With COVID-19 as a driving force, financial leaders and their associated teams are making plans for a new post-pandemic stage of financial transformation. For many businesses, a post-pandemic finance market means shifting beyond automating processes like financial consolidation, reporting and planning.

A post-pandemic financial transition will require teams and businesses to transform relatively quickly. This will particularly be the case for FP&A businesses shifting from standard monthly cycles to weekly or even daily processes to measure revenue, costs and cash flows.

Popular corporate performance management tools like Hyperion and SAP ERM have enabled financial professionals to automate a number of vital office processes but they may not necessarily be the most effective solutions for a post pandemic industry. Analysts have suggested that the fragmented structures, expensive upgrades and maintenance create additional management requirements rather than allowing financial leaders to really focus on analytics and decision making.

Preparing for a post-pandemic finance industry

Finance teams need to consider whether their traditional tools like Hyperion Planning or Oracle HFM are reaching their end of life. Finance leaders should have a good understanding of whether their services are capable of meeting new requirements and the costs that may be incurred in the future. Right now is a good time to evaluate your legacy tools and consider what option will suit your business now and in the future. Oracle and SAP have made plans to push customers to migrate on to their cloud applications. IT industry analysts are encouraging financial professionals to consider all other alternatives before making the transition to their legacy vendor cloud applications. There are a number of effective alternatives available on the market with more up to date architecture, new productions and support for on-premise and cloud deployment.
One particular alternative which has risen in popularity is OneStream Software. OneStream provides an innovative CPM solution, unifying and simplifying financial consolidation, planning, reporting and analytics. The platform is the first solution to provide corporate standards with the option for businesses to report and plan at various levels without affecting corporate standards. A vital asset of SmartCPM solutions is having the potential of using multiple solutions for budgeting, forecasting and planning, all within one single application. The OneStream XF service reduces the risks associated with integrations and reconciliation between various other products and applications.

Many businesses have used legacy tools to manage their planning, analysis and forecasting but as businesses grow it can become problematic in measuring and integrating data from various channels. Many organisations are looking for a unified approach, to reduce the efforts of managing multiple applications but also to enable clear visibility of all data processes.

Creating an agile, adaptive and visible platform is exactly what businesses need to progress and prepare for a post pandemic future.