Keeping Corporate Finance and FP&A professionals informed, relevant, and ahead of the curve. Held three times a year, each half-day virtual event dives deep on one topic and offers practical tips for today and long-term career development for the future.

AFP's FP&A Series Deep Dive on Data

Get Your Data Right

Exclusively sponsored by AARP

June 9, 2022 | Virtual
Complimentary 

Register for this Complimentary Event

Agenda (All times eastern):

• 11:00–11:45 AM: Implementing Data Driven Decision Making | Read Description
• 12:30–1:15 PM: Delivering Data as a Service | Read Description
• 2:00–2:45 PM: Crafting Value: How Data/Digital is Reshaping FP&A | Read Description
• 3:30–4:15 PM: Taming the Wild West of Your Data for Reporting | Read Description

Followed by a roundtable discussion for attendees and speakers on June 10.

11:00–11:45 AM ET: Implementing Data Driven Decision Making

Presented By: Kayla Davis, Vice President, Head of M&A, ABM Industries

An increasing number of organizations are building data analytics capabilities in efforts to gain competitive advantage by leveraging data and AI. When executed successfully, organizations can enjoy great growth as compared to their peers. In this discussion, industry experts provide an overview of key trends and challenges in organization pursuing more advanced insight, the success factors in transforming an organization to be data-driven and shares ABM’s journey in using data to build specific use cases that enabled the organization to better measure performance and enable decision making.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the successes and failures of creating business impact with data analytics.
• Learn from ABM's journey in delivering on the vision for data analytics through lighthouse use cases.

12:30–1:15 PM ET: Delivering Data as a Service

Presented By: Jesse Todd, Group Finance Manager, Finance Data & Experiences Team, Microsoft

Inconsistent definitions, hierarchies, metrics, and KPIs across the finance, marketing, sales, and product development teams led to endless data wrangling and churn; resulting in widespread “shadow finance” and multiple versions of the truth. Sound familiar? Microsoft Finance’s response to this challenge was a company-wide process and change management effort to create trusted data that was widely available, enabling finance to focus on delivering insight instead of managing data. Learn how they did it, and how you can assess how to improve your own business data strategy.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand common challenges facing finance teams to reduce manual work and build trust with business partners stemming from ineffective and non-centralized data management approaches.
• Learn how Microsoft implemented an aligned data management framework to create a common data language across multiple functions to increase efficiency and deliver greater insight.

2:00–2:45 PM ET: Crafting Value: How Data/Digital is Reshaping FP&A

Presented By: Andrew Codd, Founder & Producer of #SITN Finance Podcast & Finnetics®, Consultant, Dell Technologies

Dell Technologies had a problem. After years of digital transformation, the support services finance team assessed themselves with a net promoter score negative 100. The problem was a lack of holistic approach to staff, customers and data. For them, the answer was to create digital competencies around data management concentrated in regional hubs, and then refocus the people on business problems. This reduced the number of people at the bottom of hierarchical pyramid traditionally aggregating and arranging data; they were redeployed in the “middle,” closer to the business doing more interactive work. The new diamond shape of the team, narrow at the bottom and top, wide in the middle, puts finance close to their customer where they can add value.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand how the company organizational chart needs to change when finance embraces improved technology and tactics.
• Understand the Importance of knowing the difference between Data Digitization vs. Digitalization.
• Learn the three levels of value internal stakeholders demand, and how FP&A can meet them.

3:30–4:15 PM ET: Taming the Wild West of Your Data for Reporting

Presented By: Greg Gillespie, Principal, Collectiv

Business intelligence tools (BI) have unlimited potential to produce data that benefits organizations of all sizes, yet the sole deployment of a BI solution will not deliver the desired results without developing ‘Excellence’. Excellence is the force that governs and oversees the adoption, implementation and maintenance of BI platforms to connect across functions and improve data integrity. In this session, FP&A practitioners discuss the challenges and best practices for seamlessly creating BI Excellence.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand key steps to manage and standardize chaotic reporting processes to improve data quality across the enterprise by building a BI Center of Excellence.
• Learn a CoE framework that was built upon industry best practices, including governance, engagement, learning, and organizational support.

On Demand: What to Talk About When They Talk About Digital Transformation

Presented by: Naj Uddin, CIO, and Scott Frisch, COO and CFO, AARP

Moving to the cloud, becoming an analytics hub, complying with state-level privacy guidelines, and of course, getting your data right. These all add up to the biggest corporate trend to hit your budget: digital transformation. Your CEO is fired up, the IT team is excited, but what do you do? AARP’s Naj Uddin, CIO, and Scott Frisch, COO and CFO, have worked closely together to achieve their award-winning transformation, and offer exceptional insight into collaboration between IT and finance and the overall change process. This discussion equips FP&A professionals with the critical questions, decisions to be addressed to ensure successful integration, and deployment of your organization’s technology transformation.

Register for this Complimentary Event

To request a confirmation of CPE credits record the CPE Code provided at the end of each qualifying presentation. Complete the Session Evaluation for each session attended and enter the CPE Code in the required field.  

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