How to establish sustainable success in Strategic Finance, one step at a time. When executed correctly, Strategic Finance is the linchpin between Strategic Planning and Budgeting. It helps organizations turn strategic thinking into reality by cascading thoughts and goals into measurable financial outcomes.  

An important characteristic of FP&A practitioners is a commitment to continuous improvement.  There are a number of ways for FP&A practitioners to commit toward improving their work.  For me, one of the ways I commit to continuous improvement is reading books.

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. In 2000, I began my career in FP&A as an analyst at Silicon Graphics, the same year that the iconic Nokia 6210 was launched.  Back then the functionality of the mobile phone was limited to voice calls and simple text messages.

Financial Planning and Analysis (FP&A) play a pivotal role between Strategy, Business and Data: a business partner advisor, helping to form a pathway that navigates an uncertain future, but in reality, the value created is very difficult to measure.

The inaugural London FP&A Circle meeting took place less than two weeks following the UK vote for Brexit. In this dramatically transformed business environment the role of FP&A is more important than ever in helping to manage the value of the company. In undertaking this task, the analytical maturity of the company is very important.

Cost Accounting provides insight into the relationship between financial sacrifices and financial benefits. There are a number of elements within this discipline that support this relationship. FP&A stimulates thinking about activities that create sacrifices in order to create benefits. These activities develop a framework for understanding what organizations are doing and where they are going.  The question is: which element of Cost Accounting develops a meaningful framework that links activities to understanding?

Please forgive me for my persistent rant and criticism against accountants who budget poorly or continue to calculate the substantial and growing high indirect and shared costs originating from resource expenses such as salaries, supplies, power, information technologies, and travel. I cannot seem to hold back my frustration.

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This article addresses technology in FP&A. In his book "THE INNOVATORS" Walter Isaacson describes two ways of utilizing technology.  One way is artificial intelligence, machines thinking on their own.  Another way is augmented intelligence, people using machines to help organize information.

In recent posts we’ve seen how tiny changes in the way we present numbers can have a huge impact on how well the information is understood. In this post, we look instead at how those little things can affect how your integrity or your ethics might be perceived.