36. How CFOs can use new finance automation tech to their advantage - with Jack McCullough and Hannah Munro

36. How CFOs can use new finance automation tech to their advantage - with Jack McCullough & Hannah Munro

Jack McCullough: 0:50 

 Hello, everybody and greetings from Boston, Massachusetts. As you probably figured out, this is not Hannah Munro. I'm Jack McCullough, and I've actually been a guest on this podcast three different times. Hannah's had me on the hot seat. So, I just thought this would be a good opportunity to turn the tables a little bit. And as it turns out, Hannah actually has some interesting ideas on technology, the direction it's heading and the optimal use for it. So, Hannah is the guest today. That's right. She is a guest on her own podcast, CFO 4.0, The Future of Finance. And Hannah is the MD of ITAS. Hannah, welcome to your own podcast. 

Hannah Munro: 1:31 

Well, thank you so, much for having me, Jack. It's great to be on the show, to be fair. 

Jack McCullough: 1:36 

Yeah, darn generous of me to have you as a guest on your own show, isn't it today? 

Hannah Munro: 1:41 

Absolutely. And it's very, very weird already being on the other side of the microphone, as it were. 

Jack McCullough: 1:48 

There you go. So, anyway, you know, I know it's one of those odd things, like you always make your guests the star of the show, and that's great. But, you know, perhaps your guests don't know a whole lot about your own background and whatnot. And so, I looked you up on LinkedIn, and, you know, one thing that jumped out at me is you were at the Bourne Grammar School, and you studied math, physics, chemistry, and bio in grammar school. Okay, I... I studied reading and baseball, I think, or something like that. I know you've had a technology career, but were you perhaps a little bit of a nerd as a child or as a teenager, Hannah? 

Hannah Munro: 2:29 

Oh, absolutely. I was that geeky kid on the playground that was either reading a book or playing, you know, doing, before this whole technology business, we used to have like maths books with exercises. I was that geeky kid that would spend time just doing that for fun. So, I've always been a definite nerd, as you would say, Jack. 

Jack McCullough: 2:50 

Oh, nerd's not a UK thing. It's only an American thing. I thought it was global. So, it's interesting because having done this three times with you and even spoken to you off of it, I just didn't sense that about you at all. But interesting that you came. And you've been at ITAS now for over a decade. 

Hannah Munro: 3:09 

Yeah. So, that's, do you know what, that always, like I say that, and I go, oh my gosh, isn't, decades sounds so, much longer than 10 years, doesn't it? I don't know what it is about the word, but yeah. So, I came into the business, I think it was, yeah, about 11 years ago. And, and it was just, it was just such a shift because you don't go into school. And when you look at careers, you don't say, right, I'm going to work in implementing finance and accounting systems. You know, it's not kind of on the approved careers list. Quite frankly, it should be. So, ... Most of the people, when I speak to people about what we do as business analysts and as techies, it's really interesting to hear the background of where they come from. So, I actually fell into it very, very luckily. So, my dad was a techie, and he worked with Sage Software. So, he was like, I came back from New Zealand, having spent a few years over there. And he was like, right, you need to be gainfully employed, Hannah. I'm going to get you on some courses and give you a direction. I was like, brilliant, great dad. Thank you very much. And I just, I loved it. I genuinely, you know, talk about, you know, parents knowing best in that one case he did. And I've been thankful for it ever since to be fair. 

Jack McCullough: 4:26 

Yeah, it's interesting. Yeah, because when you're in your early 20s, the last thing you want is advice from dear old dad, right? It seems like with hindsight, he had some good instincts. He knew his little girl. 

Hannah Munro: 4:40 

Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, he just sort of set me out and I went out to my first few customers. And, you know, when you just really enjoy something and I love speaking to customers about their processes and their analytics And I think they were quite pleased that I wasn't a debits and credits person, because that's where a lot of finance tech people come from. They come from an accounting background. And I was able to bring something different to the party that wasn't there at the time, which was actually, let's focus on your reporting and your analytics. And let's focus on how efficient and how do we automate your processes. Even back then, which, you know, 10 years ago, finance was starting that shift. So, I came at it from a slightly different angle to most. And it seemed to really resonate with the people I was working with. 

