We arrived at the client as a Project Finance Controller in a context of lockdown, so with very few interactions with the colleagues and having to learn processes and systems from home.
The team was quite deforced by many departures and maternity leave with an accelerated handover of only 2 days.
By trying to get, step by step, the right information from the right person, we started elaborating the puzzle and working on a more or less independent basis, focusing more and more on the daily tasks described below.
Industry
A to Z project finance follow-up in an industrial production environment
The situation
The task
Our tasks and responsibilities were to:
• Participate in overall Project Management process jointly with Project Manager
• Be the main partner for the Financial Strategy success of the project
• Supervise, analyse and support for overall finance topics of the project
• Challenge and approve Project Financials
• Contribute effectively with the project initial setup (SAP project creation/parametrization, stakeholders’ meetings…)
• Prepare the budgeting and forecasting
• Manage and analyse costs, revenue and profitability
• Prepare timely forecasts for sales, costs, margin and cash
• Be responsible for the billing process and follow-up
• Support the finance teams in the monthly closing process and reporting Project financials in a suitable manner
• Analysis and follow-up of project cash-flow and project cash-curve
• Participate in overall Project Management process jointly with Project Manager
• Be the main partner for the Financial Strategy success of the project
• Supervise, analyse and support for overall finance topics of the project
• Challenge and approve Project Financials
• Contribute effectively with the project initial setup (SAP project creation/parametrization, stakeholders’ meetings…)
• Prepare the budgeting and forecasting
• Manage and analyse costs, revenue and profitability
• Prepare timely forecasts for sales, costs, margin and cash
• Be responsible for the billing process and follow-up
• Support the finance teams in the monthly closing process and reporting Project financials in a suitable manner
• Analysis and follow-up of project cash-flow and project cash-curve
The action
In order to succeed in the integration of our consultant in the team, many initiatives has been taken:
- Pick-up the phone, dare to ask questions to various stakeholders never met in real
- “Get our hands dirty” into systems (ERPs) and processes
- Master the daily work of a project finance controller thanks to a good dose of initiative and of course, a well-developed sense of analytics
The results
We managed to:
- Successfully adapt in a covid/teleworking context, in an industrial environment full of challenges in terms of systems, processes and people
- Efficiently integrate, both professionally and humanly speaking, while facing an offsite training/debut period
- Master succesfully of daily and requested tasks, allowing to further deepen financial analysis skills and performance with regards to answering ad-hoc requests, therefore bringing some added-value and impact for the client