• 4 Tips for a Faster and More Effective Budgeting Process: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 6, 2023

  These practices help organizations complete their budget quicker and with a better final product. Read the full article ➔

• Why a Smaller IT Headcount is Not Necessarily Better: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 2, 2023

  Use this guidance to make well-informed, data-driven decisions about your IT workforce. Read the full article ➔

• 3 Ways to Accelerate Travel Expense Approval and Reimbursement: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 5, 2023

  Companies that reimburse employees more quickly save time and money, while reducing finance teams' and employees' frustrations. Read the full article ➔

• 3 Ways to Control Uncollectible Balances: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 7, 2023

  Challenging and chaotic business environments teach us important lessons — if we are willing to learn them. For example, in 2020 the COVID-19 pandemic taught us that humans crave social interaction, parents generally don’t make very good math teachers, and your household should always have an amp... Read the full article ➔

• Is Your Chart of Accounts Too Long? Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 3, 2023

  The chart of accounts (COA) is a listing of the general ledger account names and identification numbers arranged in the order in which they customarily appear in financial statements. It can also include a description of what should be included in each account. The COA is a key accounting tool us... Read the full article ➔

• How Many Learning Days Should You Offer Employees? Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 5, 2023

  There is a certain complacency that many organizations start to develop once employees move beyond their onboarding and initial probationary period. Now that these employees are settling into their roles, the thinking goes, they do not require further learning or training. This is not the right w... Read the full article ➔

• Number of Finance FTEs Benchmarks AR Efficiency: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 1, 2023

  Accounts receivable (AR) is one of the most critical and high-volume processes that organizations carry out. Delays in this process mean less working capital and liquidity, making AR one area where improving efficiency can pay off exponentially.  One good way to measure the efficiency of your AR ... Read the full article ➔

• 5 Ways to Speed Up the Year-End Close: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 8, 2023

  The annual close comes during one of the heaviest workloads of the year for accountants. Month-end, quarter-end, and year-end closing processes converge in a perfect storm that takes time and energy away from operations-supporting daily activities. However, the best accounting teams don’t wait un... Read the full article ➔

• Cycle Time for Short-Term Cash Forecasting: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Jan. 3, 2023

  In moments of disruption — whether from a global pandemic, geopolitical conflict, a recession, or something else — the need to prepare an accurate short-term cash flow forecast becomes critical. The ability to create and adjust these forecasts quickly allows management to make better and more inf... Read the full article ➔

• How Much Does It Cost to Process an Invoice? Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Dec. 7, 2022

  The total cost to invoice customers is an important key performance indicator that measures the efficiency of your sales and accounting teams and the health of the invoicing process. After reviewing cross-industry data on the cost of invoicing, we’ll explore three areas where you can look deeper ... Read the full article ➔

• Too Many ERP Systems Are a Bad Thing: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 2, 2022

  Finance shared service centers (SSCs) provide a centralized team that carries out high-volume, repeatable finance processes on behalf of business units or areas across an enterprise. Organizations commonly choose this model to achieve process standardization and improvement, reduce errors, and br... Read the full article ➔

• How Much Revenue Should Each Employee Generate? Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Oct. 5, 2022

  A competitive labor market has placed enormous wage pressures on employers over the last few years. The result has been a material increase in labor costs for employers looking to backfill vacant positions, retain key personnel, or grow their business with added human resources. More than ever, o... Read the full article ➔

• Top Performers Automate 40% of Primary Controls: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 7, 2022

  If you’re not already automating your internal controls, you should be. The cost of controls technology has come way down while its capabilities have increased. Advanced controls automation is now accessible even to smaller organizations, and the return on investment is high. Automation not only ... Read the full article ➔

• Top Organizations Record Accounts Payable Cycle Time in 2.8 Days: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 3, 2022

  An optimized accounts payable (AP) process not only helps organizations take advantage of early pay discounts and favorable payment terms but is vital for cash flow management more broadly. But AP teams do not work in a vacuum — process excellence is partly a product of collaboration with other a... Read the full article ➔