Jack McCullough: 5:32 

Yeah, that makes sense. Because as I recall, you studied mathematics in undergrad. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, there weren't, you know, those who can't tell, I'm probably close to Hannah's father's age, little age gap. But, you know, there weren't a lot of careers in the accounting profession for folks who studied mathematics back when I did. You wanted to work in accounting? Yeah. You study accounting and the CFO is usually the best accountant in his or her company back then. And now it's about analytics and strategy and some other things. So, I can actually see how you'd be a real value add to your client base. No question. 

Hannah Munro: 6:08 

Yeah. And it's really interesting about mathematics because I was talking. So, I actually, when I recruit, I look for maths grads. Like people say, oh, you know, we have accounting is also a great, you know, but I actually prefer maths grads to IT students. graduates because when one of the things about maths in particular is that and as a business analyst this is this is what we do so, with them with a maths grad what you're given is a problem and your job is to figure out what tools do you need for the job so, if you think about systems and processes and technology you know what all the different systems do and you know you can find that out but actually the hard bit is figuring out how do they fit together and so, that's why I've really love employing maths grads because they have that problem solving mindset and they're used to working with really abstract, you know, I didn't see a number for I think about three years when I was doing my maths degree. So, you know, trying to work with abstract concepts, that's, you know, that's why I think there's something quite unique about those kind of graduates. 

Jack McCullough: 7:14 

Interesting. So, that's fascinating how the road you've travelled. So, now you're with ITAS and before we went live, you were telling me you're just growing, right? I mean, you're adding a lot of people and just the demand for your services is unprecedented. Is that a fair word to use right now? 

Hannah Munro: 7:34 

Yeah, it definitely is. So, ITAS obviously has been a sage partner for donkey's years. So, it was actually established in 1995. I hasten to add, I wasn't actually around then, just to add to that. But in the last sort of 10 years, it's been quite interesting. So, when I first joined, you know, we were a small, you know, very small operation. There was only a couple of us. And then in the last 10 years, we've grown and grown. And we're really excited. Obviously, we've won a few SAGE awards last couple of years. And this year has just probably been one of our biggest. I think that that I think the coronavirus situation has just accelerated a lot of the digital transformation projects around the world and the stats back that up as well in that people are bringing things forwards and the pace of change is accelerating as well. 

Jack McCullough: 8:25 

Yeah, it just, the change has sort of been happening, but now it's, you know, like it's on steroids or something like that. I've never seen anything quite like it. And, you know, who would have thought a year ago that this is where it would be, right? So, I mean, it's just, 

Hannah Munro: 8:42 

Well, that's the crazy thing is that you look at, you know, there's a film out on Netflix that was about the, you know, about a similar scenario to what we're in. And it was, you know, it was supposed to be some sort of random, you know, you know, fantasy of what could happen. And actually, we're living it. And I do think that COVID in itself is obviously incredibly, you know, cause so, many challenges across the world and, you know, so, many bad things. But one of the things that has been as a catalyst for change, both in flexible working in digitization and it's brought technology I think the people side of business to the fore humanity I think is um we've moved forward with that as well so, there's some good you know there are some silver linings somewhere to be found 

Jack McCullough: 9:28 

yeah, without a doubt I mean obviously nobody, but a madman would wish for a pandemic on the planet, but you know the Whatever hand you're dealt, it's your job to make the best out of that hand. And I do think there are some positive things about adaptations that we were forced to make. And work from home being the most obvious, right? I mean, I was at the school, I could never work. You've got to go and build relationships and have those water cooler chats. And while I won't surrender the fact that there is value to that sort of thing, the fact is we've been awfully productive the past year, haven't we? And I 

Hannah Munro: 10:04 

think people are rethinking things, aren't they? They're not just looking at it in the same lens. And I think what's been interesting to me is that it's gone on long enough for those changes to become embedded and for people to actually think of them as a long-term shift rather than just a short-term piece. So, yeah, there's huge amounts of change. And I do think it's going to continue in terms of other things coming out. And certainly, we're seeing and hearing it from our customers as well. 

Jack McCullough: 10:33 

That makes sense. So, cool. Well, I feel lucky, Hannah, because I don't get to interview on my own LinkedIn Live a lot of tech gurus like you. So, let's get into the technology. I'd love to hear Hannah Monroe's vision for the near-term future, if that's OK with you. 

