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Some of the challenges/ building blocks in building a solution and how should you go about it?

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In this, the third and final part of the three part series on some of the challenges that our clients typically experience at month end. I chat to Elzaan of Semaphore communications on what some of the challenges are and the building blocks.

We pick up from the previous conversation where we closed with how to get data from your system into Excel Power Pivot

Some key points that we discuss are:

We focus on how we build solutions for our customers and the process that we go through from
Understanding what are the building blocks to a solution
still more pitfalls like prolonging the suffering by trying to build a solution yourself
Our experience in creating rapid solutions using Excel PowerPivot
How we deliver a first touch solution within the first week or two. This give you immediate action and deliveries that you can use to work with
We talk about the “one-button refresh” approach that we use in our Excel Power Pivot workbooks
Is it now possible to take off over month end?

Listen to the conversation below

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If you experience some of these challenges with your month-end reporting then we may be able to help you.

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Here is a summary of that conversation

What are some of the challenges/ building blocks? How should you go about it?

When we present financial managers with the options they try to do it themselves because they’re Excel experts. That’s great, but we also do think that it defeats the original purpose – focusing on their actual jobs. Our solutions are built for life (unless something radical changes in the business), and we show you how to change some things (views, periods etc). The process we go through is to identify your biggest pain point – what is the thing that you’re really challenged by now, what is the thing that’s taking you the most time, that’s necessary to do but not the most productive use of your time.

Comparing financial statements is normally the biggest area for financial managers. So we say let’s focus on the pair-down or income statement and doing just that for you and let’s build and automate that process. It’s a relatively quick delivery cycle so within the first week or two you already know what you’re getting because we work with you to show you this is what it’s going to look like, this is the behaviours you’re going to see, and ask “did we capture all your ideas?” So you can almost immediately start exploring the tool and provide feedback on areas that need improvement. We do understand the financial world pretty well but like to leave room for creativity and special requests. We build fully-automated systems with one-button refresh of everything.

At what point should you consider automating reports/ upgrading to a dashboard scenario?
At any time you’re doing manual work, you’re ready for this. The technology is there and available for you if you tap into it. The feedback we generally get from financial managers is that they didn’t know it was this easy and could work as well as it does. Some people also describe the technology incorrectly which leads to misconceptions. We solve the biggest itch and give them some time back in their day to think (and don’t overwhelm people).

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If you experience some of these challenges with your month-end reporting then we may be able to help you.

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