Kin + Carta (Valtech) Uses Planful for Financial Performance Management With More Speed, Insights, and Collaboration

Valtech (formerly Kin + Carta) is a global digital transformation consultancy with offices in 26 countries, including Germany, France, UAE, Argentina, Kosovo, Poland, the U.S., and other countries worldwide. It moved to Planful to eliminate slow, manual effort and reduce reliance on spreadsheets and continues to find new ways to use Planful to make financial performance management a team sport. It even credits its use of Planful as critical to accelerating Valtech’s acquisition of Kin + Carta.

Like many organizations, Valtech relied extensively on spreadsheets and outdated software to run finance, budgeting, planning, and other financial processes. It consumed much time, which kept the team from effectively analyzing data, engaging with the business, and answering strategic questions.

“We were just number crunching in a tool, so we didn’t have the time to get into conversations with our senior leadership,” recalled Dominic Hawkes, Head of FP&A at Valtech. “We had forecasting and monthly consolidation in spreadsheets and then manually loaded them into the system each month.”

Dominic recognized the need for change, especially as the business grew and increased economic volatility was on the horizon. He saw the potential in finding and deploying a more modern, globally-capable, intuitive financial performance management solution. This would address its current challenges and provide a platform for future growth amid a fast-changing business environment.

Valtech selected Planful after thoroughly evaluating several financial performance management options. What sold Dominic was Planful’s cloud-based, finance-owned platform, its highly intuitive interface, and the comprehensiveness of its solution that included close and consolidation, planning and budgeting, workforce planning, and more, all in a single solution.

“We’re global, and because Planful is cloud-based, it lets our teams access it from anywhere,” said Dominic. “But more importantly, we noticed during the evaluation process that Planful was so easy to use that anyone in the business could use it. And, when we’re looking to roll out different reports, analyses, and forecasts, we can build those ourselves. Other tools didn’t offer that, which is why we loved Planful.”

Valtech quickly put Planful to work on monthly close and consolidations, budget versus actuals analyses, and delivering monthly report packs to the CFO and budget holders. Faster access to more accurate data enabled teams to spend more time understanding and analyzing the financial data yet still have time to consult with the senior management and business stakeholders. Planful’s intuitive, easy-to-use platform also led to Valtech rolling out Planful’s workforce planning capabilities and Planful Budget Manager Experience to budget holders, delivering financial insights on time and in the requested format.

“Planful is a tool that we use across the business; it isn’t just a finance tool,” explained Dominic. “It brings our budget holders closer to the process so they feel like they’re more involved, and that really improves the relationship and creates trust.”

Valtech set out to streamline and accelerate financial performance management, and Planful delivered. Where the finance team used to take seven business days to close the books each month, they’re now closing on the fifth working day and providing forecasts by day nine.

“We now do our monthly review of actuals versus forecast on days 1 through 4, and it’s all in Planful, and we can drill through to the transaction level data, to the ledger detail, and even down to the invoice,” Dominic said. “That saves us time. And, we’re heavy users of Planful comments, so we can tag Accounting when they need to accrue for this cost or recast that spend.”

Dominic added that the company generates a monthly CFO report package that used to take up to a day-and-a-half to prepare. Now, with Planful, “We just refresh the package in a few hours, and then we can spend our time analyzing the data and looking at the drivers. When we share the package, we’re able to add much more value. That elevated FP&A to become a true strategic partner with the organization.”

Valtech also uses Planful for workforce planning across its 2,000 global employees. The ability to scenario plan and see monthly actuals versus forecasts down to the employee level creates more effective and efficient conversations with Human Resources via more streamlined and accurate workforce planning forecasts.

“We didn’t have that level of workforce insight before,” added Dominic. “We can now answer questions more quickly because we have the data at our fingertips in Planful. That’s been really useful for the executive team as we look at different scenarios. Before, we had multiple spreadsheets and never really knew the true savings or costs of a scenario.”

As it uses Planful Budget Manager Experience, Valtech gets a user-friendly way to keep budget managers engaged in budgeting, forecasting, planning, and reporting efforts.

“What budget holders love is that there’s a single source of truth,” Dominic explained. “And, what we love in FP&A is that, if they change a forecast, there’s an approval workflow in Planful. We can then approve it and submit it as part of the overall forecast.”

More recently, the company navigated economic volatility as the former Kin + Carta was acquired by Valtech, a global experience innovation company with 7,000 people across 20-plus countries. Through those challenges and opportunities, it relied on Planful to quickly understand its financial performance and plan for continued business success.

“We’ve had a lot of focus on costs and efficiencies over the past 12 months, and, with Planful, we can analyze spend, answer questions about where we can optimize or change focus, and change tack very quickly, which has been fantastic,” said Dominic. “Before our acquisition, during our due diligence process with a number of prospective buyers, the bankers noted that we were able to provide information in a timely fashion and in the formats they wanted. That helped facilitate deeper discussions and sped up the process because we could re-cut the data quickly to answer incoming questions from specific parties. Valtech is in a similar industry, and now they want to roll out Planful, too, because they’ve been really impressed by how we manage FP&A.”

With Planful, Dominic has built closer relationships with the business, spent more time on strategic planning and analysis with senior leadership, and accelerated FP&A processes – all (almost) without spreadsheets.

“I actually say, ‘No spreadsheets,’” Dominic concluded. “Yeah, I hate spreadsheets.”