Hannah Munro: 10:48 

Of course. So, I think there's three main technology trends that you will see over the next 12 months. So, probably the biggest one is productivity focus. So, some of the shifts that we're already seeing and we're doing a lot of work with is things like BPA platforms. So, BPA is business process automation. So, for example, classic example of how it's starting to integrate is you can design your own custom workflows as a business. So, for instance, rather than just when an invoice is approved, you get an email, we all get enough emails, you know, you get a Slack notification or a Teams notification. So, it's putting the design of your finance workflows back into your hands as a configurator as well. So, I think that's going to continue. And around productivity, you know, the usual suspects are becoming much more commonplace at the lower end of the market, which is exciting. So, OCR scanning for purchase invoices, automating entry, automatic allocations of journals, and all those kinds of elements are really starting to come into place and become what I call standard technologies that people will use and integrate with their systems. Whereas before they were sort of the remit of the very big the big players, the really massive enterprise systems, it's now coming into the smaller end of the market, which is quite exciting. 

Jack McCullough: 12:14 

Yeah, it is, right? Because small companies are in arguably a more competitive environment than a big company. So, these incremental changes... can make a huge difference, I think, right? 

Hannah Munro: 12:26 

Absolutely. And one of the things I personally believe is driving it is this need for adaptability and flexibility. So, within the current environment, nobody knows what's going to happen next. We could have another surge. Things can change so, rapidly. So, a way that a lot of people are looking at their internal hiring practices as well is how do we have the ability to scale up or down as we need to without necessarily hiring or firing staff? How do we keep a consistent level of staff and headcounts or reallocate that headcount to the more people-focused services? And how do we automate the other elements of our business? And that's where business process automation really comes in and the technologies that go around it. So, even things like putting down your bank statements, like you used to have to do that manually or use paper to tick stuff off. No, that's all just feeding directly in from the banks. Over in the UK and in Europe, we have the Open Banking Initiative. So, those kind of elements, technology is starting to catch up with what people are looking to do. And what's really exciting is that it's becoming point and click. So, you're not requiring developers to do this kind of workflow and automation. It can be done by a super user within the organization. 

Jack McCullough: 13:46 

That's interesting. And I'm sorry, I feel like I interrupted you. No, 

Hannah Munro: 13:50 

now, crack on. 

Jack McCullough: 13:52 

No, no, it's good stuff. And yeah, we're a little bit behind with the banking initiatives you referenced. But, you know, one thing people have learned is, you know, business process automation, automation generally. It doesn't work if your processes are garbage. You know, you still have to have good processes, right? You can't just say, oh, it's digital now, so, we don't have to worry about it. You need a little more thoughtfulness in your approach, yes? 

Hannah Munro: 14:16 

Yeah, and one of the biggest challenges, so, this is one of the biggest mistakes generally people, I personally believe people make when they they're looking for software, is that they'll very often come in and say, the process needs to work exactly like this. yeah so, before they've even got a conversation with a consultant they're trying to define the solution and actually the best the most successful projects I've personally worked on where the team have come into me and gone right this is the problem you know the tech to help us figure out the answer and that answer can actually be can actually be nothing to do with finance it could be how you know Are they deciding, you know, small things like it can be, have they decided their pricing strategy? Have they defined it so, that we can then automate that pricing strategy within the system so, that people aren't having to check every single invoice before it goes out and all those kinds of things. So, I think there's a real, there's a real call out, I guess, to people that are looking to implement new technologies, use the consultants that you're working with and give them the problem, you know, give them guidelines in which they can work, but don't try and restrict them into giving you the exact answer you will, you know, you think you need, because very often that isn't the best That 

Jack McCullough: 15:35 

makes a lot of sense. So, yeah, it's, you know, it's weird when you talk to people. I did it this way in the 1990s and it's always worked. So, I don't really want to change it. Let's just make it digital, though. You know, that's not the approach you're looking for. Right. So, 

Hannah Munro: 15:50 

Absolutely. And, you know, those kind of elements are really important when people are looking to change or automate what they're doing. Because like you say, it's a bit like rubbish in, rubbish out. If the process is rubbish to begin with and never delivers the result, then why would you digitize it? It just doesn't make sense. So, I must admit, as a consultant, I spend a lot of time going, why are you doing that? What, you know, that is the why. I'm like that really annoying kid that does just keeps asking why, why, why, why is that? Great, that's the answer. Why is that? And just digging underneath. And, you know, it's amazing what you find when you start digging. And I encourage people to understand it because sometimes it's just habit. They've always done it that way. Or somebody three years ago said that the system didn't work that way. So, they had to change things. And actually, a lot of the time you can do things with your existing system as long as you've understood the problem that you're trying to solve. 

