Leveraging FP&A for Growth

There’s nothing quite as uncomfortable as having to change when you don’t want to.

Or perhaps to a lesser extent of discomfort, having to change faster than you'd like to. In March and April, many companies wavered as they weighed the possibilities of what might transpire in the coming months of Summer 2020. Yet, in the recent Fall months, they've increasingly executed upon what they believed would be their new realities.

I've been saying since the beginning of this craziness that I hope doesn't last long. But I've been telling company leadership all along: "plan like it may last forever". That doesn't mean it will, but it means you're not anxiously awaiting a due date for the old way to be restored.

If there's a key mindset I've observed over the years of working with leaders and businesses, it's that the most successful ones never really want to reach their goals and be done. They don't seek finality. They never want momentum to stop because then they risk becoming complacent. They persevere and they persist and they bypass arriving.

We probably need to be updating our plans more frequently, now more than ever, because the future is so much more uncertain. We should plan and adapt continuously, and that applies to our businesses as well as our personal lives. Planning shouldn't be a once-in-a-while event; planning should be continuous.

When it comes to continuous planning in an organizational context, financial planning comes second. Mindset shifts come first. Here's why:

The most important is a cultural shift. Making sure that people understand that they're no longer going to be acting like a small entrepreneurial business they're going to be acting like a much more mature connected company. For a lot of small businesses that's a major shift and it needs to be addressed and nurtured constantly. I always say to companies that are embarking upon that path that a lot of the change or a lot of the language needs to come from the top. Certainly the CFO, but also middle-level managers as well who have bought in to the change and bought into the processes.

A second area is a mindset shift of recognizing what is possible. That in many ways it's going to be better than a lot of the frustrations and disconnects that existed when the business was a lot smaller just starting out. Every company has pain, no matter what size, and experiences consequences of that pain. But always realize that it doesn’t always have to be that way. No company is perfect, but all can be a whole lot better.

And then third, I always say to companies that are looking to expand: technology is not a fix all to all of the problems. If you bring in software, it's going to address some of those pains and problems. It’s going to allow the company to operate a whole lot more smoothly. But in some cases, if processes aren’t deliberately crafted and functioning as intended, technology implementations it may make the organization even more splintered. It's really important to understand and redefine what your processes are and make sure that they're working the right way so that when a platform comes in those processes can be well migrated. There’s often more that needs to be done on the front-end of planning than many people and companies realize.

Planning is part of life. Those of us who are futurists get energized by the possibilities that await us. We need to be intentional about what we do on the path to where we are going. In times like these, it’s of the utmost importance. Plan fully, plan often.