Getting more out of your FP&A software

Effective planning is crucial for finance teams to navigate today’s modern business challenges. Robert Kugel, Executive Director of Business Research at Ventana (now part of ISG), provides valuable insights into this topic with his recent article, "Planning to Get Ahead of What’s Next in the 21st Century."

Kugel underscores the importance of integrating dedicated planning and budgeting software into organizational strategies to enhance agility, resilience, and decision-making across the business. Let’s explore these insights further and how they align with Anaplan’s financial planning and analysis (FP&A) solution for the office of finance.  

Importance of finance planning software

Kugel begins by highlighting the essential role advanced planning software will play in transforming how enterprises and their teams manage uncertainty. Effective planning is not just a benefit but a necessity for businesses aiming to stay competitive and responsive in a rapidly changing environment. 

Enterprises utilizing dedicated planning software eliminate the time-consuming mechanics of the planning process. These software solutions automate manual tasks, fostering a high-participation, interactive dialogue within the team that focuses on the tactics and resources needed to achieve objectives. This streamlining is crucial for making planning cycles shorter and more agile. Additionally, this software facilitates real-time collaboration among team members, breaking down silos and ensuring that everyone is aligned and working toward the same goals.

Moreover, advanced planning software provides a centralized platform where data from various departments can be integrated and analyzed holistically. According to Ventana’s research, “66% of enterprises that use dedicated planning and budgeting software have a process that works well or very well”. This comprehensive view allows businesses to identify trends, forecast potential challenges, and make more data-driven decisions. With the ability to quickly generate and adjust plans based on real-time data, organizations can respond to market shifts and internal changes with greater agility and confidence. 

The role of AI in FP&A software

As artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs) like generative AI become more prevalent, so will the use of them within dedicated planning platforms. While the scope of uses for AI in business is vast, Kugel asserts that the integration of AI into planning and budgeting software, “will be the most consequential technology of this decade for business computing.” This integration will transform how businesses operate, Kugel identifies several key benefits already within reach: 

• Accelerated forecasting and planning while reducing bias

• Automating analytics production to enable more time for analysis and thought 

• Providing task supervision to spot data and information input errors

• Adding recommendations to facilitate decision-making 

• Automating commentary to enhance reporting

As these benefits become increasingly accessible, the competitive landscape for businesses will shift dramatically. Generating real-time insights through AI will not only improve the speed and accuracy of forecasts, planning, and decision-making, but also serve to attract and retain top talent. Through adopting these solutions, organizations empower their teams to focus on tasks that require their skill and judgment rather than low-value, manual work.  

A new approach to finance planning

To fully leverage the benefits of AI and planning software, Kugel advocates for an approach coined by Ventana in 2007, integrated business planning (IBP). IBP connects operational and financial plans, ensuring that all aspects of the business are aligned and working towards common goals. This integrated approach offers several advantages: 

Holistic view: IBP provides a comprehensive view of the organization’s operations and finances, enabling more informed decision-making.

Agility: By integrating planning across different departments, IBP allows businesses to respond more quickly to changes in the market or internal conditions. 

Resource allocation: IBP ensures that resources are allocated effectively, supporting the achievement of strategic objectives.

Enhanced collaboration: IBP fosters collaboration between different departments, ensuring that everyone is working towards the same goals. 

These advantages all support more effective, agile and accurate planning but enterprises must still ensure to simplify these tasks for individual business units. Kugel asserts that this is indeed possible as, “AI-infused IBP software will make FP&A far more productive.” 

Anaplan: Your dedicated FP&A platform 

Anaplan’s FP&A solution is the ideal solution for companies seeking to modernize their planning processes. By integrating advanced AI capabilities with a unified, real-time data platform, Anaplan empowers finance teams to transform their planning cycles, optimize resource allocation, and make fast, data-driven decisions with confidence. The platform’s flexibility and scalability ensure that it meets the needs of businesses of all sizes, enabling them to stay competitive in an ever-changing market.

For companies looking to elevate their FP&A and IBP processes, Anaplan provides the technology and support essential for success. Our dedicated planning platform not only positions your business to meet current demands but also to excel and thrive in the future.