Jack McCullough: 16:49 

Yeah, it is interesting. And the two most important questions in business, Hannah, I believe, the second most important is why, because you're challenging institutional thinking. And I think the most important is why not? Because that actually forces you to look at possibilities, right? So, a person who asks those two questions a lot is probably, you know, maybe the smartest person ever. or at least the best problem solver on the team. Why and why not, right? 

Hannah Munro: 17:20 

Yeah, no, I love that. Why not? Yeah, I'll have to think of some ways I can ask that more. But yeah, no, exactly that. And I think there's always, I think people have heard so, many stories about technology projects going wrong that they try to over-engineer the requirements gathering And, you know, requirements gathering is really important. You know, you've got to cover the bases, but there's always a danger that you get yourself down a route that's because you're working off a tick box exercise rather than evaluating what you could do. You know, why wouldn't you do these things? Why wouldn't you look at this? Why wouldn't you look at that? So, you know, classic example is, you know, do you have grid-based entry for entering a purchase invoice? Well, you don't need it because you're all, the invoice is entering itself from an email. So, does it really matter? And I've had a few, you know, I've always hit scenarios like that where I'm like, well, let's just have that conversation. Let's understand the why you need that and let's make it even better. Let's give you a better solution. 

Jack McCullough: 18:22 

Yeah, no, it makes a lot of sense. And, you know, the last several years we've heard about finance transformation, and I felt it was, perhaps overused, but I actually no longer think that. I think finance transformation is bigger now than it's ever been. So, you know, the current landscape of technology, can you just give us at the 10,000-foot view how it's fundamentally changing finance? 

Hannah Munro: 18:47 

Yes. So, there's a I think the biggest shift is the need for financial transformation for finance teams to be able to offer more value is actually shifting what they need from their finance software. So, there's a couple of things that are feeding into that. So, the decision-making time. So, there's some crazy stats about how quickly we make decisions nowadays. So, the decision-making time is actually shrinking rapidly. So, rather than having sort of weeks or, you know, if we're lucky days to make a decision, it's actually coming down to hours, which is meaning that actually you have to change your systems because you need to be able to pull information out within minutes and produce reports for the wider organization, but also So, for those reports to be accurate and valuable, they need to have all the information that's relevant, which means your processes need to be more efficient. Because if you're taking three weeks to close down your month end, then if you're trying to pull report mid-month, it's already out of date by the time you've pulled it. That is, in my personal opinion, that's what's driving a lot of this automation side is the fact that actually people know that the landscape is changing. They don't know how it's changing or what the current situation is, but they know it's changing. And there's a lot of frustration there. around the fact that they can't get good information. So, when CFOs and finance teams are going out and working in partnership with the rest of the organization, if they don't have this information at their fingertips or it's not right, that's not enabling them to do this financial transformation piece because they just don't have the systems. So, I think the shift that we're seeing is that this concept of like a lean and agile finance operations piece, getting stuff in quickly and with high levels of productivity so, that those roles can be shifted into the more exciting transformational piece and working widely across the organization. 

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Jack McCullough: 21:13 

Yeah, it's interesting. And that's the key, right? Working widely across the organization. If you're just thinking of this from a finance and accounting perspective, you're dead before you start, right? 

Hannah Munro: 21:25 

Absolutely. And I think the technology is now enabling that. So, we talked about trends. So, one of the other big trends is AI. And it's actually coming into finance software, and you don't even see it happening. So, Things like, you know, we work with credit control software that identifies when patterns change. So, when somebody that paid on time starts paying a bit later than usual, it's just a flag, you know, hang on. Guys, just watch this. Or we've got, you know, stage intact latest release. We've got GL outlier analysis. So, what means that if you miss post something, it's telling you, it's identifying, are you sure that should be going there? Or that doesn't look right. That looks a bit, that transaction doesn't look correct. You need to look at that. So, you're managing finance by exception rather than actually doing all of the reconciliations and analysis that you would normally do, which again, more time to spend on the interesting and strategic side of finance. That makes. 

