Preparing Your Team for FP&A Transformation

In FP&A there are plenty of tools, technologies, and platforms that can be leveraged to accelerate your team's value proposition. However, to get the best out of the technology you need the people and process to match: it takes commitment, connection and collaboration.

Right now, there is plenty of opportunity for improvement in most Finance departments. Prophix’s survey found that only 20% of Finance departments can forecast reliably beyond 12 months - a number that hasn’t changed since their 2017 survey.

We can do better, but we can’t do it alone. Here are the top three components your team needs for FP&A transformation and success.

#1- Build Business Partnerships

Business partnership means fostering collaborative, strong, and value-added relationships with other functional areas in your organization. I’ve written many articles and spoke at many conferences and this process is the most important for top performing FP&A teams. You might ask, “Chris, how do I get started?”

It’s simple: sit down with another functional area and ask them what their business pains, frustrations, opportunities, and efficiency concerns are. You don’t have to be a manager or finance leader to start these conversations.

“Well, Chris, why is business partnership important?” Think about that last strategic business initiative or the last big project that got implemented. My guess is that initiative or project involved many business areas to get it complete or get it off the ground. So, business partnership and solutioning is vital and should be a pillar for your FP&A team.

Reader challenge: Build a new partnership with another functional area on addressing one of their business pain points. Then revisit your findings, insights and how you can help continue to address other pain points.

#2 - Develop Partnerships into Lasting Alliances

Now, before you jump to conclusions that FP&A is only focused on building  self-serving partnerships, that is not my intention. Leveraging alliances means continuing to leverage relationships, experiences, and favorable business outcomes to continue to drive your FP&A mission for the good of the company.

For example, say you built a strong alliance with the VP of Sales at your organization through being in the trenches and going through some battles together. Now, you are looking to sell a new FP&A technology adoption internally for your team. What better group to help advocate and sell this project internally than sales leadership? These people are the masters. Side point: I think FP&A are masters at this as well with the art of storytelling, but I will save that for another post. Now, in this example you’re not only leveraging the relationship, but also the advocacy, skills, and overall human capital which every organization has.

Reader Challenge: Identify an opportunity to grow or expand by leveraging a business alliance you have built then set up a cadence to identify other business areas.

#3 - Practice Listening with Empathy

I’ll be the first to say this is challenging for me given I’m a non-traditional finance and FP&A leader because my primary focus is on people and strategy first, then numbers and forecasts. I know, you are probably reading this like, “What?” but hear me out. Too many times FP&A teams focus on competency-based skills, i.e. forecasting, data skills, budgeting, and other technical competencies. Why? It’s where we are most comfortable and love showing that we are the spreadsheet superstars. Am I right?

However, FP&A has a greater impact when we’re quick to listen and slow to speak. Before we speak, we need to deeply understand the root cause of concerns from our business partners. We need to put ourselves in their shoes, feel their pain, and really take time to understand. Why is this important? Think about the last time you were quick to offer a solution to a business problem without really understanding the reason why it occurred in the first place. Sound familiar?

Reader Challenge: In your next meeting with a business partner don’t come in presenting the numbers. Ask how they feel about the current state of their business. Then, sit back, listen, and seek to deeply understand what they’re saying.

Transformation Is a Team Sport

The latest tools and tech make FP&A transformation possible. But to get the most out of you transformation journey, you need to enhance your connections to the rest of the organization. Practice consistently communicating and collaborating with people in other departments, seek to understand their needs, and your team will be better equipped to advise and ultimately lead.