In the not-for-profit sector, we often hear “do more with less”. But how?
At QMetrix we hosted a webinar for not-for-profit finance leaders, discussing challenges and opportunities in the Financial Planning and Analysis (FP&A) space. Watch the webinar here or read below for a summary.
Key themes and challenges for not-for-profits
In a 2023 Notprofit Standards Benchmarking Survey, BDO found that NFPs have typically been laggards in technology adoption, but this is changing. While historically deterred by high upfront costs, they are starting to realise the need for digital transformation – workforce shortages are causing by stress and burnout, waiting lists for services are growing, and the lack of adequate technology can be an obstacle to reporting program impact. These all contribute to NFPs seeing a need for technology and increasing their spend on it.
How does this apply to the office of finance? In our experience working with many NFPs, we see a need for agile financial planning. While the costs can sometimes seem high upfront, the return on investment and impact it brings to the mission makes it worth it. Listen to this in the video at 04:17.
Priorities for modernising the FP&A process
During the webinar, we polled attendees, asking “What are the priorities for modernising your FP&A process?” The top answer was to get better visibility of key metrics via dashboards and reports, alongside moving away from manual Excel spreadsheets (67%).This was followed by having or doing better rolling forecasts (57%) and what-if scenario planning (52%).
Clearly, reporting is a big part of finance teams in NFPs, and so is wanting to move away from traditional Excel-based planning methods which are proving insufficient, creating inefficiencies and limiting strategic decision-making.
To change this, finance teams can adopt modern FP&A tools which can improve collaboration, enhance reporting accuracy, allow real-time visibility into financial metrics and more.
FP&A tool highlights – featuring Workday Adaptive Planning
We showcased an example of this in Workday Adaptive Planning, a leading FP&A tool used by over 7,000 organisations globally. Here are the key highlights covered:
- Cloud-cased and SaaS: Accessible via a web browser and with seamless Microsoft Office integration.
- Dashboards and reports: Real-time insights, interactive charts, and drill-down analysis.
- Role-based access: Users see only relevant data with audit tracking.
- Flexible planning: Sheets replace Excel, with interconnected data and version control.
- Driver-based forecasting: Budgeting based on actuals, assumptions, and key drivers.
- Personnel and cost allocation: Plan staffing costs and distribute shared expenses.
- Automated calculations: Currency conversion and system-wide updates happen instantly.
- Self-service: Business users can self-serve and generate reports.
- System agnostic: Integrates with multiple systems including ERP, CRM, payroll, and HR.
To view these features, watch the video at 18:43. The demo provides an overview of features; if you would like a more detailed demonstration of how this works specifically for NFPs and the pre-built templates QMetrix has built, please let us know.
Making it real: Not-for-profit finance stories from Beyond Blue and CareFlight
We had two finance leaders from the NFP sector join us to share about their challenges and stories of digital transformation – Joanne Papworth, Head of Finance and Commercial at Beyond Blue, and Al Beyan, FP&A Manager at CareFlight, both of whom QMetrix worked with to implement Workday Adaptive Planning (watch at 36:13).
Some of the key challenges Beyond Blue face are volatile revenue and increasing costs. This has meant needing to constantly adjust their business structure to meet the needs of their community in a sustained and responsible way. To do this, they need constant confidence in their numbers.
While they had a great process, they couldn’t get past some of the limitations of Excel. They decided to invest in Workday Adaptive Planning and now, it’s easier for the business to budget and forecast, and the days spent on reporting are less – with better outcomes.
It has been 18 months since implementation, and Joanne says they are still talking about its benefits and exploring ways to further utilise other features in Workday Adaptive Planning. For more detail, read Beyond Blue’s case study here.
For CareFlight, Al highlighted challenging changes such as the time after COVID-19 where surges in the aviation industry led to increasing costs of procuring aircraft parts. To tackle these challenges and as the organisation grew, CareFlight needed to gather data from multiple sources and provide insights to help with informed decision-making.
They embarked on an organisation-wide digital transformation, of which one part was to upgrade their FP&A system to Workday Adaptive Planning. This has led to financial planning becoming faster and more agile than when they were using Excel as their primary tool. Al also spoke about the importance of communicating and collaborating with the business to get buy-in for new systems.
The future of finance: Leveraging modern FP&A tools
Not-for-profits are a vitally important part of the economy and society. As organisations that work to maximise their social impact with limited budgets, “back office” activities must be lean and efficient. Furthermore, in a challenging environment, finance leaders must explore ways to make every dollar count towards their mission and serve their communities well.
At QMetrix, we’ve worked with many not-for-profits including Save the Children, cohealth, Vision Australia, AnglicareSA and Micah Projects over the past decade. Looking to modernise your FP&A processes and tools? Learn how we can help NFPs with FP&A solutions here, or contact us to discuss.
