Awareness / Forecasting / Workflow
Many business owners think that getting their monthly financial statements is all they need to make proper decisions about the direction of their business. While it is a great start, this type of reporting will only tell you what has happened in the past and doesn’t give you insight into what will happen in the future. Here are three way you can obtain exceptional reporting.
The most common type of business reporting that business owners get is the monthly financial reports from their accounting system. While this is a great start, it only scratches the surface in meaningful data.
A better approach is to pull data from multiple sources within your IT infrastructure into an easy to read dashboard that lets you see key drivers of your Company’s success. For example, if you are pulling information from both the accounting system and overlay it with information from your customer relationship management system (“CRM”) then you can learn more about activities that drive your business.
The accounting system will tell you how many successful sales there were, the average price point and when it was made.
The accounting & CRM systems combined will tell you which sales team is most successful, what activity and the cost of the activity contributed to closed sale and create a profile for the ideal sales process that your team can use as a template going forward.
Within your business, there are many roles and each role has different needs in terms of operational information. While the shipping department might want to know how many orders need to be shipped tomorrow compared to the previous day, that information doesn’t provide any value to the frontline operational staff. Frontline staff will want to know information such as the production target, average production and remaining orders to be produced.
It is important to use a business intelligence (“BI”) system that will allow reporting that is customizable on a per user basis, so they are only seeing the slice of the system information that is relevant to them. This helps keep employees engaged with the system instead of seeing it as irrelevant to their daily interactions.
Most businesses have specific reports and KPIs that they agree will guide decisions. However, the business goals, the needs of the employees, and business conditions change over time. For example, if you were to go from a single product to multiple products, the need to report and allocate costs on a per product line basis comes into existence. We recommend reviewing the reporting and intelligence system on a quarterly or bi-annual basis, depending on the rate of growth.
Are you getting the information you need out of your reporting system? Contact us and we can review and make recommendations to turn your data into actionable information.
Many business owners think that getting their monthly financial statements is all they need to make proper decisions about the direction of their business.
What can we help you with today? Please feel to reach out with any inquiries that you might have.
Avisar Everyday is a trusted provider of accounting solutions, giving our clients insight and financial clarity that empowers them to make enlightened business decisions every day.
