One important skill finance professionals are never taught during their formal education is the power of personal engagement with operations and using these relationships to deliver bottom-line value. There is too much focus on models, processes, procedures and systems without regard to the fact that all these have to be developed, operated and interpreted by people. 

Being a business partner requires a specific skillset. Furthermore, specific conditions should be in place to increase the chance of success. In the article, Anders Liu-Lindberg describes two main option for the implementation of the concept of FP&A Business Partnering.

FP&A does not work in the finance silo of providing backward looking analysis of what has happened. They arm themselves and their operational and departmental leaders with the “why” of the performances and develop insights on trends. In the leading state of the FP&A Business Partnering Maturity model, FP&A is a credible partner that the business leaders can rely on when developing a sound strategy.

Finance is tasked with delivering better Business Intelligence and more importantly better insights to influence decision-making in the right direction and creating an impact on company performance. At the center of this shifting demand is the FP&A function which needs to deliver better analytics but also needs to partner with business stakeholders.

As Finance leaders, we can’t expect the business to view Finance as value-added partners if we can’t put a stop to this often-inaccurate stereotype in advance. So where should we start? The answer lies in better communication along with greater transparent and objective measurements that can be easily understood and used by all.  
 

Interview with Gemma Davie, Senior FP&A Director at CA Technologies, a member of London FP&A Board.  We only need to look at the evolution of the mobile phone to understand why the role of the FP&A business partner has changed. As technology has continued to evolve at an increasing speed and the business environment has become so complex and volatile, decisions have to be made quickly and the demand for timely, flexible, forward-looking analysis has transformed the role of the FP&A business partner.