Adventures in modern accounting: what all cutting edge finance teams do
It would be an understatement to say that processes among financial teams have changed quite a bit over the last few years. It makes sense: turmoil warrants necessitated change, which ushers in a technological revolution.
How many organizations do you know still use the same old, outdated tech stack that’s been around since the early aughts (or worse, even before…)? Unfortunately, according to recent data, that number is still way too high.
To stay ahead of the game, you need to keep an eye on the market's pulse by analyzing what successful financial teams are doing, trends they are taking seriously, and future-proofing your tactics to encourage even faster growth.
The current landscape
One of the most prominent landmarks of the latest financial tech revolution is artificial intelligence and other automation tools used to help optimize and streamline antiquated and time-consuming processes. Even before the pandemic, processes started to shift in finance teams because of the widespread availability of automation and AI.
Bonus: Find out how finance professionals really feel about automation in our most recent research report “Are Friends Electric?”
Here are some details about precisely what AR and AP teams look like nowadays:
Accounts Receivable
- Modern AR teams are increasing their ability to forecast new trends and future-proof strategies.
- Accounts Receivable teams are seeking to reduce costs by eliminating paper invoices.
- Automation in the AR space is prioritizing data security and risk management.
Accounts Payable
- AP teams of 2022 are still reeling from the aftermath of employee turnover in The Great Resignation.
- Accounts Payable teams are watching paperless payments rise to become the industry standard in real-time.
- AP teams and their competitors are in a modern-day arms race to adopt high-level data analysis technology.
While some of these trends apply to both Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable, it’s essential to recognize their importance in each separate space in order to understand them. For example, while both AR and AP see an increase in paperless payments, the way they impact each sector is different.
Being ready to act when trends change is crucial. With an eye on what modern teams are known for in 2022, we can now look at the latest emerging trends that threaten to change the current status quo and how to take advantage of them.
Popular trends
Staying up to date and being able to forecast trends gives you and your business a huge advantage. You don’t just know what’s happening in your space; you know what WILL happen in the future.
Taking time to look at the current state of AR and AP teams and identify what trends are emerging is time-consuming but, it’s necessary if you want to evolve your processes to keep up.
Here are some trends shaping the way finance teams look now and will look in the future:
- Accounts payable data in 2022 is becoming more and more valuable. 55% of organizations said drilling down into AP data analytics will become a business priority throughout 2022 and beyond
- E-invoicing is on the rise. Interestingly, a boom in e-invoice market growth came from the B2B segment. According to Ardent Partners, 56% of AP professionals pay when invoices are due or payments are late and 44% pay early to receive discounts.
- Invoicing processing automation is lighting the way for more productive and cost-effective strategy implementation. With invoicing automation, workers have more time to focus on more strategic work.
- Modern account receivables teams are seeking to improve the customer experience by ensuring that payments are easy to make and can be made in the customer’s preferred format.
- The fight against e-invoicing fraud is critical, AP automation can help. Unfortunately, this is not an emerging trend, and it’s one that we still need to keep an eye on. Fight against e-invoicing fraud with AP automation and their built-in safeguards against fraud.
- Digitization and automation are changing compliance. Compliance processes are becoming more easily optimized through AP compliance automation. This helps ease the woes faced by needing to meet new and different regulations in other countries than the one where you’re accustomed to doing business.
The trends mentioned above are just a few that experts are taking note of in 2022. While many others are on the horizon, these are a great starting point for AP and AR teams to better understand the financial world they’re operating in.
In the face of constantly evolving new technologies, widespread resignations, and a (semi) post-pandemic world, there’s no question that the realms of AR and AP will remain in flux. But like other trends, spotting the opportunity to act and change can give you a competitive advantage.
See how Tradeshift is helping cutting-edge financial teams prepare for 2022 and beyond. Scale your digitization with our comprehensive global compliance and leverage simple and fast integration options. Schedule a demo now.
