What’s now and next for finance and procurement? Automation, digitisation and the future of global trade

Strategy & Leadership

What’s now and next for finance and procurement? Automation, digitisation and the future of global trade

June 04, 2019

Global

Candice de Monts-Petit
Candice de Monts-Petit

June 04, 2019

Global

Candice de Monts-Petit
Candice de Monts-Petit
Candice de Monts-Petit

Manager

Candice is a manager within Economist Impact's Policy & Insights division in EMEA. Prior to joining the Economist Group in 2018, she was the editor of IR Magazine, the global publication dedicated to investor relations professionals. She had an early career working in finance and investor relations in the natural resources sector in Moscow, Paris and London. Candice holds an MSc in Business Management from Université Paris Dauphine, an MA in Political Science (Post-Soviet studies) from Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris and a degree in Chinese Studies from Université Paris Diderot.

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Technology innovation and the shifting dynamics of global trade are challenging businesses in every sector to adapt. This pressure is felt as much by the finance and procurement functions as any other, and their preparedness for emerging trends will greatly influence their organisations’ ability to thrive in the future.

This report, written by The Economist Intelligence Unit and sponsored by Basware, examines which emerging dimensions of three broad trends -- automation, digitisation, and shifting trade winds -- finance and procurement executives expect will affect their companies most; what their impact will be; and how they have prepared.

It is based on a survey of over 400 finance and procurement executives in the US, UK, France and Germany, as well as in-depth interviews with the following:

  • Nicolas Roux, chief procurement officer, SITA
  • Marceau Pasquier, chief financial officer, installed base, Framatome
  • Rainer Krug, head of global finance and procurement, KWS
  • Lorelei Davis, head of digital innovation accelerator program, KWS

Download the report to find out how finance and procurement executives are preparing for the most important trends shaping their future.

 

 

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Steering through collaboration: CFOs driving new priorities for the future

It is well established that the modern CFO has a more strategic role to play in a business, but a clear action plan to achieve this is lacking. A key element of this is helping the business to deal with change. Some changes are planned: launching a new product or service, setting up operations in a new region or acquiring a competitor. Others may be unexpected: a major disruption to supply-chain operations, the emergence of new regulation and legal reporting requirements or the unpredictable impacts of global economic uncertainty.

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Managing unexpected changes to financial forecasts and adapting finance processes to rapidly evolving business models are top challenges finance executives face in executing their day to-day activities.

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All functions are working to meet these challenges and, as a finance head, we have to have visibility across all functions, how they are progressing [towards meeting goals] and ensuring that their direction is in line with overall strategic goals - Lalit Malik, CFO of Dabur, an Indian consumer goods manufacturer.

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There are a number of reasons why the role of leading cross-company collaboration around steering should fall to the CFO and their team. First, through the activities of budgeting, the finance function is the custodian of the clear, quantitative expression of management expectations and determines how resources such as cash and people will be allocated in order to achieve them. In our survey, 90% of respondents say that finance should facilitate collaborative enterprise planning to ensure that operational plans are aligned with financial and strategic plans.

Second, through performance management, the finance function is the gatekeeper for critical data that illustrate how well—or otherwise—the company is rising to the challenge of change. That includes data relating to sales, supply chain and delivery, which need to be reported back to the business in ways that help drive improved decisionmaking. Our survey reveals that companies in which finance executives feel empowered to drive strategic decisions across business functions are more likely to report a higher financial performance in fiscal year 2016/17 and 2017/18 and anticipate higher growth rates for 2019/20.

 

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