A new survey by accounting automation software leader BlackLine, suggests that more than half of US-based Finance & Accounting (F&A) professionals are continuing to prioritize their organization’s finance transformation goals, with 53% of respondents indicating the COVID-19 pandemic has had just ‘some’ or ‘little to no impact’ on these initiatives moving forward.
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With very little warning or time to prepare, many F&A teams were thrust into a new world of distributed work and their first-ever virtual period-end close with the onset of the global pandemic. With many organizations now evaluating the success of their first virtual quarter-, and in some cases year-end, close, BlackLine polled over 780 F&A professionals in the United States to gauge how they navigated this new reality of uncertainty and change.
The findings reveal key challenges created by the unprecedented shift to a distributed working environment. Of those surveyed, close to half (44%) cite communication and collaboration as an obstacle to closing virtually, with 31% citing technology and infrastructure. Eighty-two percent of respondents said they feel closing virtually with a distributed workforce will impact their audit and/or other third-party engagements. But, encouragingly, the survey findings also reveal 40% expect to witness a new urgency to embrace technology within their organization post-crisis.
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BlackLine enables F&A teams to seamlessly adapt to changing circumstances, enabling collaboration, visibility and control to complete a close from any location, making it an ideal solution for distributed working environments. Implementing new technology can help companies close with confidence during the current crisis and beyond, according to Ventana Research, a leading US-based technology industry research and advisory services firm.
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