BPM Pulse™ Survey Results - Prophixresource.prophix.com/en-whitepapers/WP-Pulse... · BPM Pulse...

A BPM Partners Research Report

BPM PulseTM Survey Results Performance Management Research Study: Spotlight on Financial Consolidation for 2014

April 2014

BPM Pulse Survey Results - Financial Consolidation for 2014 1

© 2014 BPM Partners, Inc. All material contained in this document remains the property of BPM Partners and cannot be published or duplicated without the express written consent of BPM Partners, Inc.

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Table of Contents

Background for the Survey ............................................................................ 3

About BPM Partners ...................................................................................... 3

Survey Methodology ...................................................................................... 3

Demographics ................................................................................................. 5

BPM Spotlight – Financial Consolidation .................................................. 10

Performance Management: A Leading Choice for Consolidation ......... 10

Financial Consolidation by the Numbers .................................................. 12

Multiple General Ledgers ............................................................................ 15

XBRL .............................................................................................................. 18

Consolidation Features ................................................................................ 22

The Month-End Close .................................................................................. 24

The Importance of Consolidation ............................................................... 27

Additional Resources ................................................................................... 28

Complete Series of BPM Pulse Survey Reports ..................................... 28

Vendor Customer Satisfaction Ratings ..................................................... 28

Comprehensive Vendor Information .......................................................... 28


Background for the Survey This independent study by BPM Partners was conducted through an Internet-based survey from January, 2013 through April, 2013. The purpose of the survey was to identify important trends in Business Performance Management (BPM) and perceptions of BPM vendors and service providers. In total, 296 valid responses were received. We then analyzed these results in terms of both the current state of affairs, as well as the implications for BPM in 2014. Our analysis focused on the expected or appropriate next steps for vendors, as well as for purchasers of business performance management systems.

About BPM Partners BPM Partners is the leading independent authority on business performance management (BPM) and related business intelligence solutions. The company helps organizations address their budgeting, planning, financial reporting, regulatory compliance, profitability optimization, key performance indicator (KPI) development, and operational performance challenges with vendor-neutral experts who can guide companies through their BPM initiatives from start to finish while both reducing risk and minimizing costs. BPM Partners has specialized packages that lead clients through project justification, requirements definition, vendor selection and deployment of departmental or enterprise-wide BPM or business intelligence (BI) systems. For further details, go to http://www.bpmpartners.com. Follow BPM Partners on Twitter @BPMTeam.

Survey Methodology Respondents were recruited through various promotions (electronic mail and newsletters) to subscribers of Business Finance Magazine, BPM Magazine, the BI Survey and the B-Eye Network/TechTarget. In addition, BPM Partners maintains a database of more than 14,000 contacts constructed from attendees of BPM Partners Webcasts as well as other industry events. These contacts were invited to participate through email programs and the BPM Partners Website. Financial, administrative, line of business and technical users were included.

This survey was available and open to all. While vendors may have promoted it to their customers, they did not provide an invite list to us which is an approach used by some similar industry surveys. We feel this would skew the results by allowing vendors to cherry-pick their best customers for the customer satisfaction portion of the survey.

http://www.bpmpartners.com/

https://twitter.com/BPMTeam

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All participants were provided a copy of the results for their participation. No funding was accepted in terms of sponsorship of the survey itself from any vendor to avoid any potential bias in the results. Some vendors do fund free distribution of the results to the end user community. Additionally vendors may choose to participate in post-survey analysis of the results, but in these cases all details specific to individual responses are removed.


Demographics When analyzing the BPM Pulse data it is important to keep in mind the background of the respondents.

Company Size Breakout

Source: BPM Partners' 2013 BPM Pulse Survey

The Data: Even though in the survey we called companies with 101-1000 employees Small II, this is really the lower end of the midmarket. If you combine Small II and Medium to create 'the Midmarket', you find that almost two thirds of the respondents, 63%, fall into this category. Similarly, if you combine Large and Enterprise you find that larger companies make up 29% of the responding organizations. These classifications were self-reported by the respondents. We utilized number of employees as the

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measure because revenue classifications become difficult when you include not-for-profits, government agencies, and financial institutions.

