Ask, Share, Learn – Within the Largest Community of Corporate Finance Professionals

The 7 Keys to Unlocking Accounting Close and Reporting Effectiveness

• Discover how to identify process bottlenecks, optimize period-end processes, and automate reconciliations and other repetitive operations

• Understand key best practices for the financial close and how to apply them to your company

• Understand how to better align process and technology for your company’s financial close and reporting environment

After attending this event you will be able to:

Learning Objectives

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Welcome to Proformative

Ask, Share, Learn – Within the Largest Community of Corporate Finance Professionals

The 7 Keys to Unlocking Accounting Close and Reporting EffectivenessJon Paul, CEO, Value Added Finance Resources

Agenda

• 7 Best Practices for Closing Your Books Quickly• Making the Fast Close Happen

– Goals for the Close– The Human Dimension– Designing the Fast Close– Optimizing Technology– Migrating Towards the Faster More Effective Close

• Beyond the Fast Close– Shifting to More Value Added in Accounting

• Case Study– Putting It All Together to Drive Change

7 Keys to a Fast Close

1. Get Buy-in Throughout the Company2. Change the Mindset of Your Accounting Staff3. Uncover and Tackle Your Big Rocks4. Make Technology Work for You5. Manage Your Materiality6. Sharpen Your Senses7. Raise the Bar High

1. Get Buy-in – Start With Why

Buy into the Why before getting to the What and How• Conditioned to know the score quickly

– Capital markets, sports, weather, travel times• Numbers are like produce in grocery store

– Longer they take, less interest, well into next month• Can’t act on what you don’t know

– Shift sooner to looking forward– Spend more time improving results

• Paradox- faster close leads to better accuracy– More time to dive deeper after close

Buy-in Inside and Outside Company

• CEO/President/General Manager– Get everybody to support your effort

• Information Technology– Provide integrated, faster information

• Operations– Production or billing information

• Salespeople– Expense reports on time

• Suppliers– Expedite tardy bills or give estimates

2. Change Accounting Staff Mindset

• Create a safe place– Estimates OK, can tighten next month

• Tolerate ambiguity– Estimate and tighten, accrue and true up later

• Timing over precision– Use skills at front end of closing process

• Less time closing, more time improving– More fun than keeping score; have big impact

• Service mentality– Finance serves rest of company, not vice versa

3. Tackle Your Big Rocks

What’s Your Toughest Numbers to Generate• Can’t have fast close until you address this• Should be a key number

– Pharmaceutical firm- product cost– Professional service firm- progress billing– Telecom firm- bad debts– Nonprofit- insurance billings and collections

• Usually serious systemic issue– Information technology, process, people

• Number could swing wildly month to month• Destroys confidence in monthly financials

4. Make Technology Work for You

• What level of detail into the General Ledger– It’s called “general” for a reason

• More robust systems than GL for subsidiary ledger– information such as sales, production, receivables

• Direct feed into GL vs. manual journal entry• How integrated is the system information• How accurate, what work-around needed• Special needs- currency, consolidations• Is your financial package still a good fit• Role of Excel spreadsheets

Role of Excel• Use but don’t abuse Excel

– Not meant to be massive database for heavy consolidations

– Extensive manual input or worksheet links opens doors for errors

• Add-on programs can offer a bridge– Cloud based program for more database power and

control that uses familiarity of Excel for input of data and export for reporting

• Excel can do some things better– Faster design of reporting package, analysis, graphics

• Take advantage of Excel power features– Macros, lookups, named ranges to pull in and link data

• Use Excel more for proofs, less for original data

Thank you for your interest in this presentation. View the on-demand webinar or download the full

presentation at:www.Proformative.com

The 7 Keys to Unlocking Accounting Close and Reporting Effectiveness