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THE NEED FOR SPEED, PREDICTABILITY

Performing the monthly financial close process quickly is needed to enable Accenture business leaders to report quarterly earnings results to analysts and the public on a predictable and timely basis. In its early years, Accenture faced challenges in optimizing the financial close process, with more than 200 different finance applications across 47 countries, managed by 40 local controllership teams. Additionally, excessive demands on support teams for availability of reporting led to employee engagement issues. Accenture recognized it needed a faster and more reliable financial close capability.

PEOPLE, PROCESSES AND TECHNOLOGY

Moving to a single global instance of SAP for its internal business functions set the stage for Accenture to establish a single financial close process, a journey that began from the ground up. A collaborative team from the business and Accenture’s internal IT organization embarked on the journey to rethink the key components of the organization and people, processes and technology:

ACHIEVING WORLD-CLASS CLOSE

The strong foundation the financial close team has laid around organization, processes and technology enables it to be proactive and perform the close process faster and more predictably than in the past.

Today, Accenture is able to close its books in four days at the local level, in five days globally, and in six days to deliver final management reporting—what business leaders consider world class.

Benefits generated

FAST BUSINESS DECISION MAKING

FAST BUSINESS
DECISION MAKING


OPTIMIZED TECHNOLOGY

OPTIMIZED
TECHNOLOGY


APPROPRIATE STAFFING

APPROPRIATE
STAFFING


SPEED IN CLOSING THE BOOKS

SPEED IN CLOSING
THE BOOKS


HIGHER LEVELS OF PREDICTABILITY

HIGHER LEVELS OF
PREDICTABILITY


FLEXIBILITY

FLEXIBILITY


SCALABILITY

SCALABILITY


CRITICAL CLOSE ISSUES DROPPED 75%+ OVER 10 YEARS

CRITICAL CLOSE
ISSUES DROPPED
75%+ OVER 10 YEARS




 

 

 

As Accenture has grown it continues to do more in shorter time frames—doing things better, faster and cost effectively. But the journey is an ongoing one. Accenture continues to focus on performance tuning, data archiving, infrastructure upgrades and other ways in which to further enhance its close capabilities as it rethinks ways to lead in the New.




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