Analytics is a marathon - and you're falling at the final hurdle
Anders Liu-Lindberg
Leading advisor to senior Finance and FP&A leaders on creating impact through business partnering | Interim | VP Finance | Business Finance
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We've all had enough of "here's one weird trick that can change your career" articles, or clickbait about "the one skill you need to level up". My views are clear: in order to create real value in the modern Finance Function, we all need to be multi-disciplinary professionals with a holistic understanding of the organization and the interpersonal skills required to make ourselves heard.
That said, there is one area of career development on which Finance professionals have so far failed to focus - and it's one that can yield significant results, very rapidly. Unfortunately, it's also the one many of us dread: presenting.
Nobody cares about your process
It's a brutal truth, but one of which we all need reminding: nobody outside of the Finance Function cares about your pivot table.
But almost always, the traditional format for presenting our work begins with an explanation of the clever processes we used to generate whatever the output is. Then we might talk about the details, for example, the data we analyzed and why. After that, we'll tell our audience about the 'insights' we gleaned from that analysis - that is, the things we learned. And finally, we'll present our recommendations for action.
If we think about this from the perspective of our audience, we can immediately see that this format is completely topsy-turvy. Stakeholders from outside the Finance Function or the Data & Analytics team aren't concerned with the process, other than to be confident that the methodologies are sound. Instead, the only thing they really care about is the business problem they are facing, and how Finance can help them solve it.
It's no wonder that Finance gets ignored.
Friends, Romans, countrymen...
We don't need to be great orators in order to make an impact. The next Malcolm X isn't going to turn up in a Finance presentation, and that's fine. But with a bit of creative thinking and some forward planning, we can significantly increase our impact on our organizations not by changing the work we're doing but simply by changing the ways in which we communicate that work.
So let's go back to that "standard" format for a Finance Function presentation, and see how we can improve it. We're going to work to a single principle: rather than talking about ourselves, we're going to talk about the stakeholders we are trying to support. At every stage, we'll focus on the value that we're generating for the business. If it's not immediately valuable to our audience, it's not staying in.
On that basis, our presentations will begin not with the process but with problems - that is, what is the business problem we are tackling with this piece of work? How does it impact the business; what are the implications of the issue at hand; and what role does Finance play in its solution?
Then we can explore that solution. First, what is it? What is the action that we are recommending, and why? How did we come to this conclusion? You'll notice that process creeps back in at this stage, and that's absolutely right - but by tweaking the language we use and the way in which we are communicating information, we can talk about the process as something that is beneficial to our stakeholders, rather than something that is relevant only to the Finance Function itself.
In other words, we can explain why we've developed the recommendations that we have, based on our broad understanding of the problem and of the business as a whole. The point is not to underline how clever we are, but instead to create trust and faith in our work - the crucial foundation on which we can build real action.
Finally, we should explain how our recommendations will be implemented. Again, this is an interdisciplinary piece of work that will often require a deep understanding of other functions within the business. To be a real value-creator, the Finance Function doesn't just make recommendations or proclamations - instead, it develops a plan of action with concrete outputs and a work schedule to show how they will be implemented.
Output, output, output
At every stage, we should focus not on our own "inside baseball" but on the real-world challenges facing our organization and its stakeholders.
We're already doing the work. By tweaking how we present that work, we can radically improve the outputs we generate and their impacts.
Try it today - it will transform your career! And if you need help in improving your management reporting or your team's presentation skills then don't hesitate to reach out.
This was the sixth article in my latest series about the "Data to impact journey" You can read previous article(s) in the series below.
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While you await future articles why not read my previous series on Data & Analytics below?
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Anders Liu-Lindberg?is the co-founder and a partner at the?Business Partnering Institute?and the owner of the largest?group dedicated to Finance Business Partnering?on LinkedIn with more than 10,000 members. I have ten years of experience as a business partner at the global transport and logistics company?Maersk. I am the co-author of the book “Create Value as a Finance Business Partner” and a?long-time Finance Blogger?on LinkedIn with 115,000+ followers and 200,000+ subscribers to my blog. I am also an advisory board member at?Born Capital?where I help identify and grow the next big thing in?#CFOTech. Finally, I'm a member of the board of directors at?PACE - Profitability Analytics Center of Excellence?where I support the development of new analytics frameworks that can improve profitability in companies around the world.
Product Marketing Manager at OneStream Software
1 年Great article Anders Liu-Lindberg! As finance professionals we often forget when presenting to a room of stakeholders that many of them are not finance professionals themselves. If we want to be seen as valued business partners we need to make sure we aren't too lost in the land of finance data and lingo, and are leading with insights and analysis that moves the needle in terms of business value and results. Don't want to lose the audience if we're leading with the wrong messaging. Thanks for sharing!
Fractional CFO/Controller | Helping SMEs Drive Financial Success | Training and Developing Future Finance Leaders
2 年Thank you for the article and the insightful podcast, Anders! After listening to you, one message stands out for me. We as finance and accounting professionals need to go beyond numbers and play our role in business decision-making by digging deeper into the reason behind data.
Executive Director, Profitability Analytics Center of Excellence PhD, CPA, CMA, CSCA, FCMA, CAE
2 年I completely agree Anders Liu-Lindberg, we (finance professionals) need start with identifying the needs of our customers and then figure out how to address them. Consistent with that philosophy, the next meeting of PACE's Data Analytics interest group, to be held December 7th, and led by Prashanth H Southekal, PhD, MBA, ICD.D and Edward Roske, will be on the topic of "Transitioning from Data to Decisions for Analytics Success". A frequent case of failure of Data & Analytics projects is not focusing on the last mile of analytics. This is mainly because, most data and analytics programs today are not conducted with the “end in mind” i.e., starting from the end i.e., what insights are needed to achieve decisions and business results and how to get the right data to derive those insights. This presentation will cover practical techniques to move from the traditional data management strategy to decision science strategy so as to improve the odds of Data & Analytics project success and to deliver business results. Interested folks can register for this free session on the PACE LinkedIn page (https://www.dhirubhai.net/company/49152443/). While there, feel free to check out the other great content there and follow the page! Toby Hatch
Fractional CFO for Family-owned Businesses Manufacturing & Retail |Cash Flow Management, Profitability Analysis, Coach | I help increase cash and profits by 10%
2 年It's not about the process, but about the results! Most executives don't have the time for all of those details. Of course context is needed for giving the insights, but not the explanation of how you crunched the numbers. Begin with the end in mind! Thanks foe sharing Anders! ??