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Cash Flow Analysis with Microsoft BI

Global Data 365
July 21, 2022

With the advancement in technology, it is more important than ever to understand how cash flow analysis will affect your company and how technology, such as business intelligence (BI), can help you keep track of your cash.

What is Cash Flow Analysis?

Financial reporting requires the use of cash flow analysis. You can tell where cash is produced and invested by looking at your company’s cash inflows and outflows over time so you can prepare accordingly. Controlling your cash will help your company not only stay afloat through difficult times but also open gates to new opportunities.

Have you had a profit or a loss? Cash flow is important at any point of a company’s development cycle, whether you’re a new start-up or an existing company. Anything you do requires money, from managing assets to hiring a new employee. To achieve security and consistency, you must have the right tools and structures in place at the right time to help you manage and predict your cash flow.

Different Approaches to Cash Flow Analysis

At the end of each quarter, most accounting teams are responsible for conducting a cash flow analysis to determine that all the company’s expenses are taken into account.

Free Cash Flow (FCF) is among the most valuable financial performance indicators. Experts look at FCF or operating cash flow minus capital expenditures to determine how much money a business has left over to broaden or return to shareholders. You have an issue if your expenditure exceeds your income.

A cash flow statement is a crucial tool for managing cash flow, and it contains data from operations, investing, and financing. A cash flow statement is traditionally created to use Excel-based manual data analysis. It can be difficult to combine data from your cash flow analysis, expected and real operating expenses, capital expenditures, accounts receivable/payable balances, and general ledger data. Excel costs time and money. Identifying the ramifications, many businesses have simplified manual accounting processes and adopted business management and intelligence technologies to better analyze and predict cash flow.

Cash Flow Analysis with BI

Companies have embraced business intelligence technology to change the way they handle their cash flow now that the platform is more available and affordable. Companies use business intelligence and analytics software to automate cash flow analysis and provide the tools they need to analyze data optimize cash flow analysis, and more.

Review the Jet Sample: Cash Flow Statement.

The best feature of business intelligence software is that it is designed to provide more precise financial statistics and, as a result, eliminate the guesswork from the cash flow analysis process. BI solutions provide managers with reports that are timely, reliable, and simple to use.

Here are a few examples of how BI is assisting companies all over the world in better managing their cash inflows and outflows.

- Intelligent Predictions

Financial predictions enable you to prepare for the allocation of resources and budgeting by providing a clear way to make strategic business decisions. Cash predictions can be generated automatically using BI software. Financial managers can remain updated with this ability, including advanced warnings of cash shortages or surpluses. This enables a business to respond rapidly to growth potential or to cut back when necessary.

- Data Management

Assembling data from various sources is the most time-consuming aspect of cash flow analysis by spreadsheet. You will get the figures you require in real-time using BI software that combines with your ERP and CRM solution. The cash flow analysis will provide more useful insights and up-to-date reports, allowing you to make fast, data-driven decisions.

- Manage Projects

Large projects may have a significant impact on cash flow. For cash flow development and proper development, financial managers need greater control of what goes in and what comes out, so the ability to analyse a project’s length, expenses, resources needed, and payment terms is critical.

- Plan Inventory

There are some costs involved with the inventory. It not only binds up cash in goods but getting too much inventory can also be harmful to your cash flow. You will make a decent source of supply and be more careful with inventory spending with BI tools. In the long run, BI will save you a lot of time and money by sales forecasting and intelligent reporting.

- Risk Management

Should you put money into a new venture? Should you temporarily reduce your spending? Risk management software such as BI software is a reliable tool. If you have a cash flow problem, if your prediction indicates that you may not have enough cash, a BI solution will enable you to perform a fast prediction and liquidity analysis to assist you in making the best decision possible.

BI Solution

BI tools help data-driven analysis and decision-making, which is just what you need to keep a tight grip on your cash flow. Although there are many BI solutions available today, particularly for Microsoft Dynamics users, there is no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” solution.

We are here to assist you if you want to improve your financial statements and cash flow review. Contact us today!

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Global Data 365 is composed of highly skilled professionals who specialize in streamlining the data and automate the reporting process through the utilization of various business intelligence tools.

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Limitations of Power BI – Are They Risky?

