On the 19th of July, we held the 4th FP&A Board in Kuala Lumpur. Like before, the Kuala Lumpur FP&A Board debate was very dynamic and insightful thanks to the participants. This time, we had 30 senior finance practitioners who represented local and large international companies such as:

• AIG
• Atalian Global Services
• Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts
• Genpact
• Weir Minerals
• and many others.

The discussion was devoted to a hot subject of Zero-Based Budgeting (ZBB) and its significance for FP&A. ZBB could be a great first step to organizational analytical transformation: it can help with Driver-Based Modelling and Planning, Rolling Forecast, Flexible Budgeting and even with Beyond Budgeting implementations.

Agenda

1. Zero-Based Budgeting (ZBB): key definitions and principles
2. ZBB as a basis for flexible Driver-Based Planning
3. A Case study from the field:

• Sook Ting Yong, Finance Director at SC Johnson, will share her practical experience about ZBB

4. Small groups discussion on ZBB implementations
5. Conclusions and Recommendations

During the debate, the Board members discussed what is needed for the successful ZBB process implementation and came up with several ideas:

• Sponsorship from the top is necessary. 
• Business Buy-In is also required. The ZBB process is an overall business process. It could be led by FP&A but will involve the whole organization.
• Data availability and standardization are very important.
• Excel is not the system to use. The overall visibility of the process is essential and the flexible system can help make it happen.
• The process can be very time-consuming. Therefore the “Hybrid” approach will help to make it more value-adding: start from the biggest cost and revenue lines and go step-by-step into more details.

Our Speakers and Sponsors

Many thanks to Sook Ting Yong,  Finance Director at SC Johnson, for sharing her company's ZBB experience.

We are very grateful to our sponsors Anaplan and Michael Page for their great support.