Making Cybersecurity Metrics Meaningful for the Board of Directors

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Published: Tuesday, October 31, 2023 07:21

communicating change

By Bhavin Shah, Senior Consultant

The cyber threat landscape

Cybersecurity incidents have rapidly increased in the last few years. In response, organizations have spent billions handling data breaches, ransomware and other cyberattacks in reactive mode. This trend will continue as the competitive business landscape, digital business strategy and technological advancements continuously change organizations’ attack surfaces. Tactics used by cybersecurity criminals – and, therefore, the threat vectors – will continue to evolve.

To address this ever-changing cyber threat landscape you must think out of the box and proactively develop the next generation of cybersecurity strategy. Just as importantly, to get buy-in for your cybersecurity and data security efforts, you must clearly articulate the measurable business outcomes associated with these efforts to your board of directors… and then back this up with data.

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Get Rid of Your Over 90 Days Past Due Problem

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Published: Thursday, June 08, 2023 06:00

Get Rid of Your Over 90 Days Past Due ProblemBy Sean Hickey, Senior Consultant

Every company where I have done SOX (Sarbanes-Oxley Act) compliance testing has the same problem: Their over 90 days past due accounts receivable stunk. In fact, they all seemed to think that having 5% over 90 (and sometimes even close to 10%!) is normal. 

These same companies also had a sea of revenue recognition journal entries on the backend of their order-to-cash process, and saw this as a normal and acceptable practice as well. 

Most importantly, they failed to see the connection between these two things.

I’m here to tell you that all of those revenue recognition journal entries are neither normal nor acceptable … and if you change your order-to-cash business processes in a way that eliminates them, the percentage of your A/R that’s over 90 days will plummet. 

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Is Your Finance Operation 
Due for a Transformation?

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Published: Tuesday, May 09, 2023 07:21

communicating changeBy Sean Hickey, Senior Consultant

A few weeks ago I was at a local business event, having a discussion with a couple of CFOs on ways to improve their company’s results. After discussing a variety of transformative business strategies that all relate to other functions within the business, they were surprised when I said, “What about your finance operations?” They had been so focused on ways to improve other company-wide horizontal processes – order to cash, procure to pay, etc., – that finance had taken a lower priority as a downstream process vs. being a horizontal process for the company as well. 

Read more: Is Your Finance Operation 
Due for a Transformation?

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