Global Data 365
December 21, 2021

If your business is considering implementing Microsoft’s Power BI analytics framework, you must understand the level of complexity and limitations of Power BI involved in successful integration. Power BI is a many-month software project based on a complex mix of technological elements, not just a device you install and customize. To get it right, you’ll need a lot of preparation and the highest level of management skills. So, what is Power BI and what are some limitations of Power BI?

Power BI

Microsoft’s Power BI is a cloud-based business intelligence service package. It uses insightful visualizations and tables to transform raw data into usable information. Data can be processed and used to make strategic business decisions in a short amount of time. Power BI is a set of business intelligence and data visualization tools that includes software services, applications, and data connectors. Power BI is a user-friendly tool with versatile drag-and-drop design and self-service capabilities. Power BI can be used on both on-premises and cloud systems.

So, what are the limitations of Power BI that you can avoid?

What is Jet Reports?

Jet Reports, on the other hand, is a dynamic business intelligence tool that goes beyond conventional financial reporting. With its user-friendly interface and Jet Dashboard Designer, organizations can leverage its capabilities for comprehensive financial reporting and analysis. Jet Reports is known for its adaptability and ease of use, making it an asset for businesses aiming to enhance their reporting processes.

We are going to give you three scenarios where a user should consider switching to Jet Reports or Jet Analytics:

Complexity Involved with Power BI

Most of us have become used to applications that can be downloaded in minutes or even hours in the case of more advanced systems. That’s a fairly straightforward scenario. At the other side of the curve are items that entail some configuration and are designed and implemented by a team of specialized experts to overcome the limitations of Power BI. A full Power BI implementation must solve a slew of design issues. The answers to those questions will affect efficiency, productivity, and adaptability in the long run. Some of the major differences between a Power BI cloud deployment and an on-premise deployment. For instance:

– What features should you run, where should they run, and how will they all interact?

– What level (or levels) of security do you incorporate?

– Will you be using SQL Server Analysis Services to model your results, or will you use the Power BI desktop tool?

– Should you use Power BI’s Direct Query function or import data?

– Will a gateway component be needed, and if so, where will it be installed?

All these are technical questions, but the solutions have long-term consequences, and it’s always difficult to adjust later. This level of complexity necessitates upkeep, which entails additional costs and disruption.

Power BI: Toolset not a Complete Solution

There are no reports included with Power BI out of the box. In fact, Power BI reporting necessitates a substantial upfront expenditure, not just in terms of constructing the technological infrastructure, but also in terms of deciding how you access the data, how and when data must be converted or pre-processed, where you archive them, and so on. After you have answered those design considerations and limitations of Power BI, you will need to put in a lot of time to set up the data access and data flow.

Data access is becoming more complex in this age of cloud computing. This is particularly true of Microsoft Dynamics 365 products, which no longer require unlimited reporting access. Microsoft has suggested some possible workarounds, but all of them require major compromises. Microsoft has introduced an indirect layer of “data entities” in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain Management (D365 F&SCM), for instance, that developers can use to obtain entry to ERP data. Personalizing Power BI can be very costly. Since every company is different and has its own set of requirements, customization is unavoidable. Recurring costs arise from the ongoing maintenance of such customizations.

Power BI as a Dashboard Visualization Tool

Power BI was developed to be used as a dashboard visualization tool. It does an adequate job of producing conventional tabular reports, lists of individual records with several columns and subtotals, and it does a great job of providing an insightful visual analysis of what is happening in the market. Traditional banking statements are not generated by Power BI because they are somewhat different from other forms of reports. Some more limitations of Power BI such as Filtering, masking, or grouping GL sums by account column, for example, is commonly required when creating a P&L statement. This is often done in different ways for each row in the report.

Columns in the report may be sorted by organizational agency or division, or they can be used to reflect various time spans, budget vs. real, or variance amounts or percentages. Since Limitations of Power BI has a little method of controlling such distinctions, having it generate a comparatively straightforward P&L is a very costly custom programming activity.

Power BI without the Limitations

Global Data 365 offers self-service, user-friendly analytics and reporting tools, as well as collaboration with Power BI and Excel. With the help of Jet Analytics, we hold the guesswork out of Power BI by automating the process of developing a data warehouse with pre-built connectors for over 140 different ERP systems, allowing business leaders and analysts to have the data they demand, when they need it, without any need for specific commands or the complexity and limitations of Power BI stack.

Need to overcome the limitations of Power BI, opt for our Power BI Training program today.

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