Organizations are now facing unprecedented uncertainty, volatility, and economic challenges. The current global recession, the result of a perfect storm of a number of micro and macro economic factors including loosely regulated sub-prime and predatory lending, mortgage-backed securities, decreasing housing prices, and the resulting credit crash has created an economic crisis not felt since the depression era. Organizations of all sizes and industries are finding they are simply not equipped to respond effectively to the growing crisis and predict likely future performance.

 

Now more than ever, CEOs and CFOs expect Finance to help manage enterprise performance, to partner to support growth, and to deliver insight—to be a major contributor to executing the strategy. Finance faces intense pressure to increase visibility and transparency, improve resource allocation capabilities, model and explain value drivers, identify and manage risk, and address regulatory requirements simultaneously. As the custodian of an organization’s planning and forecasting processes, as well as corporate information resources, the CFO has the responsibility to optimize the process of resource allocation, accurately and clearly present results to key stakeholders, and make the Finance function more responsive to the strategy.

 

Some companies will survive and top performing organizations will actually thrive following the financial chaos.  What do they know that you don’t? What do they focus on and what is their response in order to gain control, protect their core business, and leverage down-turn opportunities?

 

Palladium’s 2009 Planning & Budgeting Conference: Finding Clarity and Optimizing Performance in Uncertain Times provides the case studies, best practice dos and don’ts, and business leadership expertise that finance and strategy professionals find invaluable in helping them become an agile and high performance organization.

 

Delegates Will Learn How to…

• Leverage an integrated and flexible planning process
• Create better, faster, and more accurate forecasts
• Understand key strategic and operational performance drivers
• Incorporate scenario planning as a way to maximize performance
• Identify and manage risk in strategic and financial planning
• Accelerate cost optimization with the Balanced Scorecard
• Encourage a culture of change and financial accountability
• Optimize the allocation of resources
• And more…

 

Themes and Topics

 
1) Create Visibility
Organizations must be able to see more clearly into the future and understand and manage the business drivers impacting future performance. This theme focuses on:

• Improve Forecasting Quality, Speed and Accuracy
• Moving to a Rolling Forecast
• Develop Driver-Based Planning & Budgeting
• Align Strategic, Operational, and Financial Planning
• Provide Timely and Targeted Information via Scorecards

2) Gain Insight
How do organizations convert data and information assets into tangible insights that driver better decision-making? How do you ensure decisions are based on a comprehensive set of assumptions where a wide array of scenarios have been modeled, understood and factored into the planning process? This theme focuses on:

• Identify and Manage Risk
• Incorporate Scenario Planning
• Action-Oriented Planning
• Innovative Forecastingwith Prediction Markets
• Leveraging Technology

3) Improve Agility
How quickly can organizations “sense and respond” to changes in their internal and external environments?  This theme focuses on:

• Resource Allocation
• Cost Optimization
• Initiative Management
• Reporting and Analysis
• Measures and KPIs

4) Drive Performance
What do organizations need to do in order to establish and sustain a performance oriented culture?  How can a holistic management system clearly link strategic objectives to operational activities to financial plans and successfully drive performance? This theme will focus on:   

 

• Linking Strategic Planning to Operations
• Change Management
• Creating a Performance Driven & Financial Accountability Culture
• Finance Transformation & Process Improvements
• Becoming a Better Partner to the Organization 

Who Attends?

• CFOs, COOs, CEOs, Presidents
• VPs, Directors of Finance
• Controllers and Finance Managers
• Directors of Strategy and Operations
• Financial Planners and Forecasters
• Line of Business Leaders
• Finance Team Professionals
• Business Analysts
• Strategy Practitioners