Global organizations that manage hundreds of employees, thousands of financial processes, and millions of data points need to be focused on how to best optimize their enterprise data management (EPM).
We all know the power of data to gain valuable insight into financial performance, but the mismanagement of data could have a negative impact on the health of the organization.
We want to share these common enterprise data management mistakes that can be addressed, prevented, or overcome in any organization. It just takes the right approach and the help of today’s leading corporate performance management platform, OneStream XF, to optimize financial data across the enterprise.
Common EPM Mistakes — and the OneStream Solution
Take the time to evaluate whether your organization is prone to one of these common enterprise data management challenges and how OneStream Software offers a path forward to success.
1. System Architecture is Outdated or Not Configured Properly
EPM starts with having the right technology in place. This includes having the right system architecture to organize, store, and manage the data. Many global organizations make the mistake of using outdated legacy platforms with complicated data architectures that lead to data inconsistencies and gaps.
OneStream Solution: OneStream leverages the latest enterprise computing technologies to provide high-performance and scalability required by global enterprises with high data volumes and large user populations. Once the right system is in place, your organization can extract, cleanse, and transform data to support decision-making.
2. Software is Incorrectly Deployed
Providers of outdated, legacy software applications are forcing customers to one method of deployment or discontinuing support for the software your organization is using. When forced to one method of deployment, such as the cloud, organizations often make the mistake of spending valuable time and resources having to perform manual data integrations, system maintenance, and configurations. This often includes injecting code into the software to customize its behavior, which introduces complexity and risk into enterprise data management.
OneStream Solution: OneStream XF was built for flexibility because OneStream recognized that not all organizations are ready to move their financial data to the cloud. The platform can be deployed via cloud, hosted, or on-premise depending on your specific needs.
Our approach is to assess and evaluate your existing systems to determine viability, then develop an optimal configuration to maximize performance, scalability, and cost. And, because the data is housed in a centralized database, the data is readily available on-demand to reduce downtime and the risk of interruption to critical financial processes.
3. Applications are Disconnected
We recognize that organizations need a variety of software applications, tools, and platforms to support the various needs of each team. The challenge is connecting the data between these various pieces of software. Without proper mapping and direct connects, the data can easily be lost in the system.
OneStream Solution: When we work with organizations integrating their systems, we create direct connects to OneStream XF from other systems, such as the ERP system. We also schedule flat file uploads from other sources and set up drill back capability to get to the source data. In addition to direct connects, data files can be loaded through the OneStream interface as part of a workflow and included in a data validation sequence.
We have seen how the loading, mapping, and transforming of data from source systems to CPM solutions can be cumbersome and fragmented without highly connected tools. Data movement may be reliant on IT resources that may not be available to support the transformations and validations that must occur. This is even more problematic without transparency and controls. OneStream allows you to avoid these issues. OneStream has strong foundations in data quality that allow for unmatched flexibility and visibility into the data loading and integration process.
4. Data Can Be Manually Manipulated
A lack of robust data integration capabilities creates a multitude of problems. This includes manual steps that introduce the risk of error, poor financial data quality, lack of traceability, and lack of auditability. If the data can be manually manipulated by users or if the data does not fully integrate with source systems, then the data loses the credibility that your organization needs.
OneStream Solution: The OneStream XF platform includes advanced data integration capabilities to maximize financial data quality. If your organization is concerned about manual processes creating the risk of error, then consider that financial data quality is built into the platform to provide strict controls, delivering confidence and reliability in the quality of the data.
Additionally, financial processes can be automated in the platform, which makes financial reports more accurate. Plus, users and stakeholders across the enterprise can utilize the core financial and operational data using a single interface. With full integration to the ERP and other systems, the enterprise can simplify business processes, which helps reduce errors and inefficiencies from manual processes.
5. Security is Not Optimized
A cousin to manual manipulation of data is concern about the security of data. Organizations that do not have strict security protocols for who can access and work with data opens the door to unauthorized access or use of the data. This mistake could cause lost time from tracing back original data or cleaning up the data, as well as security vulnerabilities if data is left exposed outside of its intended use.
OneStream Solution: The OneStream XF platform includes a series of capabilities that all naturally live and work together, meaning that all of the data is housed in a unified platform. Because all of the data is housed in a central location, it is easy to implement robust security rules and protocols to protect the data within the system. We have worked with organizations to leverage special security rules to ensure the integrity of their data, even for the most sophisticated set-ups such as private and public data access restrictions.
6. Lack of Data Visibility
We have focused on ensuring that data is protected from manual error or manipulation. What about visibility? Many organizations make the mistake of not setting up the right level of visibility for stakeholders and other decision-makers that need to be able to see financial data at their desired detail to support critical decision-making. This is difficult to achieve if your organization’s enterprise data management approach is not built for visibility.
OneStream Solution: Because financial data quality is built into the core of the OneStream XF platform — and not a separate product — OneStream provides 100 percent visibility from reports to source. All financial data is clearly visible and easily accessible for the right level in the organization.
7. Data is Unreliable for Financial Reporting
If your organization cannot trust how financial data is assembled, how can you trust the financial reports that are generated from the data? Organizations often make the mistake of assuming the data is correct when the financial reports are spit out from the software. But, if the data is pulled from multiple disconnected pieces of software, is prone to user error, and lacks traceability and auditability, how can you authenticate where the numbers came from?
OneStream Solution: There is no room for error with financial reporting — either for external reporting purposes or internal decision-making purposes. OneStream XF includes advanced data integration capabilities to help prevent costly errors or omissions in financial statements. This includes robust production reporting capabilities that include drill down, audit, process log, security analysis, certification status, and process controls to completely surround the data in protective measures.
Work With a CPM Consulting Firm That Understands Data
Data is everything for today’s global organizations. We understand the importance of technology to deliver reliable data across the enterprise and fuel critical decision-making
That’s why when you work with HollandParker for OneStream XF implementation, we will ensure that your enterprise data management processes are optimized to avoid the mistakes we have outlined, to get the most out of OneStream, and to position your organization for future growth.
As a Diamond OneStream Implementation partner, we will work your team on the nitty-gritty technical details such as direct connects, drill-backs to source, user access rules, data architecture, quality, maintenance, security, and much more.
Find out more about our capabilities helping your organization advance into the modern era of financial data management. Contact us today to inquire about OneStream implementation!