Our Analysis: This data is consistent with our field experiences in terms of the size of companies currently pursuing performance management initiatives. In the past few years the number of companies in the middle to higher end of the midmarket pursuing performance management projects has grown significantly.

Location Breakout


The Data: The survey is available globally, but the bulk of the promotion takes place on North American focused websites and blogs. The result is that while there is some


representation outside of North America (most notably Europe), the majority of responses (almost 88%) come from the U.S. and Canada.

Our Analysis: While the survey results have a North American focus, performance management itself is growing around the world. In the past year we have seen renewed interest from companies in the U.K. the Netherlands, and throughout the Middle East.

Industry Breakout


The Data: The bar labeled 'All Other Industries' represents the summation of other industry choices provided in the survey that received less than 3% each. The bar labeled 'Other' was a choice in the survey for those companies that didn't fit into our pre-defined industry list. With the largest industry receiving just 16% of responses, no industry dominates and the survey is truly cross-industry. Note: performance management consulting and software companies were excluded from all survey results. Software and

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services companies included here have a focus outside of performance management and related business intelligence areas.

Our Analysis: Manufacturing, financial services, and healthcare had the largest representation in the survey as they have had for the past several years. In the field we have seen more manufacturing companies than ever moving forward with performance management. Vendors that provide vertical solutions have focused on financial services, and to a lesser extent healthcare. We believe there is an opportunity for vendors, and a potential benefit to customers , if the next area of vertical focus is manufacturing.

Title Breakout



The Data: The largest number of responses came from individuals with titles associated with the Finance department. In addition, more than two thirds of respondents identified themselves as managers or above.

Our Analysis: Most performance management technology surveys today get the bulk of their responses from IT oriented individuals. The exception is surveys that are more focused on the financial processes themselves, not on the desired technology solution. We believe therefore that the BPM Pulse is unique in that we have financial people identifying the technologies they need to meet their business requirements. This is important because in our experience 80-90% of performance management projects are led by the Finance department. Of course the needs and requirements of IT have to be met as well, and the best projects are jointly led by Finance and IT. However, when selecting a new solution, while IT is represented on the overall team, the majority of participants come from Finance.

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BPM Spotlight – Financial Consolidation Performance Management: A Leading Choice for Consolidation


The Data: Almost 35% of respondents are now using a performance management application for financial consolidation. The next largest group, at just about 27.5%, is still using their ERP to perform consolidations. Spreadsheets follow at almost 19%. The other category contained answers ranging from 'we don't need to consolidate' to names of specific unified performance management solutions that don't have a separate consolidation module.

Our Analysis: Performance management is the top choice here, and would probably be an even greater percentage if some of the responses in the 'other' category were


properly categorized. Be that as it may, the majority of users are still using something other than performance management to consolidate. An ERP system could be adequate if there are no complexities and all business units around the world use the same ERP. While it is typically more difficult to perform a consolidation (or most other tasks)in an ERP system when compared to a more user-friendly performance management system, the number of people involved in the task is usually small. Spreadsheets can also probably handle the load when you are consolidating a handful of domestic units with limited intercompany activity. When you need journal entries, automatic intercompany matching and eliminations, currency conversion, minority ownership, or have multiple general ledgers, it is hard to beat a performance management financial consolidation solution. Be aware though that not all consolidation systems are created equal. Some are extremely powerful and can handle the most complex statutory reporting requirements and often come bundled with disclosure management tools. On the other end are systems that do a good job of simply 'adding things up'.

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Financial Consolidation by the Numbers How large and complex is the typical consolidation system in terms of number of cost centers being consolidated as well as the number of currencies?


The Data: Just about 57% of respondents consolidate 25 or fewer entities. About 18% are in the 26-100 range. Summing up the remaining choices results in about 25% of companies having over 100 entities.

