Starting a business and sustaining one are two very different things that are both essential in their own way. Your accounting team handles the current data of your business while Financial Planning and Analysis enable your foresight and wisdom for what can be done ahead.

One looks at cash flow management to do reports while a full FP&A, reviews these reports to analyse your data so you can make wiser decisions not just to keep your business afloat in unpredictable seasons but also for it to still keep growing.

From Survival to Growth: Why FP&A Is Essential

Your business needs a team that is as visionary as its founder. Once you’ve already put up a business, you can easily get lost or carried away in the daily operations that the future your business could be headed to might easily be overlooked or set aside.

Your FP&A team ensures that your vision for your business keeps moving forward, so much so that at the very least, they will forecast a five-year plan opportunity plan for growth. 

A skilled FP&A team will take a percentage of your budget but their sensitivity towards advancements in information, technology, and digitalisation is worth your investment. In our digital age, this is synonymous with thriving and not merely surviving.

Your FP&A team can be given the responsibilities in terms of strategising which models will save you during unpredictable events. 

As they are also handling the design of what your business model can efficiently become, they will also most certainly take into account possible changes in market conditions and prepare your business to keep growing throughout those moments.

Advantages of Skilled FP&A

When you have a team that is led by your vision and are skilful and sensitive to planning out how to make it come to fruition in the years ahead, your business will be able to:

• Utilise your resources to their utmost capacity for growth
• Ensure that both short-term and long-term developments are met
• Motivate across all levels all of your employees to work together and do better
• Save more in terms of cost, especially since an FP&A team will be outsourced
• Keep updated and on time with your current and projected financial status
• Gain foresight into possible changes in the environment and market
• Consolidate data better in order to make wiser decisions

Benefits of Having FP&A

Apart from the previously mentioned advantages of hiring an FP&A, there are other specific benefits that can be gained from working with and discussing with your possible FP&A team the significant customizable service that they can provide for you.

1. Standardisation

With the overflowing data coming in, along with reports and requirements, you can set a modern FP&A platform to be SaaS-ready so that all the information being processed can be delivered in a standardised format. 

This enables your business to have minimal errors through a standard calculation of compensation. 

Additionally, you can also integrate Human Resources, Operations, and Finances into categorisable data, which eventually frees you up with more time.

2. Adaptability

When changes happen in the market or business environment, you can set up your FP&A to give you blow-by-blow predictions and possible action plans immediately. 

By giving you access to current data, you can be empowered to make better decisions as these changes occur.

This gives you informed decisions in terms of hiring, compensation, and workforce concerns that take into consideration possible costs for employee benefits, required taxes, and eventual deductions among others.

3. Learning Ground

Hiring an FP&A gives you firsthand experience of learning from skilled analysts who can translate data into actionable growth for you. 

Not only will you be at the receiving end of being updated in terms of business status, but you will also be at the forefront of making set decisions that push you and your business forward.

You get to witness how business models, goals, and concepts are applied and delivered into better performance in areas such as turnovers, costs, revenue, and most importantly, growth.

4. Oversight in Leadership

In terms of managing your finances, the one thing that is not part of your team of accountants’ job description is to oversee and to lead–which is the main role of your FP&A team.

By translating strategic goals into your annual and operational budgets, your FP&A team delivers results along with strengthened predictability of cash flow management.

Your team does their work with the end in mind–not just by forecasting but by also presenting to you actionable and therefore, doable models for your consideration.

As the business environment, these days continues to build upon speed, staying afloat or merely surviving might not be the only goal you should have for your business. Hiring a skilled FP&A team to work for you will empower your business to grow. 

At the end of the day, your business grows with you. Your vision drives it. Your FP&A team is only there to widen the horizons with you.