Controller’s Book of Key Benchmarks

icon Research Report on Benchmarks, Accounting & Performance Measurement, Accounts Payable, Credit & Collections, Financial Leadership, Security, Best Practices, Charts and Graphs, Managing Accounts Payable, Managing Credit & Collections, Managing the Budget Process & Financial Close, Policies and Procedures, Research  •  posted 06/15/11

This guide will give you all the key F&A benchmarks needed to oversee, set goals for – and manage – the financial close; the budget process; the accounts payable department and functions; the credit, AR and collections department and functions; and the security department and functions.

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At last – controllers now have in one concise resource, all the key F&A benchmarks needed to oversee, set goals for, and manage the:

• Financial Close
• Budget Process
• Accounts Payable Department and Functions
• Credit, AR and Collections Department and Functions
• Security Department and Functions

This new guide from IOFM provides you with benchmarks for each area–along with their interpretations–based on individual surveys conducted over the past two years by IOMA’s Institute of Finance & Management (IOFM) of the professionals responsible for managing the functions in each area.

32 Key Questions this resource will help you answer:

On the Financial Close:

• Should we be completing our accounting closes more rapidly?
• Do we perform too much account reconciliation or data rework during the closing crunch?
• Does the complexity of our corporate reporting prolong our closes?
• Would simplified information technology (IT) systems shorten this process?
• Do we make good use of best practices?

On the Budget Process:

• How many line items are tracked in the annual budget – can we budget with fewer?
• How many budget iterations do companies perform – can we do with just 1 or 2?
• How many weeks does it require to complete the annual budget – can we do it in half the time or less?
• Do we link the budget to corporate strategy?
• Is the information we produce through budgeting realistic and relevant?
• Is excessive detail and false precision diminishing the value of our budget?

In Accounts Payable:

• Are our processing costs and staff productivity at optimal levels?
• Is our incidence of duplicate payments and check fraud normal?
• Are our error rates at acceptable levels?
• Do we have the right operational policies and procedures?
• How much can higher levels of automation help us to improve our benchmark comparisons?

In Credit, AR and Collections:

• Are we using the top 3 best practices for maximizing performance in credit, receivables, and collections?
• Can we automate deduction management?
• Should we make use of automation of credit decisioning?
• Should we be further along in the use of electronic invoicing?
• Is our annual bad-debt write-offs as a percentage of sales out of line?
• Is our percent over 60 days past due higher than it should be?
• Do we take too long to approve a new order?
• Should we refigure our auto write-off tolerance?
• Are we using the top strategies to control credit and collection costs and improve efficiencies?

In Security Operations:

• Should we like others in our industry and size of organization do an annual physical security audit?
• Are our employees as aware as they should be of security issues and procedures?
• Should we be doing unannounced security penetration testing?
• Are we spending too much or too little on security?
• Is our rate of workplace violence and theft within acceptable ranges?
• Are we under staffed for security?
• How does our security response times compare to industry norms?

IOFM’s research and analysis of these markets for the past 15 years, plus our editorial cov­erage and interviews with industry experts and professionals in each area over the past decade, give us the unique expertise and resources to tie together the benchmarks for these key functions into one report. The specific research reports relied upon for this book in­clude IOMA’s Guide to Improving the Financial Close, IOMA’s Guide to Improving the Budget Process: Benchmarks & Best Practices, Accounts Payable Benchmarks & Analysis 2011, Credit and Collections Benchmarks & Analysis 2010, and Security Budgets & Cost Containment Strategies 2010.

No-Risk Web Offer: You get IOFM's Ironclad 100% Money-Back Guarantee: if you're dissatisfied with your report for any reason, return it within 30 days and you'll receive a full refund — with no questions asked.

Preview this report's Table of Contents.