How to win backing for your finance transformation

The playbook will guide senior leaders in what it takes to gain board buy-in for digital transformation. It will provide the rationale for transformation as well as information on the required technology, teams and process to drive fast digital change and growth. Packed with actionable advice, the guide includes statistics, insights and case studies that CFOs and CIOs can use as supporting evidence in their board proposal. Download our white paper on how to win backing for your finance tranformation. Download Now

Women in Finance Systems: 5 key takeaways

SystemsAccountants recently hosted our ‘Women in Finance Systems’ event 2022, an engaging and thought-provoking evening which successfully brought together over forty ERP, EPM and Finance Transformation professionals to discuss the triumphs and challenges being faced by women in the industry today. Our guest speakers were two experienced finance transformation managers, Ruvini Fernando and Abigail Round, who covered a range of topics including cultural narratives, gender expectations, mentoring, the importance of soft skills and having the confidence to be your authentic self. Download our white paper on the five key takeaways from the September event. Download Now

How is the CFO role evolving? Finance chiefs at Block, Meta, Workday, Nordstrom, and Estée Lauder explain.

How is the role of CFOs changing? That was a topic of discussion during “The New CFO” panel at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit in Laguna Niguel, California, on Monday. I had the opportunity to talk with finance chiefs at Block, Nordstrom, Workday, The Estée Lauder Companies, and the incoming CFO at Meta about what they’re experiencing. “I really see the CFO role as being an increasingly strategic one that helps our company balance aspiration and discipline,” said Amrita Ahuja, CFO at Block, a financial services company. Aspirations are the big business opportunities Block wants to address, and discipline is [...]

The Race to Data-first Modernisation Is On

Data represents a store of value and a strategic opportunity for enterprises across all industries. From edge to cloud to core, businesses are producing data in vast quantities, at an unprecedented pace. And they’re now rapidly evolving their data management strategies to efficiently cope with data at scale and seize the advantage. … Or are they? Well, some are. Those are the data-first organisations, the industry leaders who understand that, amid a flood of data, navigating via data-first principles to radically simplify data management is not only critical to surviving and thriving in the long run, but also essential right [...]

5 benefits of integrating financial processes

While companies are increasingly choosing ERP software and finance systems based in the cloud, many are still operating from legacy systems that aren’t connected to the internet and using processes that create accounting silos. For example, employee expenses and customer sales that run on different systems make it difficult for employers to gain a “live” picture of how the business is performing. Mistakes can also be made as colleagues manually share documents and data with each other. Whether you’re a start-up or a large corporation, integrating your financial processes has many advantages, from cutting costs to helping you plan for [...]

How Much Does ERP Cost? And How to Gain Budget For Adoption

An enterprise resource planning (ERP) system obtains and structures transactional data, helping to coordinate the company’s resources and producing real-time operational data. It can drive your company’s success and growth by streamlining processes and consolidating data from disparate functions to provide a single, accurate version of the truth. With this information, leadership can more effectively manage operations and optimise decisions. “ERP systems offer strategic and quantifiable benefits,” says Justin May, Managing Director of Truskey Consulting, which helps organisations leverage technology to maximise efficiencies, cut costs, and drive new revenue opportunities. May says ERP solutions can help companies successfully move into [...]

How to Do Succession Planning: 10 Best Practices You Should Follow

Succession planning helps companies retain top talent and enable a smooth handover when a key person leaves. The process ensures that employees are developed to fill important roles within a business, such as an IT manager or Chief Financial Officer (CFO). By following succession planning best practices, you’ll have groomed a successor with the expertise and management skills to keep the business humming in the event someone departs. Succession planning means you can move staff from role to role as needed, and create a culture of professional development. It can also help achieve better strategic workforce planning. Here’s how to [...]

Attracting and retaining talent after the Great Resignation

Millions of people are leaving their jobs every month, and there is no sign of this epochal movement slowing anytime soon. Dubbed ‘the Great Resignation’, the wave of people who have changed roles or otherwise exited the workforce since the pandemic began could result in one fifth of the global workforce quitting their jobs in 2022, the largest study of its kind recently found. Last year, 47.8 million US workers left their jobs at an average of nearly 4 million each month, while in the first half of 2022 that number rose to an average of almost 4.5 million per [...]

