With Anaplan, Cross-Functional Leaders Uncover New Opportunities for Value Creation

Ask any growth-minded business leader what’s keeping them up at night and nine times out of ten you will probably get the same answer: revenue and costs. In fact, cost pressures were recognized as a top concern by finance chiefs in a recent survey by Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, with about four out of five respondents reporting larger-than-normal cost increases at their firms.

While this is not a new concern, the emphasis on cost and revenue is no longer unique to the office of the CFO, especially in today’s dynamic environment. Supply chain leaders are increasingly responsible for driving revenue with more active demand management. Sales leaders are tasked with optimizing their pipeline by targeting accounts with a higher propensity to buy. And HR leaders are on the hook to make strategic staffing decisions that will help foster growth without wasting resources.

For many companies, this transition has helped break down organizational siloes that existed for years, driving partnerships across the enterprise that help businesses link operational decisions with financial results. We’ve seen leaders accelerate transformation projects—moving away from planning using point solutions or static spreadsheets—and an increase in real-time data analysis to inform more accurate forecasts, budgets, plans, and reports.

This trend may be picking up steam, especially as businesses continue to grapple with new levels of volatility and uncertainty, but at Anaplan, it’s a concept we’ve been committed to for years. In fact, we coined the phrase connected planning in 2017 after realizing how critical collaboration, alignment, and shared ownership are to a company’s ability to accelerate revenue growth, expand margins, optimize assets, and manage risk.

According to Gartner® xP&A is the evolution of planning, combining financial and operational planning on a single composable platform. It “extends” traditional FP&A solutions focused solely on finance into other enterprise planning domains such as workforce, sales, operations and marketing. The report also suggests that through 2024, 30% of FP&A implementations will be extended to support operational finance processes with 50% requiring a substantial xP&A roadmap from the vendor.

We’re excited that Anaplan is included in this Market Guide, and as the only vendor to hit all the identified xP&A planning functions with a “turn-key” ability.

There’s no question that concerns over costs and revenue will continue to be top-of-mind for business leaders, especially as the pace of change and disruption accelerates. We are committed to arming business leaders around the world with a platform to drive collaboration, break down operational silos, and transform company data into action – so that decision makers from every corner of the business can plan in real-time, forecast with accuracy, and unlock new opportunities to reduce costs and drive growth.

To access Gartner’s Market Guide for Cloud, Extended Planning and Analysis Solutions, click here.

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