Our Analysis: The number of entities has a significant impact on the performance of the consolidation system. Also keep in mind that in addition to the base units there could be a sizeable number of consolidated entities created during the process. If currency conversion is involved there might be a local currency base entity and consolidation created translated entity for each foreign unit. There may be 'ghost' entities to hold


adjustments and a consolidated post adjustment entity that combines the base entity data and the adjustments for each entity requiring adjustments. Of course there are also the standard consolidated entities that are created to hold the roll-ups of base units in particular geographies, or product lines, or management structures. There could be alternate hierarchies (legal/management for example) that have yet another set of consolidated results. The point is, the number of entities in the system can grow rather quickly. When the numbers get fairly large and there is a lot of intercompany activity you will want one of the higher end consolidation solutions, especially if all of this is coupled with a chart of accounts with thousands of line items.

Now let's take a look at currencies, another element that could add complexity.


The Data: Almost 85% of respondents utilize 10 or fewer currencies. The next largest group, 9%, is in the 11-30 to range.

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Our Analysis: This is an area that has certainly changed over time. In the early days of performance management many global organizations had a significant number of currencies to deal with coupled with alternate conversion methodologies to address hyper-inflationary countries. Thanks to the euro and other changes this is a much simpler area to address today. However, some challenges still remain. One issue is getting the latest exchange rates. Some vendors have streamlined this process by partnering with data providers and creating direct links to the currency data tables in their products. Also, you should be aware that some vendors treat currency conversion as just another calculation and use their logic rules to apply the rates. This approach is not as intuitive as dedicated currency conversion functionality. Another challenge is automatic calculation of currency gains and losses. One final challenge to consider - looking at base level data at currency rates that are different than what they were at the time of data entry or data loading. For example, looking at actuals at budget rates. Some of this can be handled at report time, but higher end systems address these challenges as part of the consolidation process.


Multiple General Ledgers One of the key benefits of a performance management consolidation system is the ability to roll-up data from disparate ledgers into a consistent and unified final product. We wanted to know how prevalent the need for this is.


The Data: The response to this question is almost split right down the middle. 49.2% need to consolidate data from 2 or more general ledgers, while 50.8% do not.

Our Analysis: This is one of the fundamental reasons companies seek out a consolidation system in the first place (as opposed to using a spreadsheet or their ERP system). From this data it seems that about half the organizations have this need. This makes sense to us and is one of the reasons that consolidation isn't as high on the list of requested capabilities as budgeting or reporting, which almost every company has a need for.

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Next we looked at chart of accounts standardization. It seems that if a company is running multiple ledgers it would be likely that they would also have multiple charts.


The Data: This question was only asked of those who indicated they had multiple general ledgers. Slightly more than half, 52.6%, stated that they do not have a single standardized chart of accounts across their multiple ledgers. The remainder say that they do.

Our Analysis: Multiple charts of accounts creates an added layer of complexity. Accessing and retrieving data from multiple source systems and then rolling it up is a complicated task in and of itself. Having to additionally determine where a line item from ledger system A fits in to the master chart of accounts and doing the same for ledger systems B, C, D, etc. is a significant undertaking. This is why customers with multiple


ledgers still attempt to synchronize or 'harmonize' their charts of accounts prior to bringing in a new system to automate the consolidation process itself. Even with a single chart of accounts there is still some data mapping that needs to take place because the performance management system doesn't usually maintain data at the same level of detail as the source transactional systems (nor should it). That challenge is multiplied with multiple systems with their own charts of accounts. Of course each of these source system charts may be updated over time and there is the risk of data being lost if the mapping tables aren't updated accordingly. Some of the larger vendors do offer master data management (MDM) tools to aid in this synchronization process.

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XBRL Many vendors have been adding XBRL (extensible business reporting language) tagging capabilities to their consolidation, reporting, and disclosure management offerings. We wondered how interested performance management customers really were in this feature.


