The-Accountant-Jan-Feb-2018

Information INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Technology
By Theuns Holtshousen, Divisional Business Leader CaseWare Africa
Leveraging
the machine
Technology is transforming
our private lives. Social media,
instant messaging, apps in
general are in widespread use
globally, and in Africa too.
Despite this, many finance professionals
in Africa express reservations about the
impact that technology might have on
their working lives. Some of the key
questions being asked are: Is it affordable?
Is it secure? Do I have, or can I find, the
skills to use it effectively? Will it replace
me or my staff?
These questions must be addressed as
a matter of urgency because one thing
is clear: your competitors are already
adopting technology, and you risk falling
behind them if you do not. It is vital that
you understand what technology can do
for your business, and begin the journey
now. However, finance professionals must
also take the time to understand all the
issues.
The following five considerations
should guide their thinking when
implementing technology:
Five key considerations to help
African finance professionals adopt
technology successfully and ensure
they are competitive into the future
1. Technology adoption is real, and it
focuses on automation. As I have already
indicated, the march of technology is
fundamentally changing all businesses.
Finance professionals simply have to keep
abreast of this trend or they will not be
able to offer the agile, expanding and costeffective
services their clients require.
The key concept driving the use of
technology within the finance industry
is automation. Your clients are using
accounting systems, ERP systems,
reporting tools and so on. You need to
be able to integrate with those systems to
transfer data seamlessly, thus eliminating
duplication and enhancing accuracy. By
the same token, automating your own
processes will generate massive savings in
both time and money, thus freeing you and
your staff up to add more value to clients.
2. Take legacy systems and data into
account. No company starts off with
a clean slate; we all have investments
in desktop systems and valuable data
collected down the years. Both must
form part of the road map for adopting
technology. Data, in particular, is the key
to understanding what clients want and
how to service them more effectively.
3. Think carefully about cloud. Cloud
is receiving a lot of media attention at
present because it has such great potential.
Companies are already gaining enormous
benefits in terms of reducing capital costs
and providing a platform for collaboration
and automation. The cloud enables many,
if not most, of the benefits that flow from
technology.
But transitioning everything into
the cloud at once is not always practical,
especially if one wants to get all the
return possible on existing technology
investments. In reality, too, many African
finance professionals are hamstrung by
connectivity that is not yet ubiquitous
or cheap enough. For them, as for the
majority of companies globally, a phased
approach is going to be best. The end
result, now known as hybrid cloud,
will already take them to the next level,
technologically speaking.
For example, hooking up an existing
desktop application to the cloud can
add great value by enabling better
collaboration and the creation of a single
data store. The latter will immediately
eliminate the problems that come with reentering
information, and set the stage for
further automation initiatives when they
make sense.
It is particularly important to integrate
the collaboration potential of cloud
into your business plan. The moment a
company starts to move into the cloud,
it becomes possible for it to collaborate
with fellow professional practices in other
areas, both within the same country or
across borders. As African regional trade
continues to increase, this will mean
that an auditing practice in Kenya will
no longer have to refer a client with
Zambian interests to a Zambian practice,
but will be able to participate in the work
of servicing that client. This will not only
strengthen the bottom line, it will also
allow a relatively small practice to provide
the reach that a much larger competitor
offers.
Indeed, this ability to compete on
equal terms with big competitors is a
general benefit of technology.
4. Do not automate a sub-standard
process. As noted above, to get the benefit
of investment in technology, companies
will automate as much as possible. It
is surprising that so many companies
simply automate their existing manual
processes, failing to seize the opportunity
to improve processes during automation.
When automating: look at where you
want to be in the future, and design your
automated processes with the end goal in
mind. That way, you will begin to build a
company that is future-proof.
5. Integration is the key to harvesting
the benefits of technology. This point is
implicit in what I have been saying, but it
is so important it needs highlighting. The
aim must be a single file across the full
life cycle of any client. Thus, for example,
the data in a client’s accounting package
must automatically populate the software
used to produce the annual financial
statements, thus avoiding the errors and
time required to transfer them manually.
Cloud-based storage can be used to
hold the supporting documents, and for
collaboration with multiple branches. The
task of consolidating the financials can
thus also be automated.
All of these considerations will
help ensure that financial professionals
“leverage the machine” effectively, and
get the biggest return on their technology
investment. In conclusion, though, never
forget that leveraging the machine is
only valuable if it is done in such a way
as to leverage humans as well. In the end,
people do business with people but the
trick is using machines to maximise the
benefits of that contact for both parties.
Brief biography: Theuns Holtshousen, Divisional Business Leader CaseWare Africa.
Theuns Holtshousen, Divisional Business Leader for CaseWare Africa, an Adapt IT company, plays a pivotal role in the strategic direction and
growth of the business across the African continent. His focus lies in market strategy and growing market share.
Theuns.Holtshousen@AdaptIT.co.za
50 JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2018