Close and Consolidate 7 – Automated reporting

Executive snapshot

• Problem: Time lost to rebuilding packs, reconciling versions, and hunting commentary. Risk increases as spreadsheets multiply.
• Solution: Consolidate once; publish many. Governed templates for management accounts, board decks, MD packs and dashboards, all fed from the same model.
• Outcome: Faster cycle, fewer errors, clearer accountability, and leaders who arrive at meetings with the same numbers and the context to act.
• Enabler: CCH Tagetik for consolidation, narrative capture, Office integration, scheduling and role-based distribution.

So what? Your finance team spends more time explaining change and less time changing fonts.

Pack snapshot (table)

What ships, to whom, and how often — so everyone knows the score.

So what? A visible map kills “I thought you had it.” Templates, owners, cadence — repeat.

Implementation playbook

Six moves that turn “manual heroics” into “press publish.” Each step includes Aim, Actions, Artefacts, and Pitfalls.

1) Standardise the story

• Aim: Agree what the enterprise reports every period: sections, KPIs, definitions, and thresholds.
• Actions: Inventory every current pack; retire duplicates; write a canonical contents list for the management accounts, board deck and MD pack; define house styles (bridges, trends, waterfalls).
• Artefacts: Reporting catalogue; KPI dictionary (owner, formula, source, tolerance); page wireframes; example commentary tone.
• Pitfalls: Designing 27 bespoke packs for 27 leaders. Start with one core pack + role filters; use appendices for noble exceptions.

2) Model once, reuse everywhere

• Aim: One consolidation model drives all outputs — no re-keying, no side spreadsheets.
• Actions: Align chart of accounts and hierarchies; configure IC, FX, minority interests; set scenarios (Actual, Budget, Forecast, LE) and time fences; define validation gates for data loads.
• Artefacts: Consolidation blueprint; mapping tables; data quality rules; test packs for edge cases (acquisitions, reorganisations).
• Pitfalls: Automating chaos. Fix master data and mappings before you press the big red “Automate” button.

3) Template the outputs

• Aim: Turn “the pack” into governed templates that refresh, not rebuild.
• Actions: Build reusable layouts for P&L, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow, bridges and trend pages; add commentary placeholders, owner tags and approval stamps; define a publishing theme for consistent typography and colours.
• Artefacts: Management accounts template; board master; MD pack; brand style guide; cover pages and watermarks.
• Pitfalls: Aesthetic maximalism. Choose clarity over couture; readers should grasp the point in five seconds.

4) Automate the narrative

• Aim: Numbers with context, every time, without novel-length essays.
• Actions: Configure variance prompts (e.g., >3% or >£250k); tag drivers (price/volume/mix/FX); enable pre-filled commentary from prior period; route for review and approval with due dates.
• Artefacts: Commentary workflow; approval matrix; playbook for tone (“headline, driver, action”).
• Pitfalls: Commentary as folklore in emails. Keep it in-tool so it travels with the numbers.

5) Schedule, distribute and track

• Aim: Right pack, right audience, on time — with an audit trail.
• Actions: Set calendars (month-end, QBR, board); publish to Teams/SharePoint with versioning; watermark drafts vs finals; maintain access logs; capture “read receipts” where appropriate.
• Artefacts: Distribution lists; publishing calendar; audit log; retention policy.
• Pitfalls: Attachment chaos. Prefer links and permissions over emailed PDFs.

6) Dashboards for the in-between days

• Aim: Continuous visibility between closes; the same truths, just more frequently.
• Actions: Build role-based dashboards (CFO overview, MD performance, Ops drill-downs); align KPIs with pack content; define refresh cadence; provide a short “how to read this” legend.
• Artefacts: KPI tiles; driver trees; variance bridges; trend pages.
• Pitfalls: Dashboard sprawl. Curate to the top 10 decisions you need to make.

So what? A simple, repeatable pattern beats craftsmanship on a deadline. Make the right thing the easy thing.

Objections & responses

• “We’ll lose flexibility.” You’ll lose uncontrolled flexibility. Governed templates plus commentary fields keep agility while killing inconsistency.
• “Our packs are too bespoke.” Most “bespoke” is filterable content. Keep one core design; add role, region, or product filters; use appendices for genuine outliers.
• “PowerPoint or nothing.” Quite. Office add-ins feed governed numbers directly into the deck. You refresh a slide; you don’t rebuild it.
• “Automation drifts over time.” Assign template owners, review quarterly, lock a KPI dictionary with version control. Governance over heroics.
• “The team is too busy to change.” Start with one pack for one audience this month; expand coverage next month. Momentum is the secret sauce.

So what? Name the worry; show the win; start small; scale deliberately.

Before vs After: habit switches

• Manual Excel assembly → Governed templates with one-click publish and automatic period roll-forward.
• Inbox approvals → In-tool workflow with thresholds, due dates, and a visible status board.
• Slide-by-slide rebuilds → Refreshable PowerPoint linked to the model; “Update All” replaces “Copy-Paste All.”
• Version hunting → Single source, watermarked outputs, and an access log. Questions become analysis, not archaeology.
• Numbers without context → Prompted variance notes (price/volume/mix/FX) captured alongside the figures.
• Hero weekends → Predictable schedules and a team that leaves on time. (Tea consumption returns to humane levels.)

So what? Change the habit and you change the outcome — every period.

How CCH Tagetik helps

The platform glues the process together so your people can focus on the story, not the stitching.

Consolidated management accounts in CCH Tagetik

• Prebuilt consolidation engine handles IC elimination, FX translation, ownership changes and minority interests with audit-ready journals.
• Dimensional model supports slicing by entity, product, channel, customer, and period — same truth, many views.
• Data quality checks and load validations prevent garbage upstream; exceptions route back to owners with context.

Board pack automation with CCH Tagetik Office integration

• Native Excel/PowerPoint add-ins keep your deck beautiful and refreshable; finance owns the content, not a macro gremlin.
• Narrative reporting captures commentary, approvals and versioning beside the numbers — no more folklore in email chains.
• One-click publish to PDF/PowerPoint with cover pages, watermarks and consistent styling.

MD performance reporting via CCH Tagetik role-based access

• Role, region and cost centre filters produce MD-specific packs without cloning templates.
• Driver-based analysis (price, volume, mix, FX) highlights what changed and why, with prompts to capture actions.
• Scheduled distribution ensures everyone receives the latest as soon as it’s approved.

Dashboards on the same CCH Tagetik model

• Visual KPIs, bridges and drill-downs run on the identical consolidation logic — reconciliation theatre canceled.
• Refresh cadence matches your data loads; near-real-time when it matters, daily or weekly when it doesn’t.
• Short “how to read this” legends help busy leaders use dashboards as designed.

So what? The tooling nudges the behaviour you want — consistency, speed and auditability — without demanding heroics.

Metrics that matter

• Pack production time: Close approval → board/MD pack published. Trend it down; automate the bottlenecks you discover.
• On-time distribution %: Scheduled date vs actual publish date by audience. Aim for >95% once steady-state.
• Variance commentary coverage: % of triggered variances with approved notes. Target 100% for board-level content.
• Manual adjustments per cycle: Aim to halve in two quarters as data gates mature.
• Reconciliation issues: Track defects by source; celebrate weeks with none.
• Adoption: Weekly dashboard users among MDs and ExCo; aim >80% after month two.

So what? If it’s not measured, it’s optional. Make reliability visible and the process improves itself.