The Data: Only 17.6% of the respondents provide XBRL filings.

Our Analysis: The small number of companies in this survey providing XBRL filings to the SEC could be a function of the survey demographics, or the role of the respondent. Obviously private companies are not providing this information to the SEC. It is likely that many of the midmarket organization in this survey are privately held. In addition, the survey respondents who may be very familiar with consolidation and financial reporting


for management purposes may not be part of the SEC reporting process. Whatever the reason, the small number reported here would lead to a similarly low level of interest in this feature from the survey respondents.

Of those that do provide XBRL filings we wanted to know how they accomplished this task.


The Data: This question was asked of those companies that are currently providing XBRL filings. Of that subset of respondents, the largest group (41.9%) is utilizing specialized XBRL reporting tools. The next largest group at 38.7% is using a service provider to do the job for them. Only 9.7% are doing it in their performance management system.

Our Analysis: What was already a low level of interest in XBRL has been reduced even further for the performance management vendors. Only 9.7% of the 17.6% that required

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XBRL in the first place are looking to their performance management vendor to supply this capability. This is consistent with our vendor selection field work at BPM Partners. Very few of our customers, even the larger organizations, have XBRL capabilities high in their performance management requirements list (if it's even there at all). Our advice to the vendors is to partner with a third party provider of software or services that can work smoothly with their products and offer this to their customers. It is not an area where they should invest their own development resources.

As a last chance opportunity for performance management XBRL capabilities we wanted to know how happy the respondents were with this current third-party approach. If satisfaction levels were low, perhaps there would be interest in alternatives.



The Data: The response was overwhelming with just over 87% stating that they are satisfied with their current approach to XBRL reporting.

Our Analysis: Well, the results are in. Let's summarize - most companies in this survey group do not require XBRL reporting. By the way, the demographic make-up of this group does closely mirror where we are seeing the greatest performance management demand in the marketplace - the high end of the midmarket. Secondly, those that require XBRL are for the most part utilizing third-party tools and services. Lastly, they are happy with their current approach. The opportunity here for performance management vendors is therefore slim. Now, for certain large deals it may be a key checklist item, so vendors should have a plan that involves a partner offering, the more integrated the better.

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Consolidation Features What capabilities are most important to performance management consolidation customers and prospects?.


Data: Respondents were asked to rate a list of capabilities on a 1 to 5 scale, with 5 being the most important and 1 being the least important. This graph displays responses averaging a 3 or better. The top rated capability was the generation of audit trails, with an average rating of just over 4. The ability to make adjustments and create journal entries was close behind at 3.97. Rounding out the Top 5 is support for alternate roll-ups at 3.87, having consolidation and reporting as part of the same system as budgeting and forecasting at 3.82, and creation of automatic intercompany eliminations 3.69.


Our Analysis: None of these ratings are too surprising. This is a very accounting oriented capability and the need for a detailed audit trail as well as the ability to make journal entries makes sense. Alternate roll-ups are also a common requirement we see in our field work. Most companies have a legal roll-up and then one or more management roll-ups by geography, by product, or by executive. There are also alternate roll-ups created to model anticipated reorganizations, as well as planned acquisitions and dispositions. The next item on the list, automatic intercompany eliminations rises in importance based on the amount of intercompany activity an organization has. Some companies have very little, but others have a large, complex, matrix of intercompany data to sort through. It should be noted that there are different degrees of consolidation capabilities offered by the various vendors. There are a handful that have extremely robust capabilities and can handle almost anything you throw at them. The majority of vendors that offer consolidation though use an 80% rule - they have developed a solution that meets the needs of about 80% of the market while keeping their solution simpler and more cost effective than the more powerful consolidation providers. It comes down as usual to fully understanding your own requirements to make sure you don't end up with more (or less) than you actually need in this area.

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The Month-End Close One of the main reasons people purchased consolidation systems, even before it was part of performance management, was to shorten the month-end closing cycle. We wanted to understand how long companies today are taking to close the books.