Jack McCullough: 22:28 

great sense. So, I want to ask perhaps an obvious question to some, but I just want to get your perspective on this. Why does any of this even matter? You know, why should finance be embracing technology? You know, is it decision making? I mean, what's sort of the driver in your opinion? 

Hannah Munro: 22:47 

I think there's a couple of things. So, I always ask this, I always find this incredible. So, people go through so, many hoops to get into finance. If you think about the length of the qualifications that you have to do and the years of experience you have to go through. So, why would those incredible talented people with all of these qualifications around accounting spend these years and then their job is typing numbers into a spreadsheet? And does A plus B equals C? So, if you think about it, I personally think that as much as technology is transforming, and we'll talk about some of the tech that's coming through that's driving this, but I do think there is a personal aspect in that people are looking at their roles and feeling unfulfilled because they're in a number crunching game. And actually, they've got so, much more to offer. to the wider organization. And I personally think that's why a lot of people are seeing how important finance is because once you can get that person out of that number crunching role, which let's be honest, they're well overqualified to do and get them into actually analysing the figures, that value comes straight back into the organization and they see the benefit of it straight away. 

Jack McCullough: 24:00 

I'm sorry, go ahead. 

Hannah Munro: 24:01 

No, no, go for it. 

Jack McCullough: 24:02 

I'm just so, it's the Bostonians in me since you if your audience is allowed to use English Bostonians are the second rudest of Americans right after New York and it's a matter of I'm trying to catch them up but you know you mentioned sort of finances of value and I think historically people have thought of finance accounting maybe as a cost centre but you just refer to it you know as something that brings value can you elaborate a little bit on that 

Hannah Munro: 24:27 

Yeah, so, there's some great stories. If you read about it, there's loads of things. But, you know, projects is a key piece, right? So, we work with a lot of project-focused organizations. But understanding where your costs are coming from and having the time to focus on those kind of pieces and understand, for instance, are you utilizing all your, you know, all of your consultants, your professional services organizers, you know, team effectively, you can add sort of 10k a year per consultant if you do it well. Understanding, you know, are you... are you being the most tax efficient in how you're doing things? So, you could, rather than having somebody that's sitting there typing purchase invoices and you can employ a tax specialist who could use, you know, spend the time analysing your numbers and your figures to see can we make tax savings? You know, you can invest that money into other places as well within, you know, within finance and that finance team working with sales to help them figure out who's the most profitable customer, not just who are the biggest ones and who look great on the marketing aspect, but can they actually go out there and work with those teams and help them understand the numbers and educate the wider organization? That's, I think, where the value of finance comes in. 

Jack McCullough: 25:47 

That makes a lot of sense. So, cool. Thank you for that. So, you mentioned AI a couple of moments ago. So, that's obviously a big one. And historically, people have been a little bit intimidated of an AI investment. I think they're thinking of the Arnold Schwarzenegger Terminator movies from the 1980s or something when they hear AI. It did have that sort of frightening connotation, but it's gone mainstream. Can you tell us what are some of the other technologies that are available now that CFOs need to be thinking about? 

Hannah Munro: 26:15 

The biggest one, I guess, to put on people's radar is APIs. So, you'll hear this phrase. So, for those of you that have worked with systems before, you'll be like, oh, yeah, of course, APIs, this, you know, standard. But for those that haven't, so, APIs are basically like, think of it like a translation box that sits outside of your system, and that allows that system to talk to others. And so, that idea of being able to connect finances. So, we talk about, you know, finance being that business partner, having data at their fingertips, but that only works if you have that data, and you have it in a clean, consistent format that you can utilize and actually use within the business. So, that's where I think a lot of the driver that's coming through at the moment in terms of integration is coming from. So, the ability to pull data from other systems and pull it into your finance. So, you've not just got financial information, you've got operational context. And that operational context then allows your finance team to go out to back out to the operational teams, to sales, to marketing, to the customer service, and again, add more value because you've got their data in a street, you know, in a standardized format that you can access and that they can understand. 

Jack McCullough: 27:26 

Okay, that makes tremendous sense that, again, building on sort of the theme of being a value add to the entire company. So, and you said API, just for the few people, what does that stand for? 