How to lead a digital transformation in 6 steps

Digital transformation fundamentally alters how an organisation operates and delivers value. Get it right and the result can drive new levels of success, but any wrong step, particularly regarding data management, can provoke damaging inefficiency, even dysfunction. “Staff hear about ‘digital transformation’ and wonder what it means for them,” says Julie Downs, Interim Senior IT Director at video game developer Jagex, who has overseen many digital change management projects. “It can mean different things to everyone, but it really relates to the business as a whole and how all the departments inside a company can share information, solutions, processes and [...]

How business intelligence & business analytics give finance leaders a seat at the top table

By using data—rather than, say, guesstimates or hunches—to guide decision-making, corporate leaders can drive performance and gain an edge on their competition. However, raw data rarely suffices. Instead, information needs to be assembled, reviewed, and analysed. That’s where business intelligence software has played a critical role. Companies are now also turning to business analytics, which tends to provide more guidance for the future. In the past, it commonly would have only been the finance and accounting functions using these tools. However, as organisations embrace digital transformation they are increasingly being used to aid decision-making across many departments. Finance leaders who [...]

Why Careers Are Changing for Women in Finance Systems

Women in finance are still underrepresented at every level. In the UK, women comprise 40% of the finance workforce, but although 52% of finance’s entry-level workforce are women, “their representation falls off at every step”. In 2015, the UK government launched the HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter with the aim of encouraging the financial services industry “to improve gender balance in senior management.” Despite steady progress in that time, the June 2022 review of the Charter’s progress found the average level of female representation in senior management was 33% in 2021. Why does this matter?  A 2019 study by [...]

Hiring employees vs contractors: Which you should hire and when

Deciding whether to hire an employee or contractor was once a simple choice: contractors were the go-to hire for shorter sprints and employees were appropriate for longer hauls. But it’s not so simple now. The world of work has changed significantly over the past two years, with employees now expecting greater flexibility and employers facing fierce competition for talent in sectors like finance and IT - regardless of whether that talent is a contractor or a full-time employee What’s the difference between employees and contractors? The key differences between employees and contractors are legal. Employees have employment contracts that control [...]

Finding and starting your next job remotely

Remote work job listings are soaring. By February 2022, they accounted for more than half of all employment postings on LinkedIn, a first for the professional network site. In the UK, searches for jobs that allow working from home soared more than 790% over the last two years, prompting a warning there may be more people looking for such roles than there are positions available. “The key takeaway here is that the supply of, and employees’ demand for, remote jobs have both grown rapidly over the past two years, but demand has grown faster,” said Mary Kate Fields, data communications […]

Make part-time jobs benefit your career by asking these 3 questions

A job for life has been replaced for many with a job for the day. Lifestyles and career choices have changed rapidly with technological advance and societal evolution creating trends that were rapidly accelerated by the seismic economic shocks of the 2008 financial crash and the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. The traditional model of joining a company straight from school and leaving it as a pensioner has evaporated. Data from the World Bank shows that 46 per cent of the global workforce were self-employed in 2019, equating to about 1.6bn people. More recently, research from jobs matching service Indeed Flex revealed […]

Contingent Workforce Management: A Guide to Best Practice

Organisations are increasingly relying on contingent workers to fill talent gaps and support their business growth. Fuelled partly by the pandemic, the gig economy has seen a huge increase in recent years, as workers look for more flexibility or perform “side hustles” to boost their income. A contingent workforce can bring plenty of benefits to a company – but it’s also a complex employer responsibility that requires careful management. What is a contingent workforce, and what are the best practices in contingent labour management? What is contingent workforce management? Contingent workforce management is managing non-permanent workers who are hired for […]

The 5 skills you need to land a finance systems role

It’s a great time to be searching for finance systems jobs. Global shocks and technological advances that upend workforces are nothing new, but there have been few periods of volatility as now, which is playing directly into the hands of talented professionals looking for new roles. Waves of resignations are expected to continue through 2023, and trends that show that the growing demand for finance expertise, accountants, auditors and finance system managers is not being met. The shortage of finance talent has even been dubbed an “existential crisis”. Although this widening divide has put job hunters firmly in control, competition […]

EPM and ERP compared: what role do they play in finance transformation?

While Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) are both software systems that potentially play a major role in financial transformation, and allow organisations to put data at the centre of their decision-making, they are in fact quite distinct systems, with few areas of overlap. Employed shrewdly, they perform different, yet complementary functions that together can accelerate an organisation’s performance. Broadly, ERP obtains and structures transactional data, helping to coordinate the company’s resources, producing real-time operational data. EPM on the other hand provides analysis and a user-friendly interface to help managers gain insights and report on their business. […]

What is ERP?

