep Rathindran, Distinguished VP at Gartner, discussed how FP&A can share their findings more widely by placing decision and planning support into the hands of the business using smart, technology-centric tools.

• “The FP&A function’s capacity is stretched thin - it is being asked to conduct more frequent reforecasting, gap-to-target analyses, and cash flow monitoring while supporting decisions of increasing complexity.”

• “Capability diffusion” puts less focus on in-person business partnering and makes technology-driven business partnering the default channel for decision support.” 

• “Capability diffusion also empowers leaders to make more decisions for themselves with ready access to FP&A’s acumen and advice, which are embedded into decision support tools.”

• “Capability diffusion has a 3.4 times greater impact on FP&A’s goal of sustainable decision support than internal consulting.”

• “Using technology as the default channel to deliver judgment-based decision support through tool-embedded analysis and insights, capability diffusion significantly expands the reach of FP&A influence by empowering decision makers to emulate the FP&A mindset.”

Journalists can receive additional information and/or request an interview with the Gartner expert by contacting Rob van der Meulen at rob.vandermeulen@gartner.com.

Presented by Mallory Barg Bulman, Senior Director, Research, Gartner

While most controllers want to shorten the close period, many find it difficult because of capacity constraints. In this presentation, Mallory Barg Bulman, Senior Director Analyst at Gartner, explained three common mistakes that controllers make when trying to shorten the close.

• “A Gartner survey of approximately 500 accountants found that when capacity gets tighter, accountants go from making one error a month to several errors a week.”
  

• “Trying to improve close times by just adding more work for accountants both burns out staff and adds risk for the business.”
  

• “Most companies try to improve close times via three paths, and tend to make similar mistakes in each path:
  
  1) Building a close playbook:  Close playbooks often codify the exact set of processes and controls that are already taking too long, without properly accounting for overheads, such as reports created, meetings, calls and presentations, or properly evaluating how essential certain controls are.
  
  2) Establishing materiality thresholds: Materiality thresholds are routinely set too low, wasting time on work that will not make any difference to the decisions of the end user of a financial statement.
  
  3) Managing stakeholders: forty-six percent of accountants report stopping high value work during the close to manage low value ad hoc requests from stakeholders. The solution is not more policies but to get better at understanding upstream partner goals to get ahead of potential disruption in the close period.”

Journalists can receive additional information and/or request an interview with the Gartner expert by contacting Rob van der Meulen at rob.vandermeulen@gartner.com.