While the brutal economic climate of the past few years moved the focus of finance directors to the basics of cost control, FDs are now approaching a crucial period in which that focus is shifting back to top-line growth. It is a period of huge challenge for CFOs, who must ensure they have a broad and accurate view of the organisation in order to make informed and timely decisions. This is not as easy as it sounds. In the most part, organisations have grown by accident rather than design as different eras of management pursued wildly different strategies. As a result, CFOs must manage a melting pot of businesses which have often been bolted together from M&A activity and which, in many cases, remain relatively autonomous. Even if a company has grown organically, the sheer scale of global business today means that even smaller businesses can function as disparate operating units spread across the world. In order to drive precise forecasting and earnings reliability FDs must adapt to these wildly volatile and complex business environments. Deploying the right tools for this task is essential. As one FD puts it, “Software can make pulling together information easier so that we can concentrate on the end goal, using the information it produces”. Accurate data is crucial to being able to successfully perform this task. But the reality is that many FDs are faced with a plethora of systems which may or may not talk to each other and which are further complicated by a multitude of locally created and stored spreadsheets.