2021 is the Year of Business Resilience: Is your finance team ready?
We’ve all been witness to, and many of us on the receiving end of, the unpredictable changes continuing to impact the Canadian market. The trending word of the moment is “resilience”, but it means much more than merely a business’ ability to keep the doors open.
Resilience is about an individual and team mindset as much as it is an approach to carefully controlling costs. The impact of such a financial downturn on employee morale cannot be understated. In fact, a recent report by Aberdeen Research revealed that:
67% of companies worldwide have shown a noticeable to significant drop in revenue, with 24% indicating an increase and 8% with negligible change.
For finance teams, these challenges have been even further acerbated by the transition to remote work. Collecting invoices from the office, getting multiple signatures on checks (not to mention printing and mailing), and the entire employee expense submission, review and approval process has required new workflows practically overnight. Adapt too slowly? Risk your vital cash flow.
This said, some companies are weathering the ongoing storm far better than others. We set out to learn how.
Over the past few months, we spoke with finance leaders from some of our SAP Concur solutions customers to better understand what makes their companies more resilient. We asked them to reflect on the past year, what finance systems and tools they rely on most, and any advice they have for other finance leaders who want to play an essential role in driving business forward.
The following videos feature insights from two of these customers. Watch each and then stay tuned for our complete Business Forward Thinkers video series coming this spring. Afterward, visit our Business Forward webpage to assess your company’s financial capabilities using our Business Resilience Checklist:
Phyllis Gleason, Controller, Cash Management
Morguard Investments
Martin Lebeau, CFO
Accedian