Hannah Munro: 27:38 

Application programming interface, I think is the technical term. I'm going to be honest; I can't remember the last time I used the full name. But it's basically, I think it's a web service that sits outside of every software. And different software have different capabilities in terms of what APIs. So, some will have all of the connections available, some will just have some. So, a lot of the work that we do is helping people connect the dots. So, you know, think of, did you ever play that as a Jack, you know, draw the dots and connect the lines. It was a game. I 

Speaker 01: 28:14 

was really awful at it, but I did. Yes. 

Hannah Munro: 28:18 

Yeah. So, you know, a lot of things that businesses are trying to do is they'll have like their CRM in Salesforce. They'll have their, you know, finance system. They'll have their expenses system. And actually, the APIs that are now available for, you know, for the right systems, they'll help connect those dots and bring it all together. And a lot of the time it's out of the box, you know, connections to do it anyway. 

Jack McCullough: 28:40 

Okay. It's fascinating. So, yeah, it's when you said API, I had a rough idea what it was, but I'm like, I wonder if I'm the only one that doesn't know what it stands for. 

Hannah Munro: 28:49 

Yeah, and then that's, I guess, the danger of working in tech. And I must admit, I do try not to use all of the lovely acronyms that we have in tech. But some of them, yeah, I must admit, saying application programming interface all the time would just, I think it would drive us all nuts to be very. 

Jack McCullough: 29:06 

fair. Yeah, it would drive you nuts. Years ago, when I was a CFO, my boss was on my case. And he asked me what something was. And I said, I just want to get rid of him. I said, it's the NBI. Leave me alone. And he actually, unfortunately, he used it at a board meeting. And so, one of the board members, NBI just stands for nothing but initials. It's a way of blowing somebody off by telling him it's the NBI. I didn't think that I thought he knew it. And he actually used it at the board meeting. One of the board members said, did you tell Bruce NBI is an answer to something. Oh my God, he didn't use it, did he? So, I've never done that again. Well, Hannah, you're a wonderful guest on your own show. So, thank you for being so, gracious and patient with me. But let me ask you a question. I'm a CFO and I sort of know I have to do something, but I'm not sure exactly what it is that I need to do. You know, where do I start? 

Hannah Munro: 30:06 

So, one of the first things I always say to people when people think this is a bit strange, because obviously doing the job that I do is actually you need to figure out if you actually need new technology or do you just need to use your old or your current technology better? Yeah. So, there's a very fine line. And I have to say, most people, you know... across the world, across the globe, but certainly the clients that a lot of them I go in and I audit, they're not even using their existing systems to its full capacity. So, the first question is, do you actually need new systems, or do you just need to use them better? And we'll talk about how you can identify that. The second piece is you need to figure out what is your long-term strategy. So, one of the real downfalls, I think, of a lot of customers is they actually make the decisions way too late. So, they decide to go at a point that they're scaling as in they're growing at a rapid rate of knots and whilst that you know obviously you can understand that you need to get your timing right so, ideally you want your systems in and embedded just before you grow so, if you know that in the next 12 months that you know in 12 months’ time you're going to be growing at a good rate and that you're already thinking about maybe hiring somebody in six months, you need to look at the systems. So, it's that balance between not going too early because you don't want to be paying for technology that isn't adding value to the organization. But at the same time, you don't want to be doing it and trying to get in new systems and new processes when your team are already overwhelmed. So, that's one of the biggest things. So, think about what do you need? And is it your systems or is it your processes um it can be a bit of both and we'll talk about that but the second big piece is what are you going to need for the next three to five years not just what do you need now um and how do you address it because one of the challenges we often see is people will just fix a part of the process rather than look holistically at their systems so, they'll decide oh we need to have an authorization a digital authorization process and they'll plug something in or they'll do just fix that one tiny piece of the process rather than taking a step back and say, what controls do we need around purchasing? How is our purchasing operating? Can we work with our suppliers better? How are we adding KPIs? What are we doing around that? So, it's looking at things holistically. 

Jack McCullough: 32:36 

That's interesting. Yeah. Fixing one thing, that's unlikely to solve a whole lot of problems, right? In the long term. Yeah. 

Hannah Munro: 32:46 

Yeah, it's a bit like putting a plaster, you know, your roof springs a leak, right? You fix the leak, but then next year, another one pops up and you're constantly going around and you've got this beautiful patchwork roof and it actually would have been way more sensible to when it started just do a quick evaluation to go are we on you know do we have the right roof is it made of the right materials do we just need to replace it and then not have to worry about it because during that time the leaks come through its damaged loads of valuable you know your lovely new sofa that you bought it's damaged all of this in so, you've actually lost more than you think because you couldn't you didn't really look at the problem and properly in the first place. 

