In today's fast-paced business environment, the efficiency of finance operations can make or break an organization's success. As companies strive to stay competitive, it becomes crucial for finance departments to evaluate and optimize their accounting processes and operations to ensure they align with business objectives.
Inefficient finance operations can drain resources and impact profitability. By streamlining processes, companies can reduce costs, improve decision-making speed and retain talent. Moreover, efficient finance operations lay the foundation for scaling and adapting to future growth and challenges. Effective, well-organized finance departments enable organizations to maintain clarity and control over their financial health and act as a platform for future growth.
The Need for Rethinking Finance Operations
Finance operations are the backbone of any organization, ensuring financial transactions are accurately recorded, reported and analyzed. Many companies have outdated, time-consuming accounting processes and struggle with attracting, engaging and retaining accounting talent. These problems can result in difficulties making quick and informed decisions.
Common issues we have seen our clients encounter include manual data entry, fragmented systems and lack of real-time visibility into financial data. Coinciding with the challenge of finding accountants and retaining talent are the skill gaps that exist in every team, particularly in smaller companies that are still developing a robust finance and accounting department.
These shortcomings not only consume valuable resources and contribute to burnout but also increase the risk of errors, contribute to compliance issues and hinder company growth. Many chief financial officers (CFOs) believe new technology will help solve their problems by providing accurate, real-time and compliant data. However, technology is only part of the solution and addressing these challenges requires a holistic approach to finance transformation and modernization.
Client Story: 50% Faster Month-End Close
One of Cherry Bekaert's clients, a mid-market company, faced significant challenges with its month-end close process. The manual work in the company’s accounting department caused delays and mistakes, which affected its ability to provide management financial reports. Cherry Bekaert conducted a comprehensive assessment and identified several inefficiencies in its processes.
By implementing automation tools and optimizing workflows, Cherry Bekaert helped the client reduce its month-end close time by 50%. The finance team was able to reallocate resources to more strategic activities, resulting in improved decision-making and overall business performance, as well as increased employee engagement.
Driving Rapid Impact With Finance and Accounting Assessments
An assessment of middle-market accounting and finance operations uncovers opportunities to create rapid impact and return on investment (ROI), while informing a longer-term path forward. When companies implement new technology to improve their accounting and finance, they often overlook important factors.
One vital factor to consider when trying new technologies is the people and teams using the software. With varying skill sets and capabilities, companies should be prepared to tailor training and technology tools to meet employees where they are. Businesses also need to think about the processes required to set up and use technology. Finally, company leadership must confirm that data from the systems meets compliance standards. Only when people, processes, data and technology are viewed holistically can you unlock the true value of an efficient accounting function.
Cherry Bekaert’s tailored assessment approach is right sized for middle-market CFOs, focusing initially on identifying quick wins, including ways to drive ROI in the first 30, 60 and 90 days. This may include streamlining workflows to identify bottlenecks and redundancies in accounting processes or helping the accounting team maximize their current technology to automate manual tasks. Our professionals will also evaluate the accuracy and completeness of financial data and reporting, while ensuring compliance with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) and other regulatory requirements.
When analyzing mid to long-term value, our assessment approach aligns with the goals of the CFO and the organization. Often, this includes evaluating the skillsets and systems changes needed to support the organization’s growth. The outcomes of this evaluation may include augmenting current departments with outsourced talent or training and upskilling current teams.
We will also evaluate the organization’s tech stack to determine the right purpose for technology that enables growth. This may include implementing, optimizing or integrating enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems and business applications (e.g., customer relationship management platforms).
CFOs help companies grow by providing strategic insights. These insights guide decisions on new markets, products, transactions and improved operations. Our tailored assessment approach helps arm CFOs with the data analytics needed to uncover such insights.
Leveraging Technology for Finance Modernization
When leveraged correctly, technology can enable a more efficient and accurate accounting and finance operation. Cherry Bekaert’s unique approach combines accounting skills and technological knowledge. Our accounting professionals will help you optimize your accounting, while our technologists will help your teams use technology to streamline and automate workflows.
Along with cloud-based solutions, artificial intelligence (AI) is changing finance operations by reducing manual tasks and providing rich data to inform the business. This includes the emerging world of “agents,” which are as applicable to small and medium-sized firms as they are to larger global organizations. These agents offer scalability and flexibility, while allowing remote, real-time access to important financial data. Our practical approach provides guidance for implementing new tools and delivers the outcomes small and medium-sized businesses need to thrive.
Unlocking Financial Excellence
Modernizing finance operations is essential for organizations looking to stay competitive in today's dynamic business landscape. Cherry Bekaert's proven modernization approach helps CFOs at any stage and offers support in building an accounting foundation, optimizing financial activities or driving company growth.
By leveraging our accounting roots and technology solutions, companies can achieve greater efficiency, accuracy and agility in their financial operations. When working with Cherry Bekaert, our clients see:
- Increased Efficiency: Streamlined processes and automation reduce the time and effort needed for routine accounting tasks. This allows finance teams to focus on their core strategic initiatives.
- Improved Accuracy: Digital tools and best practices reduce errors. This accuracy provides financial data that is correct and trustworthy.
- Reduced Risk: By staying current with regulatory requirements and implementing robust controls, organizations can mitigate compliance risks, resulting in better risk management.
- Enabled Decision Making: With the modernization of finance operations, companies can access financial data in real time. This allows them to respond quickly to market changes and, ultimately, make better decisions.
- Cost Savings: Companies can lower their costs by improving processes and using advanced technology.
- Engaged Team: Creating a more efficient finance function unlocks more time for strategic tasks and upskills talent, which often increases team engagement and reduces churn.
Operate To Innovate: Operate Smarter Today, so You Can Innovate Tomorrow
We help mid-market CFOs tackle today’s operational pain points while building the infrastructure and teams that drive long-term growth. Don’t let outdated processes and systems slow you down — let us help you build a finance function that supports strategy, scale and speed. Reach out to us today to get started.
How Cherry Bekaert Can Help
At Cherry Bekaert, our CFO Advisory practice empowers organizations to modernize their finance operations by leveraging cutting-edge technologies, streamlined processes and strategic insights. Our tailored solutions are designed to enhance financial visibility, improve operational efficiency and support data-driven decision-making, laying the foundation for sustainable growth. Whether you are looking to optimize your current systems or embark on a full-scale digital transformation, our experienced advisors are here to guide you every step of the way, helping you turn financial operations into a strategic asset for the future.
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