“I believe it’s all about productivity. It’s about how I can take many systems and simplify them. By systems, I mean, both technology as well as business processes. It’s really about how can I take that technology, and make people’s jobs a bit more interesting”.
– Don McLean, PKF Digital.
What are your options when your tech stack is bursting at the seams? You’re struggling to get visibility over what’s happening. You’re balancing multiple spreadsheets and you’re spending a lot of time consolidating data.
If you are trying to resolve your business’s data overwhelm, these are some of your options:
ONE: Spring cleans all the files and all the data. Merge duplicates, expunge old data, and trim down the data files.
TWO: Call in the professionals: Engage a professional cloud integrator to review your setup and advise on any efficiency opportunities.
THREE: Multi-Entity Consolidation solutions: Various reporting solutions, like Fathom have a multi-entity financial reporting tool to help you compare and consolidate your organisations.
A new solution on the market that you may not have heard of is Translucent.io, which I’ve recently started working with. It turns your existing single-entity accounting system into a multi-entity accounting solution. You connect your existing accounting software (Xero, QBO, etc.) and Translucent consolidates all your data to create a single financial system of record. Translucent Apps provide workflows for your muli-entity needs, such as searching for transactions at the group level, creating consolidated reporting, managing intercompany transactions, live connecting your data to spreadsheets, and more apps being released every quarter.
While you may not have heard of Translucent before, you likely heard of Dext or Receipt Bank. The founder and good friend of mine, Michael Woods, is the founder of Translucent.io. He’s built it as a tool he would have liked when running Receipt Bank.
FOUR: Anothe option here is to migrate to an ERP solution. This is something you can potentially explore with a Cloud Integrator. As you start to move into this area, you want to engage an experienced specialist who can give you an unbiased assessment of your options to help you know what is possible, and suggest options to future-proof your business.
Each option has a different price point, and it’s important to understand the scoping, implementation, training, maintenance and ongoing costs involved. Likewise, assess how many hours a solution will save you once implemented, and whether will it enable your business to scale.
It’s a different scenario, but I ummed and ahhed about a costly website rebuild, and finally went ahead with it. The day it launched, a new client contacted me through the website and that single engagement paid for the entire website rebuild and more!! So sometimes you have to spend money to make money.
What I’m going to do is drop in three short interviews I conducted while attending the conference. You may realise that I’ve already released these interviews individually, but the benefit of releasing them together is that the final podcast will be over an hour in length, which means you can pop across to EarMark CPE and earn CPE for listening and answering a few questions about the episode.
First Interview | Scott Wiltshire, Vice President & GM, Oracle NetSuite ANZ
Scott Wiltshire discusses NetSuite’s evolution as a cloud-based ERP solution and its wide-ranging functionalities, including financials, inventory management, and omnichannel commerce. Scott highlights NetSuite’s unique cloud-native architecture, regular updates, and its focus on adopting leading practices for ERP implementation. The conversation also covers the specific needs of Australian and New Zealand businesses, the integration of AI in NetSuite, and the company’s approach to customer engagement and growth support.
Second Interview | Don McLean, CEO of PKF Digital
This episode covers the triggers that indicate to small businesses they may need to consider an ERP solution. It explores the 20-year evolution of NetSuite and PKF Digital partnership and shares a case study on how NetSuite improved Thermomix’s profits and efficiencies.
Third Interview | Sarah Ryjna, Global Systems Manager Grace Loves Lace
We discuss how Grace Loves Lace uses NetSuite for scaling their operations internationally, focusing on features like WMS, dashboards, and OneWorld for inventory and order management, financials, and multi-country operations. Sarah also shares her insights on making the most of NetSuite, emphasising the use of operational dashboards and engaging with the NetSuite user community.
Curated lists of announcements from the conference:
NetSuite Australia Newsroom: everything under ‘October’ is a SuiteWorld-related announcement
YouTube video – Evan Goldberg on 25 years and the power of the Suite
LinkedIn article – Lessons learned over 25 years
NetSuite banks suite success on AI.
https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/tech/accounting-software/netsuite-banks-suite-success-on-ai
Generative AI takes centre stage at SuiteWorld.
NetSuite Unveils New Innovations to Help Businesses Do More. https://www.oracle.com/news/announcement/suiteworld-netsuite-unveils-new-innovations-to-help-businesses-do-more-with-less-2023-10-17/
SuiteWorld 2023: NetSuite’s day-two announcements – IT PRO. https://www.itpro.com/news/live/suiteworld-2023-netsuites-day-one-announcements
NetSuite SuiteWorld 2023: the biggest news – Software – CRN Australia. https://www.crn.com.au/news/netsuite-suiteworld-2023-the-biggest-news-601358
5 CFO Takeaways From NetSuite’s SuiteWorld 2023 | CFO. https://www.cfo.com/news/5-cfo-takeaways-from-netsuites-suiteworld-2023/697288/
Oracle NetSuite Embeds Generative AI Throughout the Suite to Help Organizations Boost Productivity.
Cohere Taps NetSuite to Scale Business Processes and Meet Global AI Demand.
Oracle Acquires Next Technik | NetSuite.
https://www.netsuite.com/portal/company/newsroom/netsuite-acquires-next-technik.shtml
The Accounting Podcast QuickBooks Launches Bill Pay | NetSuite Adds AI | How Financial Fraud Will Fill CPA Pipeline. https://accounting.show/355
Evan Goldberg on NetSuite Turning 25 and Pushing Boundaries with AI. https://accounting.show/episodes/evan-goldberg-on-netsuite-turning-25-and-pushing-boundaries-with-ai
The NetSuite User Groups on LinkedIn.
I partner with Fathom and Translucent.io. I was hosted by Oracle NetSuite to attend NetSuite SuiteWorld 2023 in Las Vegas during October ‘23. The conference was celebrating NetSuite’s 25th anniversary, and it was the first foray into the Netsuite world.
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