Jack McCullough: 33:26 

Yeah, it's a weird thing, right? People too often treat, they treat the symptom, not the problem. I think it might be a way to put it, right? 

Hannah Munro: 33:34 

That's a brilliant way. Yeah. Maybe you should be on the other side of this one today, to be fair, 

Jack McCullough: 33:39 

Jack. You know, we'll have to have a week of death, and I'll come up with a few brilliant things here and there. So, but cool. And philosophically, are you a, you know, big bang or phased approach? Do you think if people recognize the problem just do it and get it over with or do you sort of take your time and I'm 

Hannah Munro: 33:59 

somewhere in the middle right so, I'm a massive believer in phasing as long as you can so, one of the biggest things if you're going to phase right and it is the best way if you can do it is to actually think about dependencies right so, And if you're going to do that, don't set targets at the beginning for the first phase that are actually dependent on phase two and three. So, you know, if getting great data is really important to you, but you don't start implementing integration analytics till phase three. But, you know, and you're holding your phase one up to that pedestal, then, you know, and all of this is obvious, but you'd be amazed at the conversations that we have when we talk about this. So, phasing is really, you know, when it's done well, it can work brilliantly. But what you do need to do if you do phase is to scope the whole solution. to actually understand your wider strategy and then plan the phases. Don't just do one phase and then have to undo some of those things that you've done as part of phase one to make phases two and three work. 

Jack McCullough: 35:07 

Yeah, the whole thing is the planning process, it sounds like, right? CFOs generally are not patient, right? They like to do stuff. But it sounds like the ones who are able to sort of coach themselves, step back, think it through a little bit. They're the ones more likely to be successful in the long run, right? 

Hannah Munro: 35:29 

Yeah. And you can do it. I've seen it work well where, say, for instance, the sales team will be implementing CRM at the same time as the finance team because they're two separate work streams. So, they're not necessarily consuming each other's resources. But what you will have been a lack of focus in that necessarily on that team and that particular solution. So, the benefit of phasing is that you can just nail the finance, get the core right, and then look at CRM and then have it push into a finance system that's working perfectly. So, you're not having to deal with any challenges from that side. So, it allows you to focus your efforts. Overall, it has less impact, but it does take longer. So, it's getting that balance and, you know, making sure things are moving in quick succession. 

Jack McCullough: 36:16 

Yeah. It's like, you sort of feel good. Jeez, look at everything I accomplished this week. But you can't do that every week, right? Sometimes you just got to accept the fact that you're not going to have an itemized list of accomplishments and yet you're still moving forward. And the 

Hannah Munro: 36:31 

intimidation factor, just to say on that one as well, is that studies have shown that change programs work better when you get small wins. So, if there's small parts of the project that you can implement first and get everybody on board with, the wider project will be way more successful because they feel like they've achieved something already. So, even if you don't phase and you go for a big bang, try and just pull sections off of it and get those initial few small wins straight away so, that the rest of the project has some momentum and some drive. 

Jack McCullough: 37:02 

That's fascinating. Interesting. Cool. One thing I wanted to chat with you about because I'm sure you've observed it too, but I run a member organization and truly no two companies are alike. Can you give some tips for not only fighting the right technology, but for the right partner to assist you in implementing the technology? 

Hannah Munro: 37:26 

So, finding the right technology for me is about making sure you're clear on what problem you're solving. Yeah. So, and having, and going into that and saying, right, what is it that we're actually trying to achieve? It kind of goes back to my earlier point about not necessarily giving the answer to the solution but coming with the problem and then allowing the consultant, because they've done this. So, for instance, most finance people are lucky if they go through one implementation of a finance software every couple of years. If they're in the same organization, they're doing something very wrong to be going through lots of them. But you've got to remember that, for instance, I've done hundreds of implementations. And so, when you think of the volume that you go through, so, and at different levels as well so, I might be BA on some projects I might be more technically involved I might be supervising or shadowing so, you know the volume of projects that a consultant and a business analyst will go through will be much higher than a typical finance program. So, utilize that, use that to your advantage and come to them and ask them, how could we reimagine this? And don't be afraid to challenge the rest of the organization as part of this process as well. And look at one of the big things I always say to people is, look at the rest of the systems in your business because there is no point you having an all singing or dancing finance solution that doesn't talk to anything because part of your value in finance is about putting data together and then going back out to the organization and working with it. So, if you don't have a system, that integrates with the wider suite of products that you're working with or has the ability to, and you don't plan for that, then you're never going to be able to deliver your value as a finance team. 