• Best Organizations Report Consolidated Financials in 4 Days: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 6, 2022

  Consolidated financial statements enable organizations with a parent company and subordinate reporting units (e.g., subsidiaries, regional operations, or multiple locations) to report their finances as a single enterprise for creditors, investors, operational leaders, and other stakeholders. Prep... Read the full article ➔

• Fixing Invoice Errors Shouldn’t Take a Week: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 1, 2022

  Invoicing errors are a waste of time for all parties. The customer not only has to contact you (the supplier) to resolve the error, but your employees need to investigate its cause. Then, ideally, an employee has to take action to make sure the problem doesn’t recur.  Invoicing errors happen for ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: The Right Mix of New and Long-Serving Employees

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 5, 2022

  Highly-trained, knowledgeable, and well-tenured staff are some of the most critical assets of a business. Long-serving employees know their job inside and out, know processes intimately, and often have deep inter-company relationships that break down silos and foster collaboration.     Perry D. ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: The Cost of a Shared Services Center

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 4, 2022

  Imagine a grocery store chain with numerous stores across the country. Each store needs someone to process payroll, pay vendors, and carry out other key finance processes. Rather than hiring staff for accounts payable or payroll at every store, the business is likely to be part of a growing numbe... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Return On Invested Capital

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 2, 2022

  As countries begin to lift their pandemic restrictions and business leaders look toward post-COVID-19 business models, it’s important to ask whether the investments you made in 2020 (or earlier) still make sense. Reevaluating these investments can free up cash and enable investment in areas that ... Read the full article ➔

• Prevent Customers from Going Delinquent

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 2, 2022

  If cash is the lifeblood of a business, the revenue cycle is the circulatory system. The process of extending credit to customers, billing them for goods or services, and applying remittances to open receivables all pump blood through the body of a business. Delinquent customers and bad debt keep... Read the full article ➔

• Do You Spend Enough Time Assessing Strategic Risks?

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Jan. 26, 2022

  Strategic risks, such as the potential for a major supply chain disruption, a failed venture, or a massive cyberattack, can be difficult to assess. But companies have found effective ways of drilling into these risks and developing quick-response action plans. This month, we look at the averag... Read the full article ➔

• How to Lower Total Payroll Costs: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Dec. 6, 2021

  Everything seems to be getting more expensive. From wages and fuel costs to lumber prices, office paper, and essential grocery store items, very few areas of the economy have been spared from rising costs. Now is the time for a financial examination of all your business processes to determine if ... Read the full article ➔

• Cycle Time to Complete the Annual Budget: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 1, 2021

  Do you remember the classic holiday song, “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” by Andy Williams? Well, if you ask CFOs and business unit managers about their favorite time of year, few, if any, would say budgeting season. In some organizations, the budgeting process can start in June or eve... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Average Tenure of FP&A Employees

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Oct. 4, 2021

  Anyone who has participated in the corporate budgeting process knows that it can be an arduous endeavor. Without good collaboration and communication, this process can easily stretch into a lengthy exercise in which participants battle over strategic items like sales targets, capital investments,... Read the full article ➔

• How Many of Your Primary Controls Are Preventive?

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 1, 2021

  When I started my auditing career during the rollout of Sarbanes-Oxley, there was sustained debate within the industry as to which type of internal control was better: preventive or detective. While preventive controls are intended to prevent unauthorized or unwanted activities and variances from... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: How Far Off Is Your Sales Forecast?

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 3, 2021

  Sales forecasting is a discipline that any strong finance team will want to master. It’s especially important in industries where the majority of operating costs are fixed. When it’s reliable and accurate, the sales forecast can help leaders manage staffing levels, production schedules, capital e... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Personnel Cost of Finance

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 6, 2021

  Costs are rising across the board as the U.S. economy continues to move forward from a short but deep recession, and labor costs are no exception to this trend. Many employees who kept their jobs in 2020 were happy to stay put, but 2021 is a new year and the labor market is much more competitive.... Read the full article ➔

• Assessing Cyber Risk: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 1, 2021

