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Transforming Finance: Four Ways to Catalyze Change
In a global shift, finance leaders in public sectors are increasingly stepping beyond their traditional roles as bean counters and back- functionaries. Instead, they're taking on strategic roles that impact early-stage business planning, such as ding senior management with prioritization, allocation of resources, and informed decision-making based on the costs, risks, value, and returns associated with projects.
Governments recognize this shift's importance in enhancing service delivery efficiency, reducing risk exposure, mitigating fraud, and optimizing public value. The Ministry of Finance and Civil Service College explored The Value of Finance Leaders in Public Sectors to understand how organizations can leverage these transformations effectively.
Through interviews with finance leaders worldwide, the study pinpointed four key strategies for transforming finance roles:
Leadership commitment is crucial at the onset. Organizations should reinforce this by allocating sufficient and technological resources to finance transformation projects. Senior management must communicate the need for staff to embrace changes in their duties-such as participating in strategic planning, collaborating with cross-functional project teams earlier than before-and the shift towards integrating financial expertise into policy formulation.
Attracting and nurturing talent is vital. To build advanced finance functions, agencies should seek out new personnel while investing in current workforce skills through trning programs focused on technical competencies like IT systems management, treasury administration, and financial accounting, as well as soft skills for effective communication, negotiation, persuasion, and emotional intelligence.
Establishing such a culture necessitates revisiting incentive schemes and performance management metrics for senior management. Key Performance Indicators KPIs should include resource use efficiency and compliance standards enforcement accountability to ensure fraud prevention remns robust.
To optimize finance staff's involvement, technology investments can streamline routine processes by implementing new systems progressively across individual business units rather than the entire agency at once. This phased approach facilitates gradual refinement and perfection while boosting finance's reputation-encouraging other departments to follow suit.
Celia Lee from Civil Service College’s Institute of Public Administration and Management was part of a team that wrote Finance Leaders in Public Sector: Value, Roles, and Responsibilities. Her research includes Forensic Data Analytics: Fraud Detection and Prevention in Public Sector Procurement and a comparative study on talent management among Singapore, Malaysia, and Thland.
POSTED ON
July 2, 2014
TEXT BY
Celia Lee
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Public Service Division - Challenge
This article is reproduced from: https://psdchallenge.psd.gov.sg/ideas/work-better/four-ways-to-transform-finance-in-your-organisation
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Finance Transformation Strategies in Public Sectors Elevating Finance Leaders Roles in Government Public Sectors Shift from Traditional Finance Cultivating Risk Conscious Culture for Efficiency Innovative Technology Integration in Finance Nurturing Talent and Skills in Finance Departments