The current debate around Return To Office (RTO) likely heralds the biggest shift in the workplace since the emergence of the assembly line in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Is this relevant for an FP&A audience though? I’d argue it is fundamentally relevant for a number of reasons, not least because it is one of the biggest impacts of Covid-19 on the global business environment. This is a debate that, from a financial planning and analysis perspective, we cannot sit out. 

Traditionally, Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) teams were made of analysts. Today, in this incredible environment of constant change and uncertainties, the synergistic teams have to be multi-skilled. What are those emerging roles that we have to play in order to be successful in planning and forecasting?

Microsoft’s mission is to empower all people and organisations to achieve more. But the company has also been striving to achieve more itself, and xP&A has been instrumental in this pursuit.

Those who follow developments in FP&A closely have proclaimed a New Age of Zero-Based Budgeting. So what exactly does this mean? What do organisations find so appealing about this alternative to traditional budgeting, and how can we best implement it?

Scenario Planning is a technique used in FP&A to help guide companies through considerable uncertainty, contemplating various paths of possibilities. Despite our best attempts, our forecasts will have inherent errors; actual results deviating from the figures we had anticipated hitting.

The International FP&A Board now restarts face-to-face events, continuing our mission of learning the latest trends in FP&A through discussion and collaboration. The meeting of the San Francisco FP&A Board will discuss what lessons the pandemic has taught us. 

What are the best practices in building Driver-Based Financial models? How do we identify internal and external drivers, and use technology for integration and collaboration?

This digest includes a Gartner report on the role of xP&A in operational planning; an FP&A Trends white paper on Extended Planning and Analysis and business transformation; an article exploring how xP&A can liberate us from silo thinking; and a video case study of its implementation in a major company.

It wasn’t long ago that conversations in the FP&A community centred around driver-based planning.

Now, those at the forefront of the field have gone one step further. Extended Planning and Analysis (xP&A) marks a new era of planning, with major companies utilising it to impressive results.

In this video, we learn how A.P. Moller – Maersk Group made the transition from traditional budgeting to Rolling Forecasting.