The finance team needs to earnestly start thinking about closing the year’s books. Many CFOs will find the task particularly challenging due to a shortage of qualified CPAs and finance professionals. If you haven’t yet considered ways to reduce the workload for your staff in early 2022, it’s time to start exploring creative solutions. Here are some suggested strategies.
Do as Much as Possible in Advance
You don’t necessarily have to prepare all your year-end worksheets after December 31st. You can often reconcile lease accounting and loan amortization tables before year-end on a preliminary basis. Identify accounts that usually need periodic reconciliation and have predictable activity in the final weeks of the year. Lease and loan accounts, fixed assets that were bought or sold, and certain cash accounts with minimal activity might qualify for a preliminary reconciliation. Maintain a list of such accounts and related backup materials to verify balances after closing year-end transactions.
Line up Temporary Help
It’s a busy time for everyone, but it’s valuable to line up temporary resources early. Part-time staff from temp agencies, internships, and recent retirees open to short-term engagements can help. It’s essential to find and schedule them in advance, delegating appropriate tasks. Retirees who left on good terms can provide valuable temporary assistance due to their familiarity with your organization. Offering competitive pay and remote work opportunities can attract them for a month or two in the new year.
It’s Not Too Late to Automate
Many of the most time-consuming tasks in year-end closing involve extensive manual data manipulation in spreadsheets. Excellent software solutions in the market automate these tasks, saving time and reducing errors by eliminating copy/paste and manual entry.
Don’t assume automation requires an expensive, time-consuming software project. With modern cloud-based solutions, a small investment in time and resources can quickly implement automation. Signing up for a limited-scope commitment can enhance the cost/benefit ratio.
For Consolidated Financials, Automate the “Last Mile”
Companies with multiple locations often face the challenge of consolidating data from various entities to create unified financial statements. Finance teams gather and harmonize information from different entities, deal with various currencies, and manage different ERP systems, resulting in a cumbersome process.
The presence of multiple accounting standards like GAAP, IFRS, and country-specific variants complicates this task further.
For organizations utilizing distinct ERP systems across separate companies, merging data into a cohesive view becomes challenging. The central finance team must handle adjustments, eliminations, and currency revaluations, and create financial statements adhering to diverse standards.
Mondial offers an accounting system, that integrates with all group-company ERPs, preserving detailed audit trails and supporting multiple currencies. This facilitates producing compliant financial statements for all jurisdictions. Implementation takes only a few days, significantly reducing year-end closing efforts. Until December 17th, a limited-commitment trial of CRx is available without obligation. Schedule a free, no-obligation demo to learn more.
