FIC
courage under fire
Learning during extreme change Finance had to find the courage to lead through the pandemic, and shift to being more people-focused.
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BY CHUMA MXO
t a Finance Indaba conversation themed Courage Under Fire, sponsored by Workday, CFOs discussed how they overcame challenges throughout the pandemic.Edward Bass, Workday’s global account executive, said that the Workday story is very aligned to helping customers come out of the pandemic a lot stronger. He shared some of the things that motivate Workday and the reason they are where they are today. “What we have learnt throughout the years by talking to our prospective customers and listening to them, is that there are two things that we really need to achieve within a financial management environment,” he said. “One is to take care of the business – but we need to do that in a way that is faster and more effective. So we strive to get information in and out of the system very quickly by using the same solution that managers are using,” he
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explained. Edward said the second is to be intentional about listening to people. “We try and create a frictionless finance environment, so that you can automate as much as possible and be able to spend less time assembling the numbers, and much more time working with the business and being a true business partner with them,” he said. He told the finance community that there is a different way of doing things and it is much more focused on the business, with finance at the centre of driving the culture shift, decision-making and doing that by enablement around the data.
Power of information Edward highlighted that people can be incredibly courageous if they have the information, plans, and ability to replan, rescore, and course-correct as they go.
