Awards Winners 2022

ABOUT THE CATEGORIES

This year’s awards are divided into four distinct groups: Leadership, Management, Operational Excellence and Technology Innovation. Shortlisted individuals and organizations represent innovators of their respective industries who have displayed excellence in the delivery of innovative services. An additional awards group is open to end users of SAP solutions.

WINNERS

LEADERSHIP PRACTICE AWARDS

CFO of the Year

Joweehlyn B. Liao

Watsons Personal Care Store Inc – Philippines

Watsons Philippines has been expanding consistently in the years 2020 and 2021 despite the COVID-19 pandemic – achieved mostly by keeping the delicate balance between operations and strategy.

“It is all about balancing the short-term vs. the long term. You have to be strategic because the landscape has changed significantly, but at the same time, you have to bridge the day-to-day operations, especially the retail side. As we continue to operate, the expectation is to survive … to thrive while expanding for the long-term success,” said Joweehlyn Liao, VP, Finance and Non-Trade Procurement Director, Watsons Philippines.

Controller of the Year

Walter C. Ricarte

Globe Telecom Inc.

Submissions to the FutureCFO Excellence Awards 2022 reveal that people, process, and culture, play just as important a role, and in some cases even more than technology, towards the success of the executive, the team, and the business overall.

According to a McKinsey Global Survey on the role of the CFO, finance leaders are deeply involved in determining how businesses adapt to these trends—particularly in those places where digital and finance intersect.

Walter C. Ricarte, vice president of Finance and Business Advisory at Globe Telecom Inc. in the Philippines noted that being a finance leader during this period is extremely difficult because the business relies on you to ensure the company will be able to overcome the effects of the pandemic to the company finances.

FP&A Lead of the Year

Thitima Chaipornmetta

Cigna Insurance PCL.

Alexander Bant, chief of research for CFOs at Gartner predicts that 2022 will be a make-or-break year for CFOs when it comes to unlocking the value of AI, hyperautomation, digital skills, continuous processes, and data management.

Of course, technology has a role to play in the evolution of the CFO role and the development of the finance function. But technology alone will not spell success or failure.

Thitima Chaipornmetta, director of FP&A at Cigna Thailand, concurred citing the importance of technology and implementing new tools for process automation and leveraging data analytics to improve financial performance and get insights.

Finance Team of the Year

Food Panda Philippines Inc.

OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE AWARDS

Excellence in Audit, Compliance and Governance

Wilcon Depot, Inc.

Excellence in Financial Planning & Analysis

QBE Asia

For some calling 2020-2021 as challenging times may be an understatement. In the ACCA-PwC report, Finance Functions: Seizing the Opportunity, it described the period as testing the effectiveness of finance teams challenged how they deliver insight to the business.

For many, it has served to demonstrate the flexibility and resilience of the latest generation of cloud tools and technologies. It has also informed how the solutions developed in a pre-COVID world can be enhanced to support the anticipated new ways of working.

Siang Leng Tay, CFO and head of FP&A for QBE Asia, summed it up by adding that the biggest change is the need to respond quickly to rapidly changing economic conditions/business challenges as well as being the co-pilot to senior management and Boards for strategic decision making.

Excellence in Operational Accounting and Control

Hexamatics Servcomm Sdn Bhd

Hexamatics Servcomm, an HR and business process service provider headquartered in Malaysia, decided at the onset of the current pandemic to automate its operational account and control (OAC) function, which has been crucial in reducing daily operation time by 50% to 60%.

According to the company’s assistant finance manager Kausalyaa Somosundaram, the exercise was primarily aimed at allowing the company to track its bookkeeping – both accounts receivables (ARs) and accounts payables (APs) – from one place. Previously, Hexamatics inputted these two data sets in separate Excel sheets for the last 10 years.

Excellence in Tax Management and Optimisation

Elite Commercial REIT Management Pte Ltd

Excellence in Treasury and Cash Management

Metro Pacific Dumaguete Water Services Inc.

TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION AWARDS

Most Innovative Use of Artificial Intelligence

Tata AIG General Insurance Company Limited

Most Innovative Use of Automation

International SOS

Deloitte’s updated Finance 2025: Digital transformation in finance lists eight predictions revolving around digital technologies. Four of the predictions have automation at the heart of the prediction. So what Deloitte is concluding is that automation is on its way to making life better for the CFO and the finance team (with provisos of course).

With himself deep into embedding automation into its international operations, Ross Mackay, group head of Global Shared Services and Finance Optimisation at International SOS, acknowledges the potential and promise of automation

Most Innovative Use of Big Data

McDonald’s Hong Kong

An essential skill for every finance professional is the ability to tell the story behind the numbers, according to Keith Chan, chief financial and technology officer at McDonald’s Hong Kong.

“Data illustrated by world-class visuals can significantly help deliver the story, align understanding and convince stakeholders to make decisions,” he said.

Before the story can be articulated, however, companies must go through the daunting task of sifting through massive amounts of internal and external data – and turning them into insights that will help senior management make strategic decisions to drive revenue growth and profitability.

Most Innovative Use of Business Application

Jabil Sdn. Bhd.

Communication is essential before, during and after any technology implementation and is essential for the successful rollout of an IT project across an organisation’s finance department, according to Leek Chew Tan, senior finance manager, Jabil Penang.

“I started my career as a project manager when I was an AP accountant, handling all the projects –just making sure everything is running smoothly and delivered on time – and I was not communicating well. Over time, I learned to create business cases that helped everyone understand what we are doing because some finance end-users may not be tech-savvy.”

Most Innovative Use of Cloud, Platforms and Ecosystems

Danone ASPAME

The rule of thumb for many IT implementations is to get the new systems up and running on a cost-friendly budget without compromising quality and performance.

Three years after Danone Asia implemented a cloud strategy to its treasury management system, boosting its visibility and control, Pulat Yunusmetov, Danone Asia regional treasury manager, urges companies - on a similar cloud journey - to buck the conventional wisdom of going after the cheapest solution in the market.

BUSINESS LEADERSHIP AWARDS

Leadership in Competencies and Capabilities

Personiv Manila

Leadership in Digital Transformation

KKR Singapore Pte Ltd

According to McKinsey, in the last decade, finance departments have reduced costs by almost 30%. The consultant predicts that the focus in the next decade will be achieving even higher levels of effectiveness.

Finance leaders spent 19% more time on value-added (versus transaction-processing) activities than a typical finance department did.

Adam Hyland, head of Principal Finance at KKR, a US global investment firm, acknowledges that the role of financing is evolving, moving from a retrospective reporting function to a digitally focused high-value proposition powering business success.

Leadership in Mergers and Acquisitions

Volkswagen Group Hong Kong

Rob Kindler, global head of M&A at Morgan Stanley, said the environment remains very good for M&A in 2022. “While it may not be another record year, all the key elements that made the 2021 M&A market so strong are largely in place.”

So, it looks like while the COVID-19 pandemic may have altered how M&A discussions were executed, it has not dampened the interest. Refinitiv estimates the volume has grown 58% from 2020.

Acknowledging the evolving model for how things are done, Ali Gulsen, CFO for Volkswagen FAW Platform, observed that the pandemic significantly altered how M&As are planned and executed.