260. Financial Transformation Live: New Years Resolutions for Finance

In this special Financial Transformation Live episode, Hannah Munro sets out a clear, practical agenda for finance leaders who want 2026 to be the year transformation actually happens.

This session deliberately moves away from technology hype and focuses on the fundamentals that enable progress. Hannah makes the case that 2026 must be a people and process year, not a rushed race to automate. As the pace of change accelerates and AI becomes part of everyday working life, finance teams need the capacity, skills and foundations to respond, rather than react.

In this episode, Hannah covers

• Why 2026 must be a people and process year, not a rushed race to automate
• How to create real capacity in finance teams to drive change, not just survive month end
• The risk of automating broken processes and why simplicity is the foundation of speed
• Moving finance from hindsight to foresight through faster closes and in-month reporting
• Using the right technology for the problem, and why AI is not always the answer
• Building resilient, well-rounded finance teams that can adapt as the pace of change accelerates

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And 2026 Focus
• 2:10 Create Team Capacity
• 4:20 Build Well Rounded Skills
• 7:05 Remove Single Person Risk
• 8:45 Fix Process Before Automation
• 12:10 Controls, Cost Of AI, Efficiency
• 15:05 Shift From Hindsight To Foresight
• 19:00 Data Quality And Integrations

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to CFO 4.0, the future of finance. The CFO role is changing rapidly, moving from cost controller to strategic visionary. And with every change comes opportunity. We are here to help you take advantage of this transition. To win at work, drive your career forward, and lead with confidence. Join Hannah Monroe, Managing Director of ITES, a financial transformation consultancy, as she interviews key experts to give you real-world advice and guidance on how to transform your processes, people, and data. Welcome to CFO 4.0, the future of finance.

