A common desire for many businesses regarding their financial admin and activities is to reduce time spent on routine tasks and enable fast access to information – all of which helps productivity and thus the bottom line in the long run.
A key way streamlining of financial activities can be achieved is in systems integration, where a common setup is used. This is usually accomplished through specific software development based on the requirements of a particular business. It’s common for businesses to have various processes and software packages to handle finances in terms of POS (Point of Sale) transactions, invoicing, and payroll – bespoke development of finance related software helps simplify things into one coherent and linked setup.
The problem with multiple software packages and processes
If these different and un-connected software packages and processes don’t ‘play well’ together it can mean lots of duplicated effort, errors, and excess time spent on mundane tasks impairing efficiency and reducing productivity.
- Duplicated effort – using different spreadsheets and data entry methods often means the same information being keyed in multiple times so wasting time and risking errors.
- Mundane task time – pulling off basic reports and statements can take more time than it should.
- Slow reporting – inefficient finance procedures can make it difficult to access key information quickly. Instead of, say, being able to produce a report comparing transactions to a certain month in the previous year … much trawling through old spreadsheets or similar may be required.
- Lack of flexibility – using multiple software packages and procedures may mean you’re missing out on more streamlined and more comprehensive ways of gathering information such as customer purchase data, financial planning for a project: for example, scheduling how much it may cost to engage specialist contractors, pay overtime, purchase materials and so forth.
Integrating your finance process
You can and should consider integrating your finance process to boost efficiency and improve your productivity: a procedure that can be achieved with the help of professional software development experts who can design a bespoke package – or adapt your present set up – to help streamline your financial activities. Your software development partner can create a package that will suit your needs now and into the future as and when your requirements change.
Planning and implementing your integrated finance process
- Your aims – to start with it’s important to know what you wish to achieve and where your existing arrangements are holding you back: this way your software development professional of choice can help you in designing a package ‘from the ground up,’ or adapting your existing set up to help achieve these objectives.
You can expect your software development partner to be very keen to discuss your aims and objectives in detail, so try and have a ‘vision’ of what you want to achieve in mind.
- All new or adapting existing packages – your software developer may advocate designing a new set up ‘from the ground up,’ or integrating and linking your existing databases and software so they can ‘talk’ to each other, so removing duplicated effort and the potential for errors.
- New tech – it may be some while since your existing finance facility was implemented. In the meantime, key tech advances such as Machine Learning, AI (Artificial Intelligence), and Big Data means there’s huge scope for automation, predicting trends, evidence-based decision making, accurate and comprehensive reporting, financial planning, and more is possible with a modern and integrated finance process.
Talk to an experienced software development expert to see what’s possible in your business