The digital transformation of business is firmly underway in today’s dynamic global markets, because decision-makers know that getting this right drives sustained success. But transformation is easier said than done, as organisational complexity, outdated systems, and process bottlenecks challenge business leaders trying to convert to digital-first principles. Overcoming these challenges is where enterprise resource planning – or ERP – comes in. But what does ERP mean? ERP refers to a digital system that consolidates data from an organisation’s various functions, linking them to a single data source. Across industries and companies of varying sizes, ERP solutions allow leaders to boost […]

Certifications and courses for careers in ERP, EPM and finance transformation

Corporate finance departments are undergoing rapid change. Data-driven technology is enabling them to streamline their traditional accounting roles while mining new insights that can help them improve and add value to their operations. The technology at the heart of this finance transformation comprises Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software and Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) systems. ERP software sits at the heart of all modern finance systems, structuring transactional data and helping to coordinate the company’s resources, producing real-time operational data. EPM systems, on the other hand, go one step further by providing analysis and a user-friendly interface to help managers gain […]

Successful finance teams hire and train for these key skills

There’s little sign of the talent crunch in finance slowing. The already-problematic shortage of critical skills is growing, and industry groups are reporting significant struggles to fill gaps across their memberships. Competition for talent is soaring across all sectors, with 87% of employers saying they’re struggling to fill positions, according to a report from Monster, Flexible Future: UK Hiring Outlook 2022. HR groups have labelled the skills shortage in finance jobs a “ticking time-bomb”. A major part of the issue is the speed at which digital processes and services are being adopted to meet demand from customers and generate efficiencies […]

How Career Pathway Mapping Helps Skills Development

Finance and treasury departments are embracing technology at pace. Data-derived insights are guiding CFO decision-making processes, optimising reporting functions, automating transactions, and making forecasting ever more accurate. The new technological landscape is giving finance operations a forward-looking perspective on their company’s activities that are enabling them to make better-informed strategic decisions, cut operational costs through efficiencies, and improve standards of service. From a human resources perspective, digitisation and automation have removed staff from repetitive tasks so they can concentrate on value-creating activities. But they have also made it more necessary for treasury departments to build high-functioning teams possessed of both […]

International Women’s Day 2022

As CFO at SystemsAccountants I wanted to share my story for International Women’s Day 2022 to help #breakthebias. From my time in High School I was lucky enough to realise what I wanted to do and set my sights on a career in Accountancy.  This started in practice, training under the excellent vocational AAT qualification.  I decided University was not for me and wanted to learn “on the job” and am so glad that I opted for this route as I gained such a strong foundation of knowledge that has helped through my entire career. I continued my studies and […]

Top 10 tips for your CV!

NOTICED. SELECTED. HIRED. The Contractor’s CV playbook for winning your next job. Are you a contractor looking to win your next contract with confidence? It goes without saying that a well-written and well-presented contracting CV does a lot of the hard work in getting noticed, getting selected and getting hired. This is especially true when you consider what you’ll likely so often be up against – competing to get noticed from many other applicants, standing out enough to be selected by recruitment teams, and being skilled enough to ultimately be hired by the client. Presenting yourself as the perfect-fit can […]

CXO Roundtable: Delivering Transformation Using S4/HANA

Despite a substantial sales and marketing effort by SAP, new incentives such as RISE, and the intention to discontinue standard support of SAP ECC in 2027, many businesses still seem reluctant to move onto S4/HANA. For many organizations, the pandemic has highlighted the fragility of their key business processes and their current technology platforms yet they are still struggling to justify the costs and the business disruption of a move to S4/HANA. In addition, many boards remain skeptical that a move to S4/HANA is a strategic priority and will unlock their digital transformation agenda. The virtual roundtable webinar, which was […]

SystemsAccountants Open New York City Office

SystemsAccountants Inc are excited to announce the opening of our second office in the US in New York City to complement our office in Chicago. We will again be using WeWork premises to support our continued growth and strategy of setting up operations in major cities to better service client and candidate markets. Recruitment is a people business and we are focused on ensuring that we meet as many clients and candidates to establish and build long term business relationships. The office will be headed up by Matteo Dix who has been with the business since 2013 having nearly two […]

Finance Transformation – Jam Tomorrow?