  An employee recently received an email from me, letting him know that I was in an important meeting and asking if he could text me. The only problem was that it wasn’t me. “Fake Perry,” as we call the would-be scammer, had been messaging our employees in an attempt to gain access to the company’s... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Total Cost to Process T&E Reimbursements

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 3, 2021

  Business travel took a serious hit in 2020, dropping by an unprecedented 97%. As the world economy forges ahead in 2021, many experts anticipate an immediate spike in travel demand that will increase rates for airfare, hotels, restaurants, and rental cars. It’s understandable if your travel and e... Read the full article ➔

• Total Cost to Manage Taxes: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 1, 2021

  It has been said that the only certainties in life are death and taxes. And unless your company is a large corporation with teams of lobbyists in Washington, D.C., it’s a certainty that your organization is going to pay a lot of taxes to a lot of entities — income taxes, payroll taxes, property t... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Invoices Billed to Customers With Credit Terms

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 1, 2021

  Decisions to extend or withhold credit can be difficult to make at any time and in any economy. In a global pandemic and economic downturn, these decisions can be even more difficult as businesses struggle to manage cash flow and keep the lights on. Every company wants to bring new customers in t... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Avoiding Payroll Bottlenecks

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 1, 2021

  Payroll is a critical business process that requires coordination and teamwork to run effectively. Even if much of the process is digitized, automated, and outsourced, manual touchpoints can still exist. Employees may have to enter and submit their hours, managers approve them, and payroll staff ... Read the full article ➔

• Producing Management Reports Faster: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Jan. 4, 2021

  Period-end management reports are an important form of decision-making support that helps leaders gain insight into specific business areas. These reports typically include financial highlights, graphical analyses, and comments on trends or variance from expected results. They also provide a foun... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Time Allocation in Finance

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Dec. 7, 2020

  Where does the time go in finance? At a high level, it may be obvious that your finance team is carrying out activities like transaction processing, setting controls, and providing decision support for the business throughout the week, but which activities get the lion’s share of finance’s time? ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Number of FTEs Performing the Order-to-Cash Process

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 3, 2020

  Order-to-cash (O2C) is an end-to-end process that encompasses all the steps that a company carries out from the time it receives an order to the point at which it receives full payment for the order. It includes managing sales orders, processing customer credit, delivering products and services t... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: What is the Ideal Number of Budget Iterations?

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Oct. 1, 2020

  Budgeting season is upon us, and the usual stresses and headaches that come along with it will likely be compounded by an especially volatile year. Reviewing and editing draft after draft of your budget will be time consuming, frustrating, and may even risk disengagement from your stakeholders. I... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Cash-to-Cash Cycle Time

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 2, 2020

  Cash-to-cash cycle time, also known as the cash conversion cycle (CCC), measures the amount of time it takes for a company to convert resources like inventory or investments in production into cash from sales. CCC is a critical measure of a business’s health and cash efficiency. If cash isn’t com... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Uncollectable Balances as a Percentage of Revenue

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 4, 2020

  In a chaotic business environment hampered by a global pandemic, many vendors, suppliers, and other businesses are holding “bad debt” in the form of payments owed that will never be collected from customers. When does a finance chief know his or her company is holding too much bad debt, and what ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Total Cost to Reward and Retain Employees

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 1, 2020

  In times of economic downturn, it is incumbent on every finance leader to take a hard look at spending and make cuts as needed to keep the business strong. While every cost should be on the table, this month I’m going to advocate a move that may seem counterintuitive. If you have the finances to ... Read the full article ➔

• Short-Term Cash-Flow Forecasting: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 2, 2020

  Over the last two months, the need to prepare an accurate short-term cash flow forecast for my board of directors and CEO has never been greater. The ability to prepare or adjust these forecasts quickly has allowed us to make better and more informed decisions about our cash needs, investments, a... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Days Sales Outstanding

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 4, 2020

  As the economic impacts of COVID-19 continue to unfold in the United States and around the world, many organizations face hard decisions. For example, a recent survey of finance executives by CFO found that 50% of organizations are scaling back or delaying investments right now, while 35% are lay... Read the full article ➔