The Data: Approximately one week was the most popular response with 37.4% of respondents. It was closely followed by two weeks with 32.6% of responses. A little over 18% are closing their books in a matter of days, while just under 7% are taking three weeks.

Our Analysis: These numbers are fairly impressive with just about 56% closing their books in a week or less. That still leaves 44% taking two weeks or longer, and you have to


feel sorry for the small subset of that group that are taking three weeks. That doesn't seem to leave much time for analysis of the results before the next cycle begins. It would seem those taking two or more weeks would be good candidates for a consolidation system to streamline the process (assuming they don't already have one). The problem that we find though is that the team is always too busy closing the books to step outside and evaluate alternatives to improve the process.

Which brings us to the next logical question, what systems are being used by those taking the longest as well as those closing the books in the shortest amount of time?


The Data: This crosstab revisited the question of how long the month-end close took and tied it to the earlier question regarding what system was being used for consolidation. What this graph shows is that the largest percentage of performance management system users (just over 45%) are closing their books in one week. The

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largest grouping of ERP users is at two weeks (just over 41%). The largest group of spreadsheet users is also at two weeks (just over 30%).

Our Analysis: As we would have expected, the largest group of performance management consolidation system users are closing their books in about a week. This is a week less than the largest groupings of ERP or spreadsheet users. To be fair, it should be noted that the next largest groupings of spreadsheet users are at one week and a few days. To us this is indicative of a more simplistic consolidation with fewer entities, and limited currency and intercompany issues. For those companies a spreadsheet may in fact be adequate. For everyone else though it is clear that there is a high probability that a good consolidation system can shave a week off of the month-end closing cycle.


The Importance of Consolidation Where does financial consolidation fit as a priority when looking at performance management systems?


The Data: More than half the respondents, 52.1%, view consolidation as an essential element of performance management. 32.4% see the value although it is not mission critical for them, and 15.4% are not interested.

Our Analysis: The number of companies identifying consolidation as being essential surprised us somewhat. As the data in this survey has indicated the value of consolidation increases with organizational size and complexity. Based on the profile of the respondents we would have guessed a lower number here. Only a small fraction (probably the smallest companies) didn't see the value at all. The net of it all is that over 84% have some interest in performance management financial consolidation which explains why more and more vendors are adding this functionality every day.

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Additional Resources Complete Series of BPM Pulse Survey Reports This year the BPM Pulse Survey was organized into five sections:

- Core Trends

- Spotlight on Budgeting and Forecasting

- Spotlight on Reporting and Analytics

- Spotlight on Financial Consolidation

- Spotlight on The Cloud and Mobile

Each of these survey sections will be available as an individual whitepaper at:

http://www.bpmpartners.com/bpmcentral_whitepapers.shtml

Vendor Customer Satisfaction Ratings The customer satisfaction ratings collected as part of the BPM Pulse are included in BPM Partners' Vendor Landscape Matrix report. In this report each vendor is placed on a 3x3 matrix based on the scope of their offerings and momentum in the marketplace. Information is provided highlighting each vendor's unique elements and/or recent developments along with 10 checkboxes identifying which specific performance management capabilities they offer. For most vendors this document includes customer satisfaction ratings for 12 attributes including product functionality, quality, performance (speed), price/value, and support. Also includes Best Fit suggestions for each vendor. To purchase this report or to learn more:

http://www.bpmpartners.com/bpmcentral_thebpmreport.shtml.

Comprehensive Vendor Information All you need to know, all in one place. BPM Partners' PerformancePlace brings together unbiased analyst reports, articles, news, whitepapers, and blogs grouped by vendor. To start your vendor research visit PerformancePlace today:

http://www.bpmpartners.com/PerformancePlaceStart.shtml

http://www.bpmpartners.com/bpmcentral_whitepapers.shtml

http://www.bpmpartners.com/bpmcentral_thebpmreport.shtml

http://www.bpmpartners.com/PerformancePlaceStart.shtml

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