5 Tools That Help Finance Teams Drive Business Strategy
A finance team that delivers reliable reports is not the same as one that influences the company’s direction. One explains the previous month’s performance. The other helps leadership understand what may happen next month, which investments are justified, where risk is emerging and what the financial consequences of proposed decisions may be.
Finance teams in mid-market organisations are generally capable of making this more strategic contribution. Their limitation is rarely expertise. Instead, their time is absorbed by operational work: manual processes, month-end reconciliations and report preparation. That leaves limited room for the analysis and advisory activity that can materially advance the business. These five platforms help address that issue.
1. Sage Intacct: Cloud-Based Financial Management Platform
Sage Intacct provides the underlying infrastructure for a strategic finance function. Through its real-time general ledger, automated close procedures and multi-dimensional reporting, the platform takes responsibility for producing accurate financial information instead of leaving that work with the finance team. Month-end close periods typically reduce significantly following implementation, as automated processes replace manual tasks that previously required substantial team time.
Its open API links Sage Intacct with the other tools used by a growing business. Rather than operating as a disconnected system that needs manual updates, it becomes the financial centre through which the wider technology environment operates. For teams currently dedicating most of their effort to administration, Sage Intacct can create capacity for broader work.
- A real-time general ledger supports current financial visibility.
- Automated close processes reduce manual month-end activity.
- Multi-dimensional reporting improves financial analysis.
- An open API connects the platform with other business tools.
- Automation enables finance teams to spend less time reporting on the past and more time advising on the future.
Why it matters: When a financial platform automates data production, finance teams can shift time away from historical reporting and towards future-focused advice.
2. Culture Amp: Employee Engagement and Performance Platform
An employee engagement platform may appear unexpected in a list focused on finance team effectiveness. However, the relationship is clear. A finance function can only serve as a strategic asset when its people are performing well and remain supported. Teams affected by high turnover, weak engagement or ineffective management lose institutional knowledge and must devote disproportionate effort to recruiting and onboarding new employees.
Culture Amp supplies data on engagement, wellbeing and performance. This enables finance leaders to manage teams proactively, identify concerns before they lead to attrition and establish the conditions needed for the sustained high performance associated with strategic financial management.
Why it matters: A finance team’s value as a strategic asset depends ultimately on the strength and continuity of its people. Culture Amp offers data that supports deliberate management of that asset.
3. Salesforce: CRM and Revenue Intelligence Platform
For mid-market organisations with a sales function, connecting CRM pipeline information to the financial system is among the most valuable integrations a finance team can support. Once Salesforce is linked with Sage Intacct, pipeline activity becomes an input to financial planning rather than remaining a separate source of commercial information.
Forecasts that incorporate live pipeline data, deal-stage conversion rates and historic close rates are materially more accurate than forecasts based only on historic averages. With this connected perspective, finance teams can deliver revenue projections that leadership can use as a credible foundation for hiring and investment decisions instead of treating them as estimates.
Why it matters: Live CRM information strengthens revenue forecasting, allowing finance teams to operate as credible commercial partners rather than solely as reporters of past results.
4. Looker: Business Intelligence and Data Exploration Platform
Even highly capable financial platforms have limitations in addressing complex, multi-dimensional questions about organisational performance. Looker is a business intelligence platform that integrates with Sage Intacct and other data sources. It gives users a flexible, queryable view of operational and financial information without requiring IT support or the creation of new reports from the beginning.
Teams using Looker can respond to business questions in hours instead of days because information is continually available and non-technical users can investigate it directly through the interface. As a result, finance is more likely to be regarded as commercially informed and responsive rather than as a bottleneck.
Why it matters: Business intelligence platforms that make financial information accessible and explorable for the leadership team can move finance from a reporting centre to an insight centre.
5. Anaplan: Connected Planning Platform
Anaplan enables finance teams to create dynamic, scenario-based financial models that automatically update as actual results are received. In businesses where annual budgets become outdated within weeks of being established, the platform provides an ongoing planning model based on the company’s current position rather than a view captured months earlier.
The platform connects with Sage Intacct, allowing actual financial results to feed directly into planning models. Scenario analysis can therefore reflect real financial data instead of estimates. Finance teams that implement Anaplan commonly describe moving from being asked to provide analysis to being invited to lead strategic discussions, as the quality and timeliness of their financial insight improve substantially.
Why it matters: Connected planning based on live financial data allows finance teams to progress from preparing reports to shaping business strategy.
Common Questions
What should finance teams do first to move from an operational role to a strategic one?
The first step is almost always automating financial data production. If a team spends most of its time on manual processes, reconciliations and report creation, strategic activity will remain out of reach regardless of its skill level. A financial platform that automates these activities creates the time and mental capacity needed for higher-value work.
When do businesses usually see a return on investment after improving their finance platform?
For most businesses moving to Sage Intacct, the clearest early improvement is the month-end close period, which typically reduces significantly during the first two or three cycles following implementation. Longer-term benefits, such as stronger forecast accuracy, improved strategic decisions and lower finance team overhead relative to business scale, emerge over the first six to twelve months. Businesses that consistently measure these outcomes find that the investment pays back well within the first year.
Is a larger team needed for finance to become more strategic?
Not necessarily. In many situations, the reverse is true. With suitable automation and connected planning tools, a finance team can provide greater strategic value with the same headcount, or even fewer people, than a team completing equivalent work manually. The objective is not to add people but to create more capacity per person for higher-value work.
How do finance teams generally demonstrate strategic value to the board?
The most effective finance presentations for boards usually centre on a limited number of carefully selected leading indicators, supported by clear trend lines and forward-looking analysis, rather than extensive historical reporting. Real-time dashboards linked to platforms such as Looker can be prepared in hours instead of days, while providing analysis that is considerably richer than manual report production permits.
What does having a place at the strategic table mean for a finance function?
It means participating in decisions before they are made rather than reporting on outcomes once they have occurred. Finance teams with a genuine strategic role are consulted on acquisitions, significant hires, pricing decisions, market entry and capital allocation before those choices are finalised. This depends on the credibility created by consistently accurate, current financial data, as well as the capacity gained by avoiding complete absorption in operational reporting.