SPEAKER_02: 0:48

Hello everyone, and welcome to this episode of FTL Live. So this is going to be a slightly different one. Normally I very much use this as a way to present some of the frameworks and some of the bits of research that we've done around transformation. But I want to take this opportunity to firstly welcome everyone into the new year. I think I can say that just it's it's still not the end of January yet, but also talk about what we should be looking forward to as 2026. So for me, 2026 is a people and process year. And the reason for that is that we we have some really great tech coming through at the moment around that's going to drive um improvements and efficiency and productivity, but it's still at that early stage. So I, for me, I'm I'm very much about making sure our customers are not only enabled for change, but they're and they're ready for it. So that, you know, as this great technology starts to feed through, um, that they they're able to take advantage of it. Because this is basically the world is moving at the slowest pace that we're ever going to see. It's only going to get faster as AI really beds into day-to-day life. Um, so for me, it's how how do we start to build the momentum? How do we start to build the speed within finance to be able to cope with that degree of change? So um, and what we find, and and and this is again where I started the podcast back back in the day of COVID is that it isn't just about tech. And I'm sure if there's age you will listen to this, they'll be going, you know, tech is important. Of course it is, it's what we do day to day, but it's about the things that go around tech, it's about the data, it's about the processes, and it's about the people and driving that change. So, my first thing is make sure you have the right team. So we're about to go into the AI age. Um, and a bit like the internet, um, think about what that did for the world of work. Um, it changed um completely. And it's not necessarily that jobs disappeared. Some jobs did, let's be open, but actually they transformed, and that's what we need to be ready for. So, and what you know, a lot of the conversations that I'm having with CFOs is that the team aren't enabled. They don't have the capacity to drive through the new projects, the new change that everyone knows. So, the first thing I would say to you is making sure that your team have capacity to drive your finance team forward. So, building and resourcing to a level where you have that extra ability to do that. Now, you could you could create capacity through system improvements, of course. You can look at how you can make these efficiencies. You can ask the question, what are we going to stop doing to create capacity for change? But the first thing is you have to create capacity because we've got 12 months ahead of us, um, and we can't run at an insane pace for 12 months as much as we like to think we can. We're all ambitious, we're all positive thinking, but we do need that change. So the first thing I'll say to you is create and build a finance team that has capacity, and you will be a you will be um an in advance of your peers because when the opportunities come, you will be able to grab them, work with them. The the second piece is that I do think that we need to start shifting that finance team from, I guess, technical accounting to genuine ability to rework process so process improvements, building communication skills and storytelling skills, building knowledge. So you know, do are they really understanding how to use the systems they have, or are they just banging numbers in to try and get to month end? So having a really good look at your team. Do I have good, well-rounded individuals with both business acumen and knowledge? Do they understand how our business operates so they can apply the technology um effectively? Um, but also do they have the knowledge of the systems that you're currently using? So investing in training, making sure your team understands your system, that they understand your data so that you can then harness the new technology that's coming through. Um, and and where I find very often is that when we go into certainly new implementation projects, we'll have maybe one individual that really gets the process or understand the system. So, how do you create an entire team of people that understand the processes and systems? Now that could be documenting processes, that can be doing cross-individual education. How do you create more well-rounded individuals? Because then you one, you do risk. We're seeing a lot of movement in finance in particular, people leaving, people shifting roles, looking for different things for various reasons. But how do you create an ability for your team to be more agile and adaptable as things are going to get thrown at you? Because they they will, right? If you've got any single person dependencies, get rid of them. And that means don't get rid of the person. Obviously, build that shared knowledge, build um systems and processes that don't rely on an individual, and make sure you have good documentation so other people can pick it up. Um having really curious people. We we actually talked in our own strategy meeting about building that curious mindset, having people that can really effectively challenge, that know how to communicate with senior stakeholders, that can really have, I guess, that they're not happy necessarily with the status quo. And that comes through maybe investing in uh development programs. So, you know, creative or critical thinking, thinking about how people communicate, understand communication styles. So for me, the this year is the year to create capacity and certainly in the next six months, create capacity, create um well-rounded individuals that you can delegate various things to, that you're not, you know, you're not limited to one great resource. You've got an entire team of people that can go out and drive the change that we are going to see and that have the capacity to do so so that you don't get left behind. So, and and and that is all about building the team for the future. So, the next thing I would like you to think about in uh as we prepare for for the year ahead is fixing the process before you automate it. So a bad process doesn't get better when you automate it, it just goes wrong faster, right? So you're gonna have more issues. So where you've got issues with processes, get into it. You know, work if you've got process that's been built upon process upon process, uh, you know, that's not been looked at for years, and you're hearing things like it's the way we've always done it, get into it, right? Because again, technology is developing, right? But the simpler your processes, they're easy, and the cheaper they are to automate, right? Um, and you've got to remove complexity. Simplicity is, you know, complexity is the enemy of speed, right? If you want to move fast, if you want to take advantage of technology, you need to have simple, non-complex processes because you will be able to move and automate a lot faster. And again, you will overtake um other um finance teams and capabilities. You will also find where you've got gaps. So things like controls, um, you know, again, you know, think about some of the issues we're having around cybersecurity, understanding controls, um, making sure that they're in place so that, and then you can automate those and make sure that you have visibility of that. Because you are going to need to move fast. You need to make sure the controls are suitable for the level of speed that you're going at. Um, and making sure that, you know, automation in my mind should remove steps, not make things more efficient. Because we are going to move to a point where people, when we're looking at the cost of AI, AI is actually really expensive to run. At the moment, it's quite cheap because we're trying to get, everyone's trying to get people on board with it. But when you look at the actual cost of running AI, the data centers, the, the, the, the engine power that sits behind AI, at some point it's going to get expensive if you've got inefficient processes and you're going to need more resource, you're going to need more AI to drive it. So we need to make sure that the underlying processes that we're using AI to automate are actually efficient and are instructed in a way that optimizes their use. So simplify, then automate, never the other way around. And resolution three, I think, you know, if you are not already thinking this, then you really should be, which is the shifting from hindsight to foresight, right? How do you build um better visibility for what's coming ahead? How do you become proactive rather than reactive? So, what I mean by that is is your data, is it taking you too long to get reports? If it's taking you weeks to get your your month-end reports, if you're not able to look midweek, mid-month to understand where the business is at, then you're already behind the curve, right? So typical high-performing um finance teams have a, you know, have around about one to three close time. If you're outside of that, then there's really needs to be a conversation about what is driving that. And and actually, you need to shift to in-month reporting. How do we get that information out? How do we understand the numbers that drive our businesses and build that out into um easily accessible reporting to enable the wider organization? Because I do think that a lot of organizations are now becoming a lot more data