Global Finance Industry Director
Ever feel like managing the finances in your business is a thankless, close to impossible task? Hamish is the Industry Director for Global Finance at IFS, the global enterprise applications company. At IFS Hamish is responsible for advocating best-practice finance solutions that are both effective and achievable for our current and our future customers. In particular Hamish focuses on helping organizations manage the challenges of global business (currency management, consolidation and taxes are just the beginning). These activities have seen him run out of fingers to count the number of countries he has implemented enterprise solutions in. Having lived and worked in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, Hamish has seen a huge variety of business approaches and ideas. This experience has seen him develop a piercing knowledge of how to help your business succeed. Outside of work you are unlikely to see him near a golf course as he probably has a handicap off the chart. However speeding down a mountain on a pair of skis is a different story.
The concept of shared service centers has been around for a number of years now. But now that they are common, what is the next step to driving out cost from your business? In my post on how to make shared services work for you, I commented that most organizations that are considering shared services…
Do you know where every number in your financial reports comes from? One of the underlying requirements of finance is to put controls around the transaction to report processes. This is often referred to as R2R or Record-to-Report. There are all sorts of qualitative measures we can put around reporting (accessible, timely and accurate just…
The short answer is – you hope you have some idea! So how are you driving out your corporate risk? No one wants to be in the spotlight like Tesco was last week, announcing that they had overstated profits by £250 million. Without having good risk and governance tools in place, this type of problem…
The tailoring of a product to local requirements, by a global (or at least globally aspiring) organization. Glocalization is the tailoring of a product to local requirements, by a global (or at least globally aspiring) organization. Everyone prefers something that has been made especially for you, rather than a copy of what someone else already…
We’ve all heard the mantra of ‘reduce cost by using shared services.’ The real question, though, is what activities are worth moving and what should you expect to gain? Most organizations that are considering shared services look at administrative functions to start with. Areas like Accounts Payable, Treasury or even the entire Finance function. The…
The problem with strategy is that none of us can predict the future. We all have aims and objectives for our businesses, but how do we translate those into long-term strategic objectives that we can reach? A common reason for changing business solutions is that the business has outgrown its existing solution and its strategic…
Transfer pricing and tax planning have been in the media a lot lately as details emerge of how companies like Amazon, Google, Vodaphone and GlaxoSmithKline proactively limit their tax liabilities by shifting revenue and expenditures across international boundaries. We are told that every organization that can, is managing where their profits are deemed taxable. Repeatedly,…
The concept of planning is central to business. Everything from production runs to capital construction projects to customer acquisition campaigns have plans associated with them. A budget is, simply put, a financial plan. So just like other areas, a budget is there to help us run the business more easily and efficiently by making important…
Finance executives are feeling tremendous pressure to drive down business costs while maintaining an acceptable level of quality and performance. In order to meet this challenge, finance leaders need three things. Access to accurate business data Tools to translate this data into actionable insights The authority to drive change The last point, authority to drive…
Finance executives all over the world tear their hair out at month’s end. Here are a few pieces of advice from an IFS expert on how proactive thinking and ERP software can take the angst out of closing out the month.
