{"id":2175,"date":"2015-05-15T20:45:28","date_gmt":"2015-05-15T20:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.peeriosity.com\/shared-services\/articles\/?p=2175"},"modified":"2022-08-09T08:50:06","modified_gmt":"2022-08-09T08:50:06","slug":"rethinking-report-generation-in-financial-shared-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.peeriosity.com\/shared-services\/articles\/2015\/05\/rethinking-report-generation-in-financial-shared-services\/","title":{"rendered":"Rethinking Report Generation in Financial Shared Services"},"content":{"rendered":"

The move to Shared Services provides companies the opportunity to have large repositories of data in one place, captured and organized, ready for analysis and data mining.\u00a0 Gone are the days, for example, when negotiating favorable purchase terms required buyers to contact the vendor to find out what was purchased, and how much, because data was distributed<\/a> over many company locations and thus impossible to consolidate.\u00a0 While this issue impacts all components of Shared Services, because of the types of data within scope, Financial Shared Services groups have the greatest challenges and opportunities for creating customer value using report generation capabilities.<\/span><\/p>\n

Unfortunately, reporting processes that don\u2019t effectively consider customer requirements can quickly overwhelm the value of the data.\u00a0 And, once a report has been requested, too often it stays on the list to be created over and over again, with no clear process for review, modification, or deletion.<\/span><\/p>\n

An accountant at a large retail company wanted to understand how other member companies manage the report generation process for Financial Shared Services processes<\/a>. \u00a0\u00a0Within a few hours, using iPollingTM<\/sup>, she had detailed answers from peers with relevant experience and knowledge, with visibility to the companies who responded and access to communicate directly with peers for additional discussion as necessary.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Here is the background statement on the reason for the poll:\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe are looking for ways to analyze and ultimately reduce the number of reports that we are generating and circulating as a company, in order to reduce redundant reporting and eliminate inefficiencies. We are interested to learn how other companies have approached this issue.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The first iPollingTM<\/sup> question asked about the current status of member companies with respect to reducing the number of reports that are generated out of Financial Shared Services.\u00a0 Only 14% indicated that they have worked hard at eliminating reports that are not highly valued and are now at about the right level of reporting.\u00a0 At 56%, the majority of member companies responded that they have made some efforts to reduce the number of reports and are making progress.\u00a0 \u00a018% of companies indicated that they haven\u2019t focused much attention on reducing reports because of higher priorities.\u00a0 Here are the details:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"current<\/p>\n

The second iPollingTM<\/sup> question asked about the approach followed to reduce the number of reports in Financial Shared Services.\u00a0 At 58%, the predominant approach was to analyze reports internally to identify ways to consolidate information<\/a>, eliminate duplicate information, and\/or eliminate old reports that are no longer being utilized.\u00a0\u00a0 For 37% of member companies, the primary approach cited was to work with customers to identify the reports they found valuable and the ones they could do without.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"primary<\/p>\n

The iPollingTM<\/sup> question generated an enthusiastic discussion between members.\u00a0 Here are several of the comments added by iPollingTM<\/sup> participants:<\/span><\/p>\n