Finance Transformation is a well-trodden path. For decades companies have embarked on „Finance Change“ initiatives with different levels of success and outcomes. The market is now mature and clients are slowly becoming more sophisticated in the way they try to shape and deliver programs. So it begs the question, why are so many companies still failing to execute successful programs and fully realize the benefits expected by stakeholders and the business? Unfortunately, finance transformation isn’t straightforward and there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. No two journeys look entirely the same. The myriad combination of drivers, base lines, objectives, ambitions and appetite […]

FastTrack International 200

SystemsAccountants were pleased to attend the Sunday Times International Track Awards dinner recently held at the Dorchester Hotel, to celebrate our placing 16th in the International Track 200 league table, which ranks the UK’s mid-market private companies with the fastest-growing overseas sales. Our CEO, Dean Turner, and International Practice Directors, Piers Reid and Johnny Abbott were in attendance. SystemsAccountants‘ inclusion on the list resulted from the successful expansion of our teams in Amsterdam, Chicago and Rotterdam and the recent opening of further offices in New York and Paris. Our strategy is to focus on globally important cities, where the mix […]

SystemsAccountants Sponsor Next Ready Business Tour

SystemsAccountants are strengthening their alliance partner status with Oracle + NetSuite by sponsoring the Next Ready Business Tour London on the 16th October. SystemsAccountants will be well represented at the event by Tom Smith, who heads up NetSuite recruitment in our London Office; Tom Montijn, who is based in our Rotterdam Office; and Will May who heads up our US NetSuite Practice. It will be an excellent opportunity for existing NetSuite customers as well as those considering moving to Cloud Based Finance solution from an Industry leader. The team from SystemsAccountants will be on hand to discuss independent project resourcing […]

SA ranked 16th in the 2017 Sunday Times HSBC International Track 200 list

SystemsAccountants is delighted to have been ranked 16th in the 2017 Sunday Times HSBC International Track 200 list, which ranks Britain’s mid-market private companies with the fastest growing international sales over the last two years. The company’s place on this prestigious league table pays testament to the hard work that has been involved in expanding the SA Brand into North American and European markets from our offices in Chicago and Amsterdam achieving 115% sales growth. Our CEO Dean Turner comments, „SA is delighted to be recognised by The Sunday Times HSBC International Track 200. We are incredibly proud to be […]

ERP in Higher Education

Whilst large companies and manufacturers have long used enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions to manage resources and control budgets; it is only over the past few years that Colleges and Universities have started to embrace enterprise wide business applications. Higher education may well be one of the final frontiers for ERP applications, and with good reason. In higher education, as it is with most other verticals, competition is tightening even as budgets are shrinking. ERP provides insights into how these institutions can better allocate budgets to ensure that they are performing in ways that outpace expectations. A few of the […]

Legacy to Cloud

As a Finance Leader I am sure you will have been inundated with articles and white papers hailing the emergence of various disruptive technologies and how they are going to change your world. From cognitive computing, to the mainstream adoption of cloud applications, visual analytics and mobile apps; it is becoming clear that the traditional business systems landscape is changing, but what’s the real picture in the Finance Departments of corporate Britain? We’ve specialised in vetting and supplying Finance Systems professionals for 20 years. We talk to Finance Directors, Financial Controllers and Heads of Finance Systems every day about their […]

Will Robots Replace Finance Outsourcing?

I wonder how many people watched BBC2’s Who’s Spending Britain’s Billions documentary recently? In essence it was an expose on how local authorities pay management consultants large sums of money on the understanding of “operating model assessments” and “transformation programmes”. It was revealed that these firms often take a large percentage for delivering cost savings. The programme challenged the effectiveness and efficiency of private outsourcing firms‘ services in the public sector. This also coincided with a report from ACCA’s Finance Transformation, SSC and Outsourcing Group about the challenge to Outsourcing service providers from Robotics Process Automation (RPA). It got me […]

Attracting and retaining Interim talent on Transformation Programmes: Why expert recruiters work best!

As a director specialising in placing Transformation leaders, I know that in a highly competitive marketplace, there is nothing that damages programmes more than bad hiring. On talking with my network it’s apparent there’s an increasing groundswell of frustration with recruitment supply chains, especially in larger organisations. Successful, experienced recruiters are successful because we leverage close, long term relationships with specialist candidate networks and senior and executive managers, doing everything necessary to keep those relationships focused on what each individual company needs. The personal relationships with individuals ensures the right team is placed for a transformation project, before, during and […]