The "Crunch Time" series for CFOs
A series on digital technology and transformation in finance
Latest: The NExT frontiers in technology transformation
Generative AI, language models, machine learning, augmented reality, quantum computing: These hot topics are everywhere, and they likely aren’t going away. Everywhere you turn, it seems like someone is testing the abilities of consumer-facing generative AI applications, such as ChatGPT, AlphaCode, DALL-E, and Bard, and learning their limitations … and potential. And everyone—including Finance leaders—could be wondering what these technologies mean for their work and for the future.
Crunch Time 17: It's time to get serious about data
Everywhere a CFO turns, something underscores the need to care about and prioritise data right now. But ask yourself: is your organisation really serious about data? If not, think about it: a comprehensive, serious approach to data can elevate finance to a more strategic role within the organisation. In this Crunch time report, we explore how CFOs can get serious about their data — and what they can expect when they do.
Crunch Time 16: Lights Out Finance
Lights Out Finance™ is about working smarter. It’s time to take a lights out approach to your back-office finance operations with touchless processes and intelligent automation. You might even be surprised to learn that you have many of the resources to become truly digital—it’s just a matter of fine-tuning the dials. Ready to flip the switch?
Crunch Time 15: The finance workforce of now
The past few years of unprecedented change, from social upheaval to a global pandemic, have shown workers what they want and don’t want. This is an opportunity for organizations to reimagine their finance function as a dynamic capability that enables the organization to do more: rearchitect the work by applying technology solutions and achieving new outcomes and value; unleash the workforce and engage them in new ways of working; and adapt the workplace so that it reinforces culture and meets employees’ needs for collaboration, physical and remote preferences, and an inclusive, equitable environment.
Crunch Time 14: Capital Allocation for CFOs
How an organisation allocates its capital is a knotty question, and each decision involves shifting priorities, multiple stakeholders, and inevitable tradeoffs. Doing it right is a key pillar of Finance Transformation, one that takes discipline, skill, alignment, and a future-forward view of how to get things done in a rapidly evolving digital world. There’s a lot at stake – but so much to gain when you answer the questions: where to start, why your organisation, and why now? These are among the questions we examine in our new Crunch time guide, Untangling capital allocation.
Crunch time 13: Finance 2025 revisited
Change in the business world is nothing new, but today’s realities do indeed feel different. With so many potential investment opportunities—and so much in the market still left uncertain—CFOs are scrambling to make sense of it all. What do current trends suggest about the future of Finance? Where are technology and automation heading in the near term? What can finance leaders do now to seize emerging opportunities and mitigate risks? These are among the questions we examine in our new Crunch time report, Finance 2025 revisited.
Crunch time 12: Enterprise Business Planning in a connected world
What if you, as CFO, could combine multiple business planning
processes into one integrated approach—resulting in a plan all key functional leaders are committed to and measured against? And what if digital tools supporting that plan, combined with human insight, could show you in real time the impact of financial, operating, and commercial decisions? Our new Crunch time report examines how.
Crunch time 11: Revolutionising enterprise service delivery
Faced with the challenge of promoting growth, efficiency, and agility in the midst of shrinking budgets, many CFOs are taking a fresh look at service delivery structures. Cost efficiencies are table stakes. Boosting enterprise resiliency and leveraging digital disruptors are the new frontier.
Crunch time 10: The CFO guide to tackling data challenges
Faced with the challenge of connecting and analyzing data from multiple sources, you might think you need to overhaul your core technology platforms. A large-scale
ERP implementation is one way to handle the problem. But it’s not your only option.
Crunch time 9: The finance workforce in a digital world
The technology coming into Finance is changing what humans do and how they do it, sometimes a lot. But that doesn’t necessarily mean wholesale workforce changes. CFOs need to align today’s Finance talent to the promise of tomorrow’s technologies—while still maintaining a workforce that can fulfill all the company’s basic financial and regulatory requirements. That’s no easy feat. But those who get it right stand to benefit enormously.
