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When choosing performance measures what are the key challenges involved in making decisions about trade offs? What are the best ways to assess guidelines and the tradeoffs that firms should weigh up when considering financial vs. non-financial measures; single vs. multiple measures; accounting vs. stock-based measures, as well as other choices?

Wim Van Der Stede
CIMA Professor
London School of Economics

Putting strategy on the map
While most organisations invest in developing a good strategy, many are failing through poor execution. The solution lies in strategy mapping, writes CIMA’s Alexa Michael

Having been responsible, in varying times of his career, for the construction of the Sizewell B nuclear power station, the Channel Tunnel rail link and now the building of the venues, facilities and infrastructure for the 2012 Olympic Games, John Armitt knows a thing or two about the challenges in taking on a mega-project. We find out what the key challenges are in keeping track on huge construction targets, measuring finance performance, delivering on time and on budget and ensuring that the business data to hand is used effectively and decisively.

John Armitt
CBE, Chairman of
the Olympic Delivery Authority
and former CEO
Network Rail

How can large corporates best monitor project progress against a financial delivery plan and make necessary adjustments? How best to engage constructively with stakeholders, including them in project team meetings when appropriate and make best use of intelligence throughout to provide reports and analysis from established databases, provide interpretation of results, assist with the reporting of results?

Stephen Dauncey
Finance Director
the Highways Agency

As we head deeper into a recession, the corporate survivors will be those that fully comprehend how their businesses “tick” from the shop floor to board level. Such companies will fully understand all aspects of their business including their different revenue streams, their people, clients and suppliers and how each business sector is performing. How can Corporate / Collaborative Performance Management (CPM) systems aid an organisation in monitoring, understanding and improving its performance including budgeting, planning, forecasting, profitability modeling, scorecarding and analysis?

Balancing short and long term performance management objectives in a globalised world: how can companies stay ‘always on and always connected’?

BI – the business leaders’ perspective

While many organisations have built major markets in China, they still under-perform compared with the potential. The market share of Europe's biggest car-maker, Volkswagen, for example, is falling year on year while the car ownership market continues to grow and grow.

According to a five-year study of multinational firms in China,  the land of the dragon will continue to remain out of reach unless firms address the problem of corporate rigidity, the reliance on familiar and conventional ways of thinking, in operations and managing the performance of people and finances.

How the Beyond Budgeting principles can be adapted to the financial services industry by:

• Exchanging ideas to facilitate the advancement of new performance management concepts and tools.
• Identifying and sharing best practices and lessons learned at an executive level.
• Supporting coordinated initiatives, such as benchmarking and learning programs

Steve Player
Director
Financial Services Interest Group –
FSIG, part of The Beyond Budgeting Round Table (BBRT)

How can the principles of Lean and Six Sigma help to form the drivers for radical change for service delivery? How to spread a social movement for change from scratch in less than a year? How is it possible to rolling out Process Improvement to the entire organisation?

The NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement supports the NHS to transform healthcare for patients and the public by rapidly developing and spreading new ways of working, new technology and world class leadership.

Bernard Crump
CEO
NHS Institute for Innovation & Improvement

Changing the culture of finance: if the ultimate goal is performance, what is the best way to manage changing the attitude, skills and focus of employees in a finance function reorganisation? As finance needs to be involved at the beginning of every business opportunity, when, potentially, they can add the most value, how can you ensure that everyone throughout the division knows the specific part of the deal for which they’re accountable?

Collaborative organisational forms and the management accountant
What are the implications for the role of the management accountant, specifically in relation to control and governance of innovative organisational forms such as joint ventures and other collaborations?

Better visibility through scenario planning – mitigating risk and pushing performance

With such volatile economic conditions and now that executive reward packages are increasingly linked to business and share price performance what should be the best practice in terms of remuneration, reward and performance measurement in the finance department?

M&A – the state of the market
The consensus view is that the market - and subsequently the economy - will stabilise by the end of the year as the medicine of billions of pounds of taxpayers money, low base rates and energy prices finally has some impact – but is this actually the reality as these bulls clash with the most pessimistic groups, asset-backed lenders and private equity?

Danny Davis
M&A expert, author, board and chair of
the Global M&A Integration Conference
Proposed contributor(s):

Coda
IBM Cognos
ICit Business Intelligence