Speaker 01: 39:22 

Sorry, 

Jack McCullough: 39:24 

go ahead. 

Hannah Munro: 39:25 

No, no, I was finished. There you go. 

Jack McCullough: 39:27 

No, you mentioned data. And actually, I follow you on social media. And you were impressed by a, well, impress me or may not be the proper word, but you referenced 70% of CFOs still make decisions based upon instinct, I think, or something like that, right? Yeah. That's a current statistic? That's still the case, huh? 

Hannah Munro: 39:49 

Yeah. The problem is the decision timeframe. So, if they had longer, most CFOs would make it on actual data. And even the data that they get, when they're making decisions, they'll try and get some data, but then they'll that kind of have this in the back of their head is that validity piece and that sort of sense check around it. And yeah, that's the crazy thing. But I think it's down to the speed of change. And so, when you think about how quickly things are changing week on week, I don't know what it's like if you go over in the US, but over in the UK, we literally find out with like a week, if we're lucky, two weeks’ notice of what's happening, whether businesses are opening up, whether rules are changing. So, if you think about that timeframe, and the need to react within hours rather than weeks or months, then I personally, I think that's what's driving it. And the days of waiting for a costly set of accounts to be released to make strategic decisions, that's, you know, I don't quite understand how any agile and growth-orientated organization can wait that long. And it's that whole concept of, you know, stop looking in the rearview mirror and start seeing what's ahead. And I think that's what's driving a lot of the tech decisions nowadays as well. 

Jack McCullough: 41:03 

No, that makes a lot of sense. Back in my day, I can remember in the 90s, a company was bragging of a three-day close. And at the time, that seemed like science fiction. It's like, ah, that's not possible. You can't close the books in three days. And now that's not impressive at all. Is that fair to say? 

Hannah Munro: 41:22 

Yeah, so, I haven't actually got the stats at hand, but I'll have to share it as part of my social post. So, if anyone's interested, but there's some stats about the average. And obviously, that's one of the first questions I when I work financing is that how long does it take you to close and understanding that and actually, the goal is not to get it down to two or three days, you know, the goal is to actually shift to a continuous close model to get to the point where you don't, you know, you have your official close. finish but you know the reality is you should be able to report pull reports at any point in the month and they should be up to date in real time um and that's what we that's where we're working to with all of our automation tools and all of our analytics is how do we get people to a real time like literally real time to the minute reporting around what's happening 

Jack McCullough: 42:09 

fascinating world that we lived in so, uh Hannah I'm just going to give you the last word I think and if there's any final takeaways, you'd love your audience to get from this conversation. 

Hannah Munro: 42:22 

Yeah, I think my biggest takeaway is to think big when it comes to what you're trying to achieve. So, don't just... Just don't, just plug the situation or put plaster over actually. When you're starting to see cracks appearing, take a step back and see if you just need to replaster the whole wall. So, I think that's the biggest thing. Think ahead of your technology strategy. Don't leave it till you've got a problem. Think, you know, three to five years ahead and start analysing and identifying solutions early. The last thing you want to do is rushing into choosing a particular solution. You want to make sure that you've got the time to get it right. And the third thing is don't discount your existing systems. There's a lot that you can do with your technology and your processes that might already be in place. And I guess the fourth, last and final thing is getting your teams involved, you know, Projects where the team have input and understand the vision and what you're trying to achieve are always the most successful. So, don't just hand them the answer and the solution you're going with. Get them involved. Take them on the journey with you and help them understand the direction that you're going with and why you're going there. 

Jack McCullough: 43:40 

That makes sense. Tech and team. You can't have one without the other. Absolutely. Well, Hannah, this has been great. I actually did enjoy the opportunity to turn the tables on you a little bit. I don't think I quite have the interview skills, but I'll get better. So, thanks for the time. 

Hannah Munro: 43:56 

I think you've done brilliantly, to be fair, Jack. And you made it quite a painless process. And I echo you. It's very strange being on the other side of the mic. But thank you so, much, Jack. You've been brilliant.