Designing the finance function of the future needs strong management to lead change - Press Release issued by Association of Chartered Certified Accountants Pakistan.

Islamabad -- July 31, 2019 (PPI-OT)

Following is the text of press release issued by Association of Chartered Certified Accountants Pakistan (ACCA)

Quote

Insights on what will shape the future of the finance function are laid out in a new report from ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) and PwC called Finance: a journey to the future?

The report summarises the responses of over 1,100 members and PwC contacts worldwide plus the views of the attendees of a series of roundtable events on six hypotheses about the future of finance which were developed jointly by the ACCA and PwC. The findings for discussions with a core group of Pakistan respondents reveal:

1. 83 percent believe that accessible, trusted data will drive real time, customer centric decision making in their organisation

2. 75 percent accepted that trusted data will be open and accessible across the organisation between the present day and the longer-term horizon

3. 83 percent agreed that finance teams will spend a lot of their time on generating insights and will spend all their time on forward insights and not rearward review

4. 77 percent agreed that soon new roles, skills and career paths will be needed as traditional finance roles will disappear

5. 75 percent agree that a change in structures will make the finance function virtual

6. 51 percent believe the traditional CFO role will no longer exist - to be replaced by roles at the chief operating officer and chief strategy officer

Commenting on the report, Sajjeed Aslam, head of ACCA Pakistan said: 'Our results show that finance is changing at a rapid pace, and this is both a challenge and an opportunity. Interestingly, the biggest barrier to this change is leadership mind-set - alongside getting to grips with the technology that now pervades our working lives. It's knowledge of this technology that's key for the future - leaders need to keep up to speed on trends.'

Brian Furness, global head of finance consulting, PwC added: 'The need for trusted and accessible data that meets customers' needs came out top in these six scenarios, and I believe this is good news - alongside the other opportunities ahead, this is a real chance for finance to develop a more proactive, advisory function, where technology has been applied to minimise the operational finance workload and enable finance to focus on helping drive...