The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many companies to revise their strategies and budgets in preparation for the "new normal". In times of such unprecedented uncertainty, complexity and risk, Scenario Planning and Predictive Planning processes came to the forefront of the management teams and FP&A professionals. 

Through the adoption of technology, FP&A teams are able to achieve complete visibility and help guide the company as a whole while assisting each team to optimise performance.

The new xP&A world is much more connected than before with the ability to assess the component of risk management, multiple scenarios, modulations, and simulations. All of them are integrated and require a much closer approach to the business intelligence range of new skillsets.

If the last year has taught us anything, traditional financial planning and analysis approaches did not work (or at least proved suboptimal) when navigating through uncharted landscapes. The pandemic forced FP&A practitioners to reassess and adapt our approach to planning, forecasting, and bringing to the forefront the importance of scenario planning. 

Our business environment is changing dramatically. Smart devices, smart offices, autonomous vehicles are boosting and creating avalanches of data every day. Big data will benefit a business. It enables business with greater insights and new opportunities, but only if you are able to manage it well.

Today, the tools that are being offered are smart enough that with a few inputs and financial insight, you are able to achieve amazing results. No need to be a data scientist to deliver these results. In this article, we discuss Roche's FP&A transformation and how the company started with small experiments before going big.