Why the “Great in…” program continues to deliver

TomTom’s CFO team launched the “Great in…” program almost five years ago. In that time, it has inspired some valuable improvements that have strengthened the team, made it a better partner to the business and improved operational efficiency across the organization.

Given the forthcoming anniversary, it is a good time to revisit the goals of the program and take time to understand why it continues to be relevant across Finance, Enterprise IT, Real Estate, Facilities and Legal.

“Great in…” has a straightforward objective: to deliver continuous improvement. We believe the best way to do this is to give employees autonomy so that they feel empowered to identify ways we can work better, and can then execute their ideas.

The program acts as an umbrella for numerous activities that put this concept into action. So that we can more easily measure these activities and the benefits they deliver, we group them into three pillars: people, process and technology.

Pillar 1: People – TomTom’s greatest asset

To ensure the CFO team has the right people to enable it to deliver on its objectives, we consider every aspect of our employees’ careers and wellbeing. We run a thorough recruitment process that identifies people committed to lifelong self-development. Then, when we hire Finance Graduates, we immerse them in our products, so they absorb the TomTom ethos.

Our culture – based on strong values of transparency, celebrating achievement and inclusivity – is so important that we seek to hire from within for senior positions whenever possible. To make sure we have the talent we need, we invest in job rotation, shadowing, and mentoring so that employees can realize their potential.

Training is especially important: each year more than 40% of finance employees take advantage of opportunities to improve their skills through our Finance Academy.

Pillar 2: Process – Eliminate, Simplify and Standardize

We are always reviewing our processes to look for ways to optimize them, by shortening cycles, reducing errors and manual intervention, and cutting costs.

We review our processes objectively and learn from our mistakes. Over time, incremental changes can deliver big improvements. The time taken to publish our quarterly financial results continues to fall as a result of multiple efforts to create transparency and improve communication, for instance. We have also strengthened our internal control environment by setting up a process repository that documents all processes and centralized oversight of fraud policy.

Pillar 3: Technology – Facilitating best-in-class processes

Technology is an enabler that helps us to achieve our objectives of cost effectiveness and creating more fulfilling roles for our employees through automation of mundane tasks. For example, we now have 150 robotic scripts running across Finance, HR and Enterprise IT, improving efficiency and freeing up employees’ time for value-added tasks.

We take a methodical approach to new technology, identifying opportunities, looking at existing and emerging options, and making a reasoned judgement based on data. For example, by applying these principles to our purchase-to-pay process recently, we now have a simple, standardized, automated and integrated solution that provides a radically improved user experience.

Getting better all the time

The “Great in…” program has achieved much in its first five years. But there is more to do. We believe we can always do better. By focusing on our people, processes and applying technology astutely, the program has helped to evolve the CFO team’s mindset and given us a valuable framework to continually improve how we work.