Tax in a digital world
It’s common for Finance to have a front-row seat when big new initiatives are underway, including technology spending. But far too often, Tax gets involved after the fact, when the best they can do is make the most of a tough situation. Fortunately, that’s beginning to change.
The reason is simple: New data modeling tools make it possible to deliver valuable tax insights about different financial scenarios—in real time. Which means business leaders get the benefits of those insights before they have to make their decisions. But before this can happen, Tax must modernise along with the rest of the enterprise.
Explore the guide
Crunch time 8: The CFO guide to cloud
This guide shares answers to CFOs’ frequently asked questions about cloud investments anywhere in the enterprise, as well as within Finance. Learn the opportunities and challenges that come with investing in the cloud so you can make more effective cloud decisions.
Crunch time 6: Forecasting in a digital world
Algorithmic forecasting is a transparent way to improve the forecasting process, while relieving finance professionals of tedious, repetitive work. The result? More accurate and timely forecasts–and more informed decisions.
Crunch time 7: Reporting in a digital world
This report describes how digital tools like automation, advanced analytics, and machine learning are making both financial and internal management reporting faster, more insightful, and less costly – and the lessons learned along the way.
Crunch time V: Finance 2025 (our predictions)
"Finance 2025" offers eight bold predictions about how finance organisations might evolve over the next several years, becoming better, faster, and probably less expensive. The technologies needed to reimagine finance are here and they will only get better.
Crunch time IV: Blockchain for Finance
"Blockchain for finance" is a practical guide for finance organisations that want to understand options for blockchain and make effective decisions about moving forward. It features more than a dozen frequently asked questions finance teams can use to make sense of blockchain technology, as well as a high-level roadmap for adoption. It also includes a seven-point checklist for CFOs who are thinking about embarking on the blockchain journey.
Crunch time III: CFO's guide to cognitive technology
"The CFO’s guide to cognitive technology" explores how organisations can deploy emerging cognitive technologies to help create a more efficient, insightful, and controlled Finance function. Included in this guide are a collection of examples based on what technologies we’ve seen companies begin to test and adopt, and our experience working with many Finance organisations.
Crunch time II: CFOs talk off the record
Thirty CFOs share their unfiltered thoughts and experiences around a broader discussion of finance and what it means to make the digital journey. Deloitte knows that one way to stay abreast of new developments is to join in focused conversations with other finance leaders, across multiple industries and geographies, so this is a good place to start.
Crunch time I: Finance in digital world
Deloitte's original point of view, "Crunch time: Finance in a digital world"—based on extensive research with finance executives, including in-depth interviews with CFOs of global businesses—explores the various digital disruptors and may be the quickest way to understand what's in store for finance organisations as they hurtle toward the future.
Deloitte's original point of view, "Crunch time: Finance in a digital world"—based on extensive research with finance executives, including in-depth interviews with CFOs of global businesses—explores the various digital disruptors and may be the quickest way to understand what's in store for finance organisations as they hurtle toward the future.
The CFO guide to SAP S/4HANA®
For many CFOs, deciding when and how to implement SAP S/4HANA could be the most significant technology investment choices of their career. It’s a big deal. SAP HANA is SAP’s brand of in-memory computing, a technology that handles massive data sets without breaking a sweat. SAP built its latest next-generation intelligent ERP (SAP S/4HANA) around this technology. SAP launched SAP S/4HANA in 2015 and plans to stop supporting older ERP versions on December 31, 2025.
Latest: Capital Allocation for CFOs
How an organisation allocates its capital is a knotty question, and each decision involves shifting priorities, multiple stakeholders, and inevitable tradeoffs. Doing it right is a key pillar of Finance Transformation, one that takes discipline, skill, alignment, and a future-forward view of how to get things done in a rapidly evolving digital world. There’s a lot at stake – but so much to gain when you answer the questions: where to start, why your organisation, and why now? These are among the questions we examine in our new Crunch time guide, Untangling capital allocation.
