Bringing together disparate data points in a coherent manner remains a very real and prominent challenge for CFOs and finance departments in manufacturing organizations.
For most organizations, the culprits are spreadsheets, disconnected pieces of legacy software, or manual processes. Fortunately, there is a better way to support financial data integration, which will enable CFOs to provide necessary guidance to decision-makers throughout the organization.
The better way is the OneStream Intelligent Finance platform. OneStream is an industry-leading corporate performance management (CPM) platform that enables CFOs and Finance teams to conquer complexity so that you can lead at speed and empower the organization with data insights.
Optimizing data integration is vital in today’s fast-paced business environment. Effective and efficient financial processes — including budgeting, reporting, planning, and forecasting — rely on quality data to make informed decisions. Without access to a unified platform such as OneStream, organizations will encounter data integration challenges at every turn. The use of multiple — oftentimes incompatible — databases will make it difficult to compile one unified report that clearly presents information. This can have tremendous consequences in manufacturing. Fortunately, OneStream has a solution.
OneStream Solves Challenges Resulting From Poor Data Integration
Financial information needs to align with what’s contained in the general ledger (GL), which is the foundation of your organization’s bookkeeping, and other data collection and storage systems to ensure uniformity across the enterprise. Unfortunately, this is not the case for organizations that rely on outdated software or manual-entry spreadsheets.
CFOs need to be aware of the consequences of poor financial data integration to see why you need a CPM solution that delivers seamless data integration. From wasted resources to increased risk of errors to poor data quality, there is plenty of room for problems when utilizing outdated data integration methods.
A lack of integration can result in redundancies, as data is duplicated across multiple departments due to limited coordination. However, this is not an issue in a unified platform such as OneStream, which solves duplication through automation.
Furthermore, a non-integrated approach is not flexible, which can lead to problems when attempting to move to a more agile and responsive method of budgeting and financial planning. OneStream solves this problem by enabling manufacturing organizations to achieve agility and respond to new challenges in their industry.
Automating and integrating financial systems through OneStream solves these issues that impair productivity, quality, and usefulness of the data collected.
It’s also worth remembering that the financial data you collect about your consumers or clients, productivity results, sales leads, revenue, cash flow, and profit margins are all essential for supplying management with the information they need to make informed decisions that impact the success of your company.
By connecting data sources, you can trace details all the way to the point of origin at the transaction level so you know where the data came from and what activity caused the results. That way, you can determine whether it’s necessary to recommend continuing certain activities, or if there is a need for improvement to drive more satisfying results.
The Value of Financial Data Integration Through OneStream
In today’s digital world, there is no shortage of data points to evaluate. The challenge comes in utilizing the full potential of the accumulated data to support decision-making.
Fortunately, the data integration capabilities of OneStream enable CFOs and Finance teams to make key determinations about the organization’s course of action. For CFOs, the question is — how can you help the organization not just stay afloat or on-track, but actually embrace new opportunities for expansion and grow with confidence?
OneStream empowers your organization by providing data insights in multiple ways:
- Extensible Dimensionality® to create flexibility for business units to report and plan at additional levels of detail.
- Data Blending to drill back to the source of the data before any calculation is performed on the source data.
- Predictive Analysis enables organizations to use their data to develop and implement predictive models across financial and operational planning processes to support forward-thinking decision-making.
With access to fully integrated datasets, CFOs and Finance teams can readily identify trends and patterns that become evident upon analysis. You can use this insight to make key recommendations on future business plans. Then, the data can be processed and transformed into clear, presentable formats for each stakeholder or team in their preferred format. The benefits are unmistakable.
– Data complexity reduction. Manufacturing organizations deal with many applications and systems, each with multiple interfaces. A data integration plan simplifies the complexity to streamline data delivery to the right level in the organization.
– Availability. Having your data stored in one centralized location makes it more accessible, which enables each stakeholder or team to analyze and make use of the data. The result is improved integration and presentation of all necessary financial details.
– Collaboration. Accessible data makes it easier to collaborate on projects and gain unity around financial decision-making across the organizations. Having access to the data in a timely and relevant manner helps tear down barriers that commonly exist between compartmentalized or siloed teams in manufacturing.
– Improved decision-making. Financial data integrations empower departments to use enterprise-wide data in ways that are relevant to their needs — and with a greater appreciation for the bigger picture. When teams can access data to better understand their impact on the overall organization’s strategy and objectives, this will create more alignment in decision-making.
Talk to HollandParker About Migrating to OneStream Software
At HollandParker, we understand the challenges associated with financial data integration for manufacturing organizations. We have helped numerous organizations streamline data integration through the OneStream platform.
With our support, we have also helped CFOs and other organizational leaders use their data more effectively to make decisions that drive business innovation and success. And, we’d like to help you!
Want to know how to bring financial data integration to the next level for your organization? Contact HollandParker for a free consultation on the OneStream platform that is designed to continually evolve and scale with your organization.
As a Diamond OneStream Implementation partner, we have the expertise and capabilities to help you take the next step gaining financial and operational insights to support faster and more informed decision-making. Contact us today!
