We believe the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software makes for interesting and highly topical reading. At a time when market disruptions are becoming more frequent and severe, and exponentially growing business data continues to go untapped, FP&A needs to be smarter than ever before.

Finance teams are integral to navigating through and adapting to disruptive events. However, as demands and challenges increase, the traditional FP&A function no longer works. A different approach, a more intelligent financial planning approach, is critical for meeting increased expectations and breaking the outdated cycle many businesses currently find themselves in.

Enter intelligent financial planning software, which empowers organizations to plan smarter, drive outcomes, and lead transformation.

The 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software provides vital insights into solutions that enable finance teams to transform their FP&A and build speed and flexibility into FP&A processes to deliver more efficient and effective decision-making throughout the enterprise.

Board is recognized as a Leader in the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software.

Board provides businesses with the capability to drive transformative efforts of this magnitude and take enterprises to the next level of FP&A maturity. In this blog, we’ll explore why we feel this recognition shows the time is now for enterprises to take on a more intelligent approach to planning.

Why we feel this Magic Quadrant™ shows the time is now for Intelligent Planning

Discussing market trends in the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software report, Gartner notes:

“We expect the financial planning software market to grow and change dramatically over the next five years. This development will be driven by the rise in demand for CFOs to play a critical role in steering the business via strategic decision support.”

Gartner further says, “This market will continue to be competitive, especially with increased customer demand for broader source system integrations and higher capacity with the large data volumes and sources necessary to support integrated business planning and predictive forecasting through AI and ML. These new predictive forecasting and analytics capabilities will enable increased levels of automation and intelligence, and better business outcomes.”

Underpinning these thoughts are two critical points:

1. Businesses need to operate with more intelligence in their planning processes, enabling frictionless planning transformation and removing most of the cost, effort, and risks commonly linked with implementing digital initiatives. This is not just in the Office of Finance but cross-functionally.
2. Data, already integral to any enterprise, needs to be standardized and utilized as a single source of truth for more reliable and faster insights.

The market will indeed remain competitive and demand more from businesses. Cross-functional collaboration led by CFOs is integral to innovating and driving decisions that positively impact the enterprise.

This, however, is only possible with the right technology in place; solutions that integrate capabilities to empower finance, strategy, and operations and drive Intelligent Planning.

How does Board support Intelligent Planning?

Board’s Intelligent Planning Platform offers smarter planning, actionable insights, and better outcomes for enterprises worldwide. It allows them to:

• understand what drives the business forward and plan for what comes next
• maximize the contribution of every individual to business performance
• streamline planning across the business to improve performance and sustain change

Only through Intelligent Planning can finance leaders empower themselves to drive the enterprise forward through a holistic approach to decision-making. In an FP&A context, Board enables finance teams to:

• take full control of value creation drivers
• derive faster, more accurate insights
• gauge the financial implication of every action to identify ideal plans
• ensure targets and performance metrics are visible to all decision-makers for better informed plans led by more accurate and visible information
• utilize event-driven scenario planning
• collaborate cross-functionally and align strategic goals across the enterprise

All of the above happens in a single platform. This is why we call it Intelligent Planning.

Board’s Intelligent Planning capabilities are a game-changer for FP&A teams. Now, more than ever, finance professionals need to uncover crucial insights from data that help to drive the business forward in an ever-changing market. We believe this is why Gartner® recognized us as a Leader in the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software.

To discover more about the state of financial planning software and the vendors in the market, download the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Financial Planning Software now.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Financial Planning Software, By Regina Crowder, Matthew Mowrey, Farrah Watson, 14 December 2022

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