Bayer’s 2018 acquisition of agricultural company Monsanto had transformed BCS in terms of scale, but meeting goals for greater efficiency in finance remained a challenge. Long-running integration efforts had also led to change fatigue throughout the organization, making further progress more difficult. For too many finance employees, inefficient processes and technology meant that workloads were not only high but also frequently unrewarding. While near-term objectives for reporting and other functions were being met, real advances still seemed out of reach.
Globally, the BCS finance team was also held back by limited coordination across regions, especially after COVID-19 made in-person meetings impossible.
Most important of all, the role of finance within BCS (and Bayer overall) was not seen as central to broader planning, strategy, and goals.
Gast understood that established thinking wasn’t working. It was time to consider more creative, boundary-pushing solutions with help from an objective, experienced guide.
Unrealized promise in the wake of a major merger
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After
Future
Replace aging applications that differed across divisions and subsidiaries
Reduce manual, disparate processes freeing up more resources for advanced analytics
Enable enhanced reporting and make it more widely available across the enterprise
Act with greater speed and agility to capture value in acquisitions
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Company-wide
opportunities
Process hundreds of thousands of transactions per month with greater efficiency
Reduce 10,000+ manual journal entries per period
Decrease >3-week close
Shorten the >3-month annual budgeting cycle
Provide better support for a growing e-commerce business
Control rising finance function costs and derive greater value
Finance
opportunities
Reduce 10,000+ manual journal entries per period
Decrease >3-week close
Shorten the >3-month annual budgeting cycle
Provide better support for a growing e-commerce busines
Control rising finance function costs and derive greater value
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Improve technical capabilities to keep pace with increased hiring needs
Reduce dependence on IT and tech resources for supporting and enabling continuous compliance with more than 800 collective bargaining agreements
Unify and automate workforce administration processes across the enterprise
Eliminate the need for employees to learn new systems and interfaces as they move from recruitment to training to managing benefit
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HR
opportunities
Before
Next
After
The KPMG Ignition workshop session and transformation plan helped the BCS finance team take critical steps, including:
• Alignment across regions on key goals and approaches for achieving them
• Creating an 18-month roadmap for finance integration, process and technical improvements, and change management
• Launching specific projects to enhance the strategic relevance of finance by providing faster, more relevant planning data.
But the Ignition team’s greatest contribution was to build confidence among managers in their own ability to deliver large and small changes that will make their work more relevant and rewarding.
A new vision for finance and a detailed plan for change
Developed all the necessary processes to support a single, modernized digital platform serving the entire enterprise
Migrated 290,000 employees from legacy systems to Oracle Cloud
Increased insight-driven decision making across functions, driving performance and growth gains
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Company-wide
success
Decreased balance sheet reconciliations
by 85%
Achieved a consolidated retail and
corporate close within a shortened period
Reduced the types of P&L statements from 100+ to 4
Reduced operations costs across the board
Enhanced availability of data-driven insights that help to capture maximum value during acquisitions
Achieved a consolidated retail and corporate close within a shortened period
Reduced the types of P&L statements from 100+ to 4
Reduced operations costs
across the board
Enhanced availability of data-driven insights that help to capture maximum value during acquisitions
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Finance
successes
HR
successes
Deployed a custom application for union-rule processing enabling a single HCM platform to administer benefits to all employee populations under 800+ complex union agreements
Created a digital-first, digital anywhere experience resulting in higher employee engagement
Reduced new-hire onboarding time
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Reduced new hire onboarding time
Streamlined and improved the process integration of new employees post-acquisition
Integrate processes and technology across the employee lifecycle from recruiting through compensation and performance
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To help BCS follow through on the transformation plan, KPMG Ignition assisted in developing an Intelligent Forecasting pilot program to test methods for enabling faster, more actionable forecast data.
We are also helping BCS establish a dedicated Office of Finance Transformation with additional support from KPMG Finance Transformation and Transformation Delivery professionals.
Future projects are also being considered to help BCS refine operating models, extend automation, enable data integration, and accelerate finance transformation.
Continue to enhance analytics-driven planning and forecasting
Optimize the supply chain
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Company-wide
vision
Achieve a continuous, virtual accounting close
Achieved a consolidated retail and corporate close within a shortened period
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Finance
vision
HR
vision
Establish a continual feedback-and-improvement loop based on quarterly HR reports from the field and deployment of new capabilities
Migrate payroll, benefits, and absence management to Oracle cloud for 2023
Insource benefits administration
Maintaining momentum for transformation
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After
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