​Another successful FP&A Board was held in Sydney on 21st August 2018, where more than 50 FP&A practitioners attended and discussed their challenges and trends in Financial Planning and Analysis.

Welcome to this blog series, where I look forward to share with you some of my reflections on what I believe are very important issues for most organisations today.

Are your KPIs, Scoreboards and other metrics safe from the Simpson's paradox?

Why, according to 70% of UK CFOs, is FP&A the hardest Finance & Accounting role for them to fill?

This is just one of the many questions the well-known FP&A thought leader Larysa Melnychuk answers as well as covering a number of relevant other areas on the podcast with Andrew Codd.

We are always working towards improving the quality of the FP&A Board meetings and would value your feedback.

Please answer the questions below:

More than 15 years ago, the Harvard Business Review had already declared corporate planning and budgeting as all but dead. “Corporate budgeting is a joke, and everyone knows it,” the business magazine wrote in 2001. The polarizing article generated an enormous reaction. However, little has changed since then.

We’ve all come across checkpoints in our personal lives where we commonly think about or use phrases such as “let’s take a few steps back”, “I need to reset things” and “let’s start all over again”.

P&L management focuses on the items included into P&L (profit and loss) report. It has become an increasingly popular technique used by the top managers around the world. P&L responsibility scope goes far beyond being simply responsible for profits or loss. Managers must not only understand what stands behind and drives each item of the report, but also need to take steps to improve P&L statements.

The fourth meeting of the Dubai FP&A Board will take place on Tuesday, 23rd October 2018. The Board will interactively discuss Why Driver-Based Planning Matters for Modern FP&A.

Back in 2004 I spent a large portion of time overseas travelling around France. I would often find when talking to a “local” the first question I would ask was:  “Do you speak English?” Most times, the response I got was a short, sharp “No!”