hungry. What we're seeing is people are looking to, you know, to surface that easily through various different AIs, et cetera. But you need good data in the first place. And when they actually unpick it, people are, you know, getting information from their AIs, but it's not based on good data. So it's not useful and it's it's it's not driving adoption. So really getting into your data, make sure you've got clear data hierarchies, data structures, making sure you've got integrations. So we actually did a webinar uh for our Sage customers all about how to build out good integrations because it is a skill we're going to need connecting the dots, making sure the data is shared across the organization so that each um team can access data and more importantly, you can leverage AI to autumn, not just to automate what they're doing, but get better insight into how to move forwards. But and then the key thing is that foresight only works and is useful and is is um adds value if the inputs are clean and the people that are using it are able to understand it. So go back to that where I started was building a finance team for the future, making sure they understand your business, making sure they have the business acumen in order to be able to take advantage of all of these new developments. Resolution number four. So use uh is really looking at the right technology to solve the problem that you have. And what I am seeing is everyone's talking about AI, but they don't necessarily understand the right application of AI. And there's different types of AI. So there's the chat GPTs of the world, there's the automated um machine learning in the background. So making sure that you're using the right tool for the job. And sometimes the answer is not AI. And I think we need to get, we need to get comfortable with that. Um, and I know I know that sometimes it's easy to go in a boardroom and had a lovely conversation um with the director of IT and technology um at a Wano construction company. Um and they were saying, coming on the podcast, by the way, um, and they were saying that, you know, sometimes the answer isn't sexy. It isn't the the shiniest toy in the room, but just in the moment is AI. It's it's going back to basics of technology and making sure we have that that that use. We've we've matched the technology we're choosing to the use and the outcomes that we need. Um, and I think that is so true. So making sure that we are using technology deliberately, we're being really clear on what type of technology we need to solve the problem, and we're being clear if it's a technology problem or a process problem or a data problem, right? Where is the issue? Um, and what we're really looking to do is improve the integrity of the data, improve the speed of the data, and improve trust in what we're producing so that you and your fight and your exec team can make better decisions. So, and again, it's not just about the tech, it's the people, it's the processes and what goes around that. And so for me, it's really about making smarter, more strategic decisions with how we move forward. So, really understanding where is the problem, you know, is it people, is it process, is it tech, is it data? It could be a combination of all of them, and then making a right choice and really focus on small iterative changes because because things are moving so fast, jumping into big wholesale changes that are going to take two years to implement, we don't have that scale. And the technology will be have changed by the time we get to the end of it. So, how do we drive impact and value within shorter time frames? And this is something we're really working hard at it. Is how do we speed up the transformation? How do we get time to value a lot quicker? And how do we drive that through? So, um, and and and so that is the new year's resolutions that I think you should consider. You know, really looking at your team, looking at their skills, looking at their capacity, and ensuring that they are ready for that change and that they're enabled. Um, fixing processes, making sure that you've got a foundation that's strong enough to scale, whether that's through the use of technology or otherwise, that you're enabled and you've got the controls in place, really focusing on moving from reactivity to proactivity, getting data out to the business faster, looking at how you forecast, trying to get into predictive rather than reactive analytics, um, and starting with a really strong, fast close, um, and then using the right tool for the jobs, you know, focusing on which is the technology that's going to solve my problem. Am I just plastering over a fix or am I really making sure that my underlying architecture is strong enough for the future? And, you know, taking the hits now so that when you know, when when the technology continue as it continues to do, as it gets stronger and better, that we're in a place to take advantage of it. And so really focusing on that for for 2026. And one of the things I have done for those of you um that do listen to the podcast or rather just live is we are doing that. So what we are we are going to be taking a short hiatus. So we're going to be um pausing and relaunching the podcast on the first, um, the first week of April. Um, so because we've got a whole new planned agenda, but what we really want to make sure is that we've we've got a consistent structure to how we're delivering episodes to you. So I'm very excited. We've got some brilliant partnerships that we're going to be launching, some amazing new content and some fabulous guests that I'm really excited to share with you as well. So I want to say thank you so much to listen to this short and hopefully sweet episode. Um, um, and you know, please do keep listening. We will be taking my favorite episodes from the past few years um and revamping them so that you have access because we've got an entire back catalogue. Somebody said they they can't believe how many episodes I think we're in the 200s now. So we're gonna take some of those older episodes that my favorites that I think are really relevant to today's audience still, bringing those forward, surfacing those for you. And then we're gonna be kicking off with our entire new calendar of education come April. So if you've got any thoughts or ideas of what we should be including in that relaunch, I'd love genuinely love to get your feedback. Um, if you are a CFO um with an amazing story to tell around transformation change or something you're incredibly proud of, then please do reach out. I also want to hear to you. And I want to say thank you so much to all of our listeners for all of the time they have taken out of their day to listen to the podcast because you know I can't believe how far it's come in the last few years. So keep listening, um, enjoy um the episodes that we've got coming, um, the the the revisited episodes um that are so still relevant, which is amazing, isn't it? Several years later. Um, and then I'm really excited to to look forward and to share our amazing new calendar with you for the next um next 12 months. Thanks all. Keep listening, and we'll see you soon on the CFO 4.0 podcast. So, for those of you that don't know what we do here at ITES, so we are a financial transformation consultancy that specialises in Sage Technologies. Whether that is looking at a new solution, evaluating your current solution, or just helping you to get the most out of your current setup, we can help. But rather than me tell you all the reasons that you should consider working with us as a Sage partner or a transformation consultancy partner, I'm gonna let our customers do the talking for us.

SPEAKER_01: 18:41

ITAS were there from the sort of get-go, helping us, you know, talking through what the process was going to involve, setting expectations, you know, making it clear that how much work we were gonna have to put in to make sure that the project was a success at the at the end, um, and then talking us through all our different options, looking through our current processes, making us re-evaluate what was important, which elements we wanted to um move across to the new system, how we wanted to configure our new system, and also kind of making us sit back and really think about what is the success of this project. When we get to the other end, when we finish the implementation and we're in the system, what's success going to look like? And actually, you know, putting that question back to us and really making us sit down and think about what is it that we but that we are looking to gain from this whole process was was really useful internally, making us really think about the key objectives and which areas to maybe prioritize over others. Um it was also really helpful sitting down and thinking about it rather than one big huge project, actually splitting it down into different phases, um, sort of smaller bite sized chunks, which made it seem a little bit more achievable within the time. Um and then thankfully, I tested. Been super flexible with us during this process because it all it happened to coincide our implementation with our first ever financial audit, which just took up huge amounts of our time that we didn't expect. So we did have to um slightly push back some of our go live dates, and thankfully, ITAS were accommodating and actually helped us navigate through through that process. And like to say that thankfully we're out the other side of our first days of go live and uh yeah, loving the move to intact.