Finance strategy consulting: breaking the cycle
The stakes are high for a finance function. Getting things wrong can have serious finance, reputational and legal consequences – both for the organisation and for individual directors and board members.
The finance function can be a hub for systems and data complexity, with each passing year creating a growing legacy of unnecessary complication at the heart of your operation. An evolving corporate regulatory environment also introduces a steady flow of new and non-negotiable requirements that must be accommodated alongside changing needs from within the business.
As a result, the finance function often adopts a defensive and risk-centric approach – doing the basics well and staying in its lane. While this is necessary and valuable, it restricts the function’s ability to enable growth.
Berkeley can help you develop a finance strategy and operating model that breaks this cycle and gives your organisation the necessary capabilities and commercial credibility.
The Berkeley Partnership consultants remained focused but definitely moulded themselves to be part of the team - this was a real positive.”
Head of Analysis & Insight, a financial services organisation
The right finance operating model
Our consultants can help you assess what your finance function should look like, in terms of your organisation and capabilities, systems and data, and relationships with other areas of the business. We can help you make the right choices, balancing your corporate and fiduciary accountabilities with commercial opportunity.
Finance strategy consulting that offers choices
Our approach to developing your finance strategy and operating model will give you a clear, transparent set of options on how to achieve the outcomes you want. We understand your needs and look to carefully balance risk, cost, pace and business priority.
Finance strategy consulting: your future capabilities
Partnering with Berkeley will give you a clear view on the new and additional capabilities required to support the next chapter of the finance story. This is likely to include skills and disciplines in change leadership, commerciality and technology that may not exist within the function today.
More than just finance consultants
Berkeley has deep finance consulting knowledge but we are so much more than just finance consultants. As transformation experts who specialise in helping organisations under the most complex, challenging and high-stakes circumstances, we can advise you on change in the context of your broader operation and organisation. We bring you a fresh perspective, creativity and constructive challenge to solve real life problems.
Our approach of bringing small, experienced teams means we act as trusted partners to your leadership team, with hands-on partner involvement in every project. Our clients tend to embed our highly experienced consultants in selected strategic roles within their organisation, where we make a real difference and transform their ambitions into results.
Finance has a natural position at the heart of a business. It can be a valuable commercial partner and enabler of growth, but operational complexity and an evolving compliance agenda often hinder its true potential. Berkeley can help you clarify your finance strategy and target operating model, the options on how to get there, and the new skills and capabilities that you will need.”
Jonathan Kennedy, Partner
Clients often ask us…
Question 1
We spend 80% of our time looking backwards and managing risk. How can the finance function become a better commercial partner to the business?
Question 2
How can we leverage new and emerging technologies to make us a more efficient and effective function? How do we adopt automation, and data analytics and visualisation?
Question 3
I don’t want an expensive, multi-year, high-risk ERP journey but how can we address our complex legacy systems and data environment?
Question 4
What finance skills and capabilities do we need for the future and how can we attract and develop the right people?
Question 5
What do we need to do about changes in the UK regulations around controls (UK SOX / Brydon)?
Question 6
How do we integrate our finance functions after acquisition and avoid duplication of work?
Question 7
How do I convince the business unit leaders on the benefits of centralisation and standardisation?
Question 8
We are part way through a finance transformation programme but are struggling and don’t know what to do – how do we ensure the programme is still aligned to what the business needs?
Client stories
Dow Jones
Global financial information and news publisher, Dow Jones, recognised it needed a step-change in its global finance function. Technology had moved on and if the company didn’t adapt its systems and processes, it would face growing inefficiencies and lowered productivity, which would ultimately impact market competitiveness and the bottom line.
Dow Jones chose Berkeley for our experience in finance transformation, programme delivery, and leadership of large-scale enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementations – expertise that would complement in-house capabilities. Our London team led the initial assessment and immediate follow-on activity, before the work moved to our New York office. From there, our US team led the program through mobilisation, implementation, and post go-live support.
Unilever - financial reporting
Unilever wanted to redefine its approach to management reporting, extending existing SAP tools to deliver a simpler and faster European financial close and management reporting timetable. We helped them evaluate their options, define plans and create the business case to secure funding for the project and then took over mobilisation and management of the 50-strong global vendor/client team which would deliver it.
Unilever - managing project turnaround
One of the world’s leading fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies, selling its products in over 190 countries. The Unilever of today has been created over many years of mergers and acquisitions. While these have enabled the group to grow, they have brought with them complications, not least for the group’s IT function.
The function's response has been to try to simplify its IT infrastructure. One important objective has been to transition to a single global SAP financial and management reporting platform, named Victory. We helped them achieve this goal, by reviewing the project underway to deliver Victory, before supporting a project turnaround and ultimately project managing it through to a successful delivery.
Global real estate services company
We worked with one of the world’s largest, US-based global real estate services companies to develop a strategic roadmap of Finance projects.
This work was commissioned by the Global Executive Board, who sought to enable prioritisation of investment decisions, ensure strategic allocation of capital, and improve financial forecasting. Over 50 projects were identified and assessed as part of the final roadmap, with a total budget of ~ $95M. We designed the process and tools for building the roadmap, detailed the next steps required following our engagement, and outlined the approach to subsequently implement a strategic portfolio management capability in order to deliver the roadmap.
