The Controller’s Guide

to Finance Automation
The Role of the Modern Controller
The role of Controller is expanding beyond just numbers.

In today’s increasingly global landscape, it’s not enough for a Controller

to only manage day-to-day financial operations.

Today’s Controllers are evolving—transforming their finance function to

be more actively strategic, contributing valuable analytics which drive
the business forward. These forward-thinking leaders spend less time
closing the books and more time finding actionable solutions. They
improve productivity, reduce costs, and streamline financial processes
throughout their organization.
Today’s Controller is moving from providing data
to providing insights about data
A main imperative for today’s Controller is to ensure that finance
is embedded in every operational aspect of the organization. To
achieve optimal results, more Controllers are reprioritizing their
focus, time, and efforts on five key areas:
• Efficient transactional processing
• Clear financial reporting
• Real-time insights into financial results
• Contributing to overall solution support
• Making decisions driven by strategy and resource allocation

Focusing on these key areas can make your role more strategic, benefiting the entire organization.
But as companies scale, so will your responsibilities, and finding the support you need to reach your
full potential can be challenging.

To successfully transform your Controller role, there’s one fundamental question that needs to be
answered:

Do you have the resources necessary to take on a more strategic role?

Payables Pain Points
For today’s Controller, the payables process has become the most maligned
of all finance workflows.
At each step of the payables process, from supplier onboarding, approvals, and
payments to issue resolution and reconciliation, there’s a potential for operational
vortexes, human error, and increased exposure to fraud that can slow down or halt
operations.
The time and expense needed to manage this function can result in operational
bottlenecks for today’s Controllers. Issues include:

• Duplicate, lost, or missing payments

• An influx of tedious, manual work
• Additional resources needed to scale
• Inefficient or outdated processes
• Lack of visibility
• Increased errors and discrepancies
• Challenges due to scaling
Operations are thriving…
Except for payables
Today’s manual processes leave finance
teams exhausted and unmotivated, and
the work isn’t slowing down. The larger an
organization becomes, the more bills it
needs to pay. But it’s not just payments
that scaling companies need to contend
with—the entire payables function
will be heavily impacted, and the VP
of Finance needs to find the right
solutions.
Elevate Your Finance Function
Controllers are responsible for building out a business’ finance processes.
They are tasked with tackling the time-consuming aspects of payables, and
it’s up to you to effectively staff your team and implement new technologies to
support your scaling business efficiently.

Tipalti Tip From the Pros

Support scaling with finance automation resources and tools. Mark Lewis, CFO, LockerDome

It’s important to empower your team to efficiently manage
back-office tasks by providing them with the right solutions.
Automation can provide the relief your team needs to manage
payments. Plus, it can increase financial controls and reporting —
uncovering actionable, strategic insights.
With 50% YoY growth and 500+ monthly publisher payouts,
Mark Lewis, CFO of LockerDome was looking for a solution that
would free his finance team from the counterintuitive treasury
management platform that their bank provided.
By adopting an automated payables solution, Lewis was able to
keep his team lean while successfully shifting their focus to more
strategic initiatives such as networking, marketplace analysis,
financing, and M&A options.

“Payment processing was taking 6-8 days

per month. Now, it’s down to hours.”
Modernize Payment Operations
A large aspect of your role as Controller is valuing different technology
solutions. It’s important to the health of your organization that the right
tools are in place for continued success and growth.

Tipalti Tip From the Pros

Stop pushing paper. Toni Tornell, Controller, United Language Group

Manual, back-office tasks can take up a lot of your team’s time For Toni Tornell, ULG’s Controller, the finance team had struggled
and energy. When evaluating which aspects of your business to with their manual payables processes for a year and a half.
automate, look at the functions that would alleviate your team’s
By adopting an automated payables solution, overall processes
day-to-day operations and transform your transactional processing.
improved, international and early payments became more efficient,
Setting up a scalable financial tech stack for your company is one of
and the need to hire more headcount was eliminated.
the most important finance initiatives.

Finance automation eliminates tedious work and allows your “Finance processes that used to take our
finance team to actively contribute to your company’s overall team 1-2 weeks are being completed in
strategic operations. 1-2 days.”
Prioritize Retention
As a Controller, nobody feels the pain of payables quite like you and your
team. As your business continues to scale, it’s important to focus on both
employee and customer retention.
Tipalti Tip
Make it easy for people to work from anywhere in the world.
In today’s landscape, scaling businesses often deal with distributed
workforces—your finance team can be based anywhere and
operate globally. To retain top talent, you want to provide the best
resources to help them succeed. Finance automation eliminates the
manual drudgery from your team’s workload and allows them the
flexibility to access key financial data anytime, anywhere.
From the Pros
Richmond Ang, Assistant Controller, Tapjoy
For Richmond Ang, Tapjoy’s Assistant Controller, the team was
prioritizing publisher payments as it was critical to the success of
their business. Still, it was a process that no single employee could
do efficiently or effectively.
Adopting an automated payables solution decreased the finance
team’s workload by over 50%. Plus, by ensuring timely and accurate
payments, Tapjoy’s processes were elevated to the highest
industry standards.
“The ability to offer a wider array of payment
methods has endeared the company to its
publisher partners—building greater loyalty
and satisfaction.”
The Ultimate Finance Automation Checklist
A Controller’s job is never done. So, how do you set your company up for success?
Evaluate your operations using this ultimate finance automation checklist:

People Assets
Are you supporting your team and Are your company’s data and resources
making their jobs more efficient? successfully safeguarded?

Technology Risk
Have you evaluated and implemented Do you have the right level of financial
the right automation solutions? control?

Reporting
Is your close process timely, accurate,
and dependable?

If you have clear responses, you’re well on your way to

transforming your finance function. If not, take a critical
look at your operations and see what you can do to improve
the financial operations within your organization.
What Tipalti Can Do for You
Tipalti manages your payables process with finance automation
technology, eliminating more than 80% of the manual effort. We provide
a truly global, multi-entity solution that streamlines the end-to-end
payables workflow, including self-service supplier onboarding and
management, tax data collection and verification, payment processing,
global remittance, automated supply chain financing, and reconciliation.

Schedule a Demo

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