^The APQC Blog

Business process management is a proven operating model to help organizations reduce variability, increase standardization, and improve process performance. APQC recently interviewed the Global Credit-to-Cash Process Owner at Minnesota-based Cargill Inc., a multinational food, agriculture, nutrition, and risk management company. Prompted by a major reorganization, the finance function at Cargill centralized its operations to leverage a process focus and redesigned its service model in terms of people, processes, data, and technology.

With talent demand high and supply low, your organization can’t afford to make hiring mistakes. A quick Google search pulls up a bounty of articles on hiring mistakes and how to avoid them. In this blog, I am sharing five common hiring mistakes and tips for avoiding them—all based on APQC benchmarking and best practices research that you can trust.

Organizations are funneling vast amounts of time and money into digitalization. And while there’s a lot of advice about which tech to buy and business areas to invest in, the people side of digitalization is also important. Without a people-focused strategy, digitalization can amplify organizational silos and breed discontent in the workforce. I talked with Dr. Carla O’Dell to learn how organizations can take a smarter approach to digitalization.

APQC published its recent Metric of the Month examining the number of budget versions before final approval. It discusses ways organizations organize their budgeting practices to minimize the number of versions needed to get one that is finally ready to send forward for Board approval. When evaluating the key metrics for finance organizations, tracking the number of budget versions has always perplexed me.

APQC asked process management experts about the keys to driving decisions with data, common mistakes while using benchmarks and analytics, and why selecting the right measures is so critical. These experts will be speaking at APQC’s Process & Performance Management Conference October 1-5.

The roundtable participants include:

Accounts receivable (AR) is a core finance transactional process that lies at the heart of an organization’s liquidity and working capital management. APQC takes a process-based view in order to facilitate benchmarking and process improvement, and defines the AR process as all of the important activities to receive and apply cash from customers for goods and services, including establishing AR policies, receiving and depositing customer payments, applying cash remittances, preparing AR reports, and posting AR activity to the general ledger.

 APQC recently conducted research within our members to better understand their burning platforms and the plans they’re executing to address them. Turns out APQC members have never been more focused on the enterprise view, driven by the focus on improving “the End to End Customer Experience.” APQC members shared that their plans to eliminate functional silos are more intense than ever before, and the digital/technological disruption increasingly permeating their organizations is creating a demand for process changes unlike anything they have seen in years.

I recently spoke with Kevin De Pree, vice-president of Rand Group, to discuss the common organizational challenges related to data and analytics and gaps in common analytics to support organizations’ data and analytics needs.   

Why do organizations continue to struggle with foundational elements of culture and effective application for data and analytics?

APQC asked process management experts about the importance of value chain in process improvements, and tactics to create sustainable improvements. These experts will be speaking at APQC’s Process & Performance Management Conference October 1-5.

Where should knowledge management sit on the org chart? I’ve been asked this question countless times, usually by KM leaders hoping to get their programs in front of the right influencers. My traditional answer is a little wishy-washy and boils down to: KM programs can—and do—report almost anywhere, and the best option depends on context.