Multinational mining company
We led the Finance transformation programme for a top multinational mining company, with the goal of transforming the Finance organisation into best-in-class amongst industry peers, operating as a true strategic partner to the business.
The programme involved target operating model development; performance management strategy; organisation design; standardisation of governance, processes and controls; global business services design and implementation; and the associated technology enablement and change management.
Global consumer goods organisation
We helped a global consumer goods organisation deliver a significant Finance transformation across over 100 countries.
This involved both implementing a new suite of SAP systems for financial consolidation and all group management and financial reporting, and also streamlining their financial reporting by consolidating the group financial results directly from the source ledgers in each of their 600+ Legal Entities around the world.
Leading global media conglomerate
We helped a leading global media conglomerate understand if - and how - they should bring together a finance shared service and a single finance IT platform across their three key publishing business units in the UK, USA and Australia.
This Finance Platforms and Shared Services Assessment defined the future landscape and the business case for such a transformation allowing the CFOs and CTOs of each business, and at group level, make an informed decision about how to move forward.
News and business information firm
We helped a New York-based news and business information business define and mobilise their Finance Transformation.
We worked with them to define a clear and aligned view of the Current State of their finance process and systems landscape (including all pain points and opportunities), a Target Future State, and a business case and roadmap to move between the two. We then went on to help them mobilise the programme to deliver this change.
Their professionalism was top notch … I've gone through a number of these types of projects in my career and this one superseded all. High calibre people with the experience and intelligence to get to the crux of the issue.”
VP Finance Operations
Client stories
Global financial information and news publisher, Dow Jones, recognised it needed a step-change in its global finance function. Technology had moved on and if the company didn’t adapt its systems and processes, it would face growing inefficiencies and lowered productivity, which would ultimately impact market competitiveness and the bottom line.
Dow Jones chose Berkeley for our experience in finance transformation, programme delivery, and leadership of large-scale enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementations – expertise that would complement in-house capabilities. Our London team led the initial assessment and immediate follow-on activity, before the work moved to our New York office. From there, our US team led the program through mobilisation, implementation, and post go-live support.
Unilever wanted to redefine its approach to management reporting, extending existing SAP tools to deliver a simpler and faster European financial close and management reporting timetable. We helped them evaluate their options, define plans and create the business case to secure funding for the project and then took over mobilisation and management of the 50-strong global vendor/client team which would deliver it.
One of the world’s leading fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies, selling its products in over 190 countries. The Unilever of today has been created over many years of mergers and acquisitions. While these have enabled the group to grow, they have brought with them complications, not least for the group’s IT function.
The function's response has been to try to simplify its IT infrastructure. One important objective has been to transition to a single global SAP financial and management reporting platform, named Victory. We helped them achieve this goal, by reviewing the project underway to deliver Victory, before supporting a project turnaround and ultimately project managing it through to a successful delivery.
We worked with one of the world’s largest, US-based global real estate services companies to develop a strategic roadmap of Finance projects.
This work was commissioned by the Global Executive Board, who sought to enable prioritisation of investment decisions, ensure strategic allocation of capital, and improve financial forecasting. Over 50 projects were identified and assessed as part of the final roadmap, with a total budget of ~ $95M. We designed the process and tools for building the roadmap, detailed the next steps required following our engagement, and outlined the approach to subsequently implement a strategic portfolio management capability in order to deliver the roadmap.
We led the Finance transformation programme for a top multinational mining company, with the goal of transforming the Finance organisation into best-in-class amongst industry peers, operating as a true strategic partner to the business.
The programme involved target operating model development; performance management strategy; organisation design; standardisation of governance, processes and controls; global business services design and implementation; and the associated technology enablement and change management.
Service
Finance strategy and operating model
Service
Target operating model design
We helped a global consumer goods organisation deliver a significant Finance transformation across over 100 countries.
This involved both implementing a new suite of SAP systems for financial consolidation and all group management and financial reporting, and also streamlining their financial reporting by consolidating the group financial results directly from the source ledgers in each of their 600+ Legal Entities around the world.
Service
Finance transformation
Sector
Consumer goods
We helped a leading global media conglomerate understand if - and how - they should bring together a finance shared service and a single finance IT platform across their three key publishing business units in the UK, USA and Australia.
This Finance Platforms and Shared Services Assessment defined the future landscape and the business case for such a transformation allowing the CFOs and CTOs of each business, and at group level, make an informed decision about how to move forward.
We helped a New York-based news and business information business define and mobilise their Finance Transformation.
We worked with them to define a clear and aligned view of the Current State of their finance process and systems landscape (including all pain points and opportunities), a Target Future State, and a business case and roadmap to move between the two. We then went on to help them mobilise the programme to deliver this change.
Their professionalism was top notch … I've gone through a number of these types of projects in my career and this one superseded all. High calibre people with the experience and intelligence to get to the crux of the issue.””
VP Finance Operations
Related Services
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