12 Signs You Could
Improve Your Processes
Many teams have accepted data challenges as inevitable. But most of these issues are solvable — often without a major overhaul. How many of these apply to you?
Inconsistent data formats
Data arrives from multiple sources in different formats, making normalisation and validation a manual, time-consuming effort every period.
88% of organisations face challenges managing data from multiple sources.
No master data standardisation
Different departments use different naming conventions, account codes, or entity references — making consolidated reporting unreliable without manual reconciliation.
80% of businesses cite standardisation as a barrier to accurate reporting.
Excessive manual data entry
Data is re-keyed between systems rather than flowing automatically. Each manual step introduces risk and consumes time that could be spent on analysis.
88% of spreadsheets contain at least one error.
Lack of automation
Significant time is spent combining, cleaning, and reformatting data rather than using it. Repetitive tasks that could run in minutes are taking hours every cycle.
71% of organisations plan to increase their use of automation in finance and tax.
Buried in spreadsheets
The team spends the majority of its time maintaining and updating spreadsheets rather than reviewing outputs and adding analytical value.
Finance professionals spend an average of 14 hours per week on spreadsheet-related tasks.
Poor data quality
Results are questioned during review because the underlying data is unreliable. Time is lost investigating discrepancies that better processes would prevent.
Organisations estimate that 32% of their data is inaccurate in some way.
No formal data quality checks
Errors only surface during review or audit — there are no automated validation rules catching issues at the point of data entry or import.
Only 38% of organisations have a formal data quality programme in place.
Limited data analysis capability
The team lacks the tools or time to perform meaningful variance analysis, trend review, or forecasting — reporting is descriptive rather than insightful.
75% of finance teams plan to invest in advanced analytics capabilities.
No real-time data access
Decisions are made on data that is days or weeks old. There is no way to run an ad hoc query without triggering a manual extraction process.
Delayed data access is cited as a top barrier to effective tax decision-making.
Key person dependency
One or two individuals understand how the spreadsheets or systems work. If they are unavailable, the process stops. This is a control risk and an operational one.
72% of organisations recognise key person dependency as a significant risk.
Inadequate documentation
Processes are not written down. New team members take months to become effective, and the institutional knowledge of how things work exists only in people's heads.
52% of businesses identify a lack of documented data governance as a key weakness.
Resistance to changing the status quo
"This is how we've always done it" is the answer when better approaches are proposed. The risk of changing outweighs, in perception, the cost of staying where you are.
Only 10% of businesses in Europe are making full use of the data they hold.
Recognise a few of these?
Improvement does not require a complete overhaul. In many cases, targeted automation of one or two repetitive processes — or connecting two systems that currently require manual handoff — can make a material difference. We are happy to have an honest conversation about what is realistic for your team.