• Increase DPO, If You Can: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 1, 2020

  One month ago, few people could have fully anticipated the scenario in which we now collectively find ourselves: Businesses and borders shuttered throughout the world, economic uncertainty for many workers, and a global economy edging toward recession. Many organizations are understandably concer... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Detect and Prevent Duplicate or Erroneous Payments

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 3, 2020

  No one likes to be charged twice or overpay for a product or service, and the same is true for organizations. The sinking feeling a consumer might feel when they realize they’ve been charged twice is magnified exponentially for CFOs when they realize that because of an error somewhere in accounts... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Total Cost to Manage and Process Collections

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 4, 2020

  In a perfect world, every customer would pay every invoice in full and would do so in a timely way. Unfortunately (and as any CFO knows), that’s not the world in which we live. Collections is an essential process for working down outstanding accounts receivable and unpaid balances to bring in cas... Read the full article ➔

• Total Cost to Perform the Finance Function: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Jan. 2, 2020

  The beginning of a year is a great time to evaluate the effectiveness of the finance function and the role it plays in helping drive a company’s success. This month’s metric — total cost to perform the finance function as a percentage of revenue — is part of a set of finance process key performan... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Days to Perform a Site-Level Annual Close

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Dec. 3, 2019

  December marks the final month of the fiscal year for many companies. That means that the year-end closing process is here, accompanied by its attendant work spikes and stresses. The annual close comes during one of the heaviest workload periods of the year for accountants, as month-end, quarter-... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Cycle Time To Perform a Financial Evaluation of New Products

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 4, 2019

  How long does it take your finance team to perform financial evaluations for new products? Have you thought about why it takes as long as it does and what might be causing delays in the process? Have you considered the benefits of this process happening faster? This month’s metric, the cycle time... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Return on Invested Capital

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Oct. 1, 2019

  October falls in the middle of a busy planning season for many organizations, which is the perfect time for this month’s metric on return on invested capital (ROIC). This measure calculates the amount of gain made on invested capital relative to the cost of investment, which gives an organization... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Days Cash on Hand

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 3, 2019

  This month’s metric, days cash on hand, measures the number of days that an organization can continue paying its operating expenses with the amount of cash currently available. If sales revenue suddenly dried up or an unexpected catastrophe interrupted the business, an organization with substanti... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: How Quickly Businesses Adapt to New Risks

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 6, 2019

  Risks pose a financial and reputational threat to organizations that can be disastrous if left unchecked. The good news is that the warning signs of risks are often hiding in plain sight for those careful enough to look. For example, there were plenty of early warning signs ahead of the Great Rec... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Total Cost to ‘Manage Taxes’

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 9, 2019

  Taxes are a complicated area of business that often requires carefully designed strategy and planning. In addition to income taxes, an organization has to be mindful of regulations involving property taxes, sales and use taxes, and excise taxes, among others. The situation is even more complicate... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Total Cost of Budgeting and Forecasting

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 3, 2019

  Plans, budgets, and forecasts can be some of the most valuable contributions that finance makes to the business. Ideally, they help organizations know what’s coming down the road and remain agile enough to respond to uncertainty and to keep the business moving forward. At the same time, planning,... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Formal Succession Planning Lacking

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 1, 2019

  Succession plans help organizations develop and retain key talent, increase engagement, diversify the pool of potential leaders, and mitigate risk with respect to key positions in leadership and operations. Strong succession planning is critical for any organization because in life there are trul... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Percentage of Approved Capital Projects Considered Within or On Budget

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 1, 2019

  Capital projects often require significant investments of an organization’s finances, time, human capital, and other resources. These projects are significant undertakings that can cost tens of millions of dollars or even more. When capital projects go off the rails and over budget, the consequen... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Number of Accounts in the Chart of Accounts

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 4, 2019

  APQC is currently in the middle of transitioning to a new ERP system. In my role as CFO, the most challenging part of this project by far has been cleaning up our chart of accounts as we make the move. With more than 5,000 accounts, our chart of accounts has gotten incredibly bloated over the yea... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Establishing the Daily Cash Position

