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The finance transformation to value
Looking to modernize your finance function? Deloitte has helped a plethora of companies with their finance transformation projects by harnessing the power of technology and talent. It all starts with approaching finance as a service rather than simply as an expense. Explore how Deloitte supports the finance function’s digital ways of working and thinking while driving success for companies’ finance transformation projects.
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- Upskilling with impact investing in finance leads to true business partnerships
- What happened next
- Looking ahead
- Explore other case studies
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Upskilling with impact investing in finance leads to true business partnerships
A fast-growing client with outlets across the nation was struggling with the roles and responsibilities of its finance business partners within the commercial finance function. The client had worked for a couple of years to make sure that the finance team had the skills and mindset to work effectively with other units of the company, to help drive decisions and unlock new value, but the client knew it needed to dig deeper. Finance employees felt hampered and constrained by the lack of definition around their roles and expectations, as well as the insufficient data, tools, and processes they were provided. Employees were compelled to do work that didn’t add value to the business, such as tedious manual transaction processing and generating reports that could be automated. The client knew that it needed to invest more strategically in the finance team and help employees truly see what was possible in their roles—and for the finance function.
What happened next
Working with the client, Deloitte started off by helping to develop an ideal future state for finance, including what its “great” would look like. We worked with the finance function to understand its current maturities and capabilities, and from that, built out a road map to get to that future state. We quickly identified the skills that needed to be enhanced, and our findings were surprising: While finance employees’ technical skills were critical, it was the soft skills, such as communication, building relationships, and presenting with impact, that business stakeholders really valued. Understanding these needs, we then built out a playbook and created a set of “Business Partner” personas to form the basis of a capability uplift program. These were delivered via a two-day workshop that was rolled out over two years to multiple teams across the finance function. The results? More than 120 finance employees have gone through the training, and the finance function has improved its qualitative performance rating, rapidly built stronger relationships with its internal customers, and raised its profile across the enterprise. With this engagement, a diverse set of perspectives was crucial to its success. This transformation was a cultural shift as well as a skills training, and we were fortunate to have buy-in at all levels to make it happen. The client’s board was deeply engaged, but just as critical was the grassroots engagement on the employee level. We were able to help the finance function truly understand who it was serving, as well as the subtleties of partnering with different business units.
Looking ahead
We’ve rolled out five installments of this training, and the client has now charged us with creating future sessions to enhance employees’ problem-solving capabilities. The response to the program has been enormously positive, and employees have worked diligently to embed the skills and behaviors they learned into their day-to-day activities. We are working with the client now to create follow-up workshops and are working alongside Deloitte Digital to build a centralized learning hub for the finance function. By investing in its finance workers, this client has doubled down on providing business insights, paving a path to the future for employees, finance, and the enterprise.
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