NEW REPORT

Efficiency and effectiveness breakthroughs

Through a number of in-depth case studies, this report reveals breakthrough examples from companies that have transformed their performance in these and other areas from:

Alcoa
Track the strategy and approach that enabled Alcoa’s finance function to be rated world-class for both effectiveness and efficiency by The Hackett Group. The global aluminium company has used process standardization and shared services to drive down costs while delivering value to its business units. The adoption of a global ERP system has played a major part in enabling continuous improvement. In cost terms, shared services has reduced the need for full time employees by up to four to one. By progressively transferring routine transactions and processes to its global business service operation, Alcoa has freed up local finance functions to improve the level of support provided to business unit managers.

Barclays
Learn about the central part played by improving the skills of finance staff to enable the function to improve the quality and value of information to managers. The case study details the major restructuring activities that have both reduced the function’s costs and increased the quality of information delivered to managers. It focuses on the skills and capabilities identified as essential for this change in role and how realistic targets have been set to improve the performance and standing of finance.

Carlson Companies
The company set itself the task of being best-in-class in all its support functions, including finance. Following a three-phase programme of centralization, standardization and technological-enabled processes, Carlson Companies centralized its accounting to reporting, order to cash and purchase to pay processes. The case study explains how it used a radical, rather than incremental, transformation programme to bring about radical efficiency improvements, the planning and resources used in the process, the central part played by shared services, talent management and a global ERP system.

Christchurch City Council, New Zealand
As part of a public sector organization, Christchurch City Council’s finance function is focused on delivering service quality to budget. Find out how finance made the transition from a conventional to a strategic business role in the Council, its application of Horizon, its balanced-scorecard performance management framework and deployment of the Baldrige Model.

Backed up with details of its innovative, reporting, planning and budgeting methods, the case study illustrates what world-class finance capabilities are in a public sector context.

Easynet
The telecoms managed network, hosting and telepresence company provides an example of the use of a shared service solution for delivering a wide range of financial as well as accounting services. The group finance director explains how the company established the organisational, technological and capabilities to deliver consistently outstanding services and support to the business. He also provides examples of how finance has helped the business to tackle issues such as cost-effective pricing systems and strategies to help the company minimize the impact of customer churn, its role in risk management and decision-making.

GlaxoSmithKline
Governance, cost-effective finance operations and business partnering are the pharmaceutical company’s yardsticks for judging world-class finance performance. While shared service centres played an important part in GlaxoSmithKline’s drive for cost-effective finance operations, the company decided that outsourcing would deliver better value. The reasons behind the decision, the evaluation criteria applied and the way in which outsourcing has been implemented are covered in this case study. GSK also targeted business partnering as a key objective for finance. This led to a definition of the skills required and performance management programmes to achieve its goal.

Purolator
The finance organization of Canada-based Purolator has undergone a complete transformation since the turn of the decade to enable it to support decision-making. Through a programme of skills enhancement, finance has developed capabilities that enable staff to work alongside manager in developing the business case for major investments and new projects. Another area it has targeted is improved forecasting to help the business take advantage of opportunities presented by globalization. Learn about the company’s Redefining Finance programme as well as its extensive talent management scheme.

Thomson Reuters
This case study focuses on the radical transformation undertaken in the finance function in Reuters, prior to the creation of Thomson Reuters. Reuters’ Fast Forward programme involved radical change across the organization. Finance was given the goal of reducing its costs to 1.5 percent of corporate revenue by 2006. The role of a global shared services organization, talent management, new performance measurement frameworks and the central part played by change management are covered in detail.

The SKF Group
As the SKF Group has been a global organization for many decades, it has developed a finance function that sets out to reap the benefits of global operation. Consolidation of the majority of transactional and rule-based finance processes in shared services centres and the use of outsourcing has freed up business controllers to play more of a partnering role in decision-support. Learn how finance is structured, the criteria for moving processes to shared services and the role of its Finance Academy in developing business partnering skills in a global business.

StatoilHydro
Oil and gas giant StatoilHydro has set out to become a world-class finance function by 2012. Find out about the initiatives including the creation of a global shared services organization, the balanced scorecard and an innovative approach to planning and performance management that had led to the jettisoning of the conventional budget. The case study explains the role of resource allocation, forecasting and performance management in the new regime.

Whirlpool Corporation
To meet the challenges of achieving world-class performance, Whirlpool’s finance function places great emphasis on talent management and moving finance staff from ‘data gatherers’ to providers of ‘insight and analysis’. The home appliance manufacturer has developed the decision-support skills in finance necessary to secure the greatest benefits from globalization. This has involved placing a strong emphasis on people development skills among finance leaders, the ability to identify high-fliers and develop other finance talent and, not least awareness of the need for cultural diversity.

Plus... many more examples from leading companies such as Royal Bank of Scotland, New York Times, InterContinental Hotels Group and Diageo.