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 4, 2019

  The volatility of the stock market over the last few months has many concerned that the longest bull market in American history may be drawing to a close. Uncertain financial times emphasize the need for organizations to take stock of whether they are positioned to withstand whatever might come. ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Finance FTEs Per $1B in Revenue

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Jan. 8, 2019

  The number of people it takes to keep the finance wheel in continuous motion can vary widely from organization to organization. But when you calculate the ratio of finance team members per $1 billion in revenue, then compare that figure across multiple organizations in multiple industries, the re... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Business Entity Revenue Per Employee

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Dec. 5, 2018

  When organizations make hiring decisions, they’re counting on the people they bring onboard to be well worth the investment. Whether an employee is in a revenue-generating role or serving in an administrative or support capacity, the ratio of revenue generated to each employee can be a key indica... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Automated Primary Controls

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Nov. 5, 2018

  If you’re not already automating your internal controls, you should be. The cost of the technology has come way down, while its capabilities have increased. Advanced controls automation is now accessible even to smaller organizations, and the return on investment is high. Automation not only effe... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Cycle Time to Prepare the Financial Forecast

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Oct. 8, 2018

  Financial forecasting is a high priority for CFOs, and doing it more efficiently and accurately is an admirable goal. Yet so much has been written about forecast accuracy that it is has become one of the myths of modern finance. When managers chase accuracy, the mere act of forecasting often caus... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Learning Days Per Employee

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Sept. 10, 2018

  In the finance world, on-the-job learning never ends. Giving your team hands-on training and stretch assignments are excellent ways to help them grow in their careers, but they don’t take the place of formal learning programs that give them the tools they need to take the finance organization to ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Number of Budget Versions

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Aug. 6, 2018

  Though summer is still in full swing, CFOs’ thoughts have already turned toward next year. Thus begins the annual budgeting season, with the inevitable multiple versions making their way through endless rounds of approvals. The number of budget versions before final approval reflects the efficien... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Uncollectible Balances

  By Perry D. Wiggins • July 5, 2018

  More than half of organizations consider customers’ adherence to payment terms to be a key indicator of the credit function’s performance. But all too often, organizations take an unrealistically optimistic outlook on past-due receivables — even when deep down, they know that the likelihood of co... Read the full article ➔

• The Real Cost of Invoicing: Metric of the Month

  By Perry D. Wiggins • June 6, 2018

  For this month’s metric, we focus on the cost to invoice customers, per invoice processed, as reported to APQC’s Customer Credit and Invoicing Open Standards Benchmarking survey by 896 organizations. The process of invoicing a customer, for purposes of this benchmark, includes maintaining custome... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Days Sales Outstanding Measures Efficiency

  By Perry D. Wiggins • May 9, 2018

  Days sales outstanding is a key measure of a finance team’s efficiency and is closely linked to days cash on hand and liquidity. Every organization is happy to have sales, but closing sales isn’t enough to keep a business afloat. Collections are key — and the faster the money comes in, the more b... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Shared Services

  By Perry D. Wiggins • April 2, 2018

  A growing number of organizations are choosing to move common or repetitive finance processes from far-flung corners of their organization to a centralized shared services center, aiming to reduce cost while improving productivity and efficiency. This month’s metric comes from the Financial Share... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Cycle Time for Monthly Close

  By Perry D. Wiggins • March 5, 2018

  When fewer days are devoted to the month-end close, more days can be spent providing finance expertise to organizational initiatives and decisions. By getting a grip on data quality, troubleshooting process glitches, and working ahead, finance teams can save time and put it to good use on higher ... Read the full article ➔

• Metric of the Month: Accounts Payable Cost

  By Perry D. Wiggins • Feb. 5, 2018

  For some companies, processing accounts payable is a time-consuming, detail-intensive function. For others, it’s a quick and easy task. But before jumping to conclusions about your company’s relative process performance, take the time to view data through multiple lenses: intra-company, intra-ind... Read the full article ➔