Dear colleagues,

In our International FP&A Board discussions, Integrated Finance is one of the few ideas almost no one argues against. Then I ask how many have actually made it operational, and the room goes quiet.

The 2026 FP&A Trends Survey explains the silence. Only 10% of organisations fully integrate strategic, financial and operational planning, yet those that do are 3.7 times more likely to be performing well than those with none. The gap in practice is wide. The gap in performance is wider.

This issue's featured white paper, The Impact of Integrated Finance, takes the problem further. Beyond planning, in consolidation and reporting, 85% of teams still run separate systems, losing time before analysis even begins.

That is why this issue treats integration as a performance question, not a system one. The articles take it further: how integration earns finance its influence, why connection must be built rather than bolted on, and the structural choice most plans skip. Our upcoming webinars turn the idea into practice. Connecting more information is not the goal. A faster, better decision is.

Warm regards,

Larysa Melnychuk, CEO and Founder
FP&A Trends Group & International FP&A Board

Most teams know fragmented systems slow them down. This Forrester Consulting research measures the cost: 85% still run consolidation and planning separately, and 64% find scenario analysis very or extremely difficult. Time lost before finance can test, trust or guide.

Two-thirds of leaders plan to invest in an integrated platform within 18 months. The paper sets out the capabilities they are prioritising.

Download the paper to review the findings → 

The business wants finance in the strategic conversation. Too often, FP&A is still reconciling data from disconnected sources, so its insight arrives late and cannot be traced.

Integration is the precondition for influence. Partnering holds only when finance shares assumptions across functions and moves from explaining the past to shaping the decision.

Read the article → 

Analysts can lose 70% of a forecast cycle chasing numbers across systems before any analysis begins.

The fix is to treat data like a product: a certified "revenue by channel" set, defined once and owned by the team that creates it, ready for everyone who needs it. Pull it, model it, decide. Connection becomes capability, not just fewer spreadsheets.

See the platform case → 

Buying the platform is the easy part. The harder call is structural: centralise to standardise assumptions and definitions, or stay close to the business so finance still understands it. Most plans skip this choice.

That is why the technology case clears and the change still slows. Integration is an operating-model decision before it is a systems one.

Explore the structural choices → 

Integration is built in practice, not on paper. It shows up in how teams define ownership, connect assumptions, govern data, redesign processes, and bring analysis into decisions before the moment has passed. That is where our upcoming webinars continue the discussion.

FP&A Trends webinars are complimentary and offer an opportunity to learn from members of the International FP&A Board and see how finance leaders around the world are developing their FP&A capabilities. If you are not able to join live, you can register to receive the recording later.

Better tools and data do not automatically improve how decisions are made. This webinar looks at the operating-model question behind modern FP&A: how ownership, process, collaboration, and decision support need to change as AI becomes part of finance work.

Join us to explore how the new FP&A Trends and EY paper reframes operating-model design for modern finance teams.

As AI accelerates analysis, FP&A’s value increasingly depends on how well finance connects insight, context, and action across the business. The challenge is no longer only producing analysis faster. It is making sure the right information reaches the right decision at the right time.

Register for the event to examine what orchestration means in practice and how FP&A can stay relevant as decision cycles move faster.

According to the last FP&A Trends Survey, only 4% of organizations can run scenarios in real time. As predictability shortens and conditions shift rapidly, FP&A teams need more agile and connected planning processes to support faster decision-making.

Register for this webinar to learn how leading organizations are improving forecasting agility, enabling faster scenario analysis, and using technology to support proactive, data-driven decisions.