A strategic investment in OneStream combined with the right implementation partner unlocks transformative financial potential. As you work through your statement of work and assess implementation costs, you may hesitate at the project manager line item. Could scraping this role be an effective way to save money, especially if someone in your organization could manage the details? Maybe, but it’s a risk. CPM project management is best orchestrated by someone who is completely focused on the task and has a unique skillset of project management and technical expertise. Tasking the project management to someone who lacks these specific skills – or who has them but is expected to perform this function beyond their typical duties during an implementation – can result in communication breakdowns, neglected key details, and unpleasant budget surprises.
Project management (PM) helps ensure effective operational coordination through communication, planning, and execution. The ability to transform complex messages into clear and compelling narratives that resonate with various stakeholders is key. PM also demands a delicate balance of strategic foresight and tactical execution; meditating on the larger picture to assess for dependencies and risks, while living in the details to ensure next steps are not overlooked. Projects thrive when PMs exude emotional intelligence as well, working hard to build relationships and advocate for everyone’s success– both individually and collectively.
Transforming financial visions into reality requires careful orchestration and unparalleled teamwork. To ensure a smooth execution, a dedicated project manager well-versed in the tools, change management methodologies, and requirements of each of Finit’s proven five stages of implementation is a tactical advantage. Finit’s PM approach is built on the experience of successfully delivering over 450 OneStream implementations, and over 1,000 CPM implementations.
Finit takes PM to the next level by ensuring our people leverage deep organizational skills to manage nuance and complexity that are inevitable in OneStream implementations. This is enabled by PMs completing robust and highly relevant training including OneStream’s Application Build for Administrators and Smartsheet’s Project Management Capstone to ensure they can effectively understand the project and leverage a suite of in-house Smartsheet templates to efficiently manage project execution and key details.
Finit PMs possess the unique knowledge and understanding of OneStream, CPM project management, and Finit implementation methodology. This enables them to proactively identify and escalate risks, and to present various options for clients to choose from so they can make informed decisions on how to address and get back on track. Let’s examine a few real-life examples where Finit PMs have demonstrated expeditious problem-solving skills to overcome unforeseen yet often inevitable challenges in a CPM implementation:
- A client underwent an acquisition in the middle of an implementation project, doubling the size of their services. Several client partners were pulled away from the implementation work to support the acquisition, most notably one of the key builders. Finit’s project trackers helped quantify the growing lag due to the loss of resources, which enabled the Finit PM to quickly identify a few options to mitigate this lag. The options, along with the pros & cons of each option, were presented to the key project stakeholders. The team ultimately decided to allocate the work of the now-lost resource to the other members of the client and Finit teams in an effort to stay on track. Stakeholders understood potential impacts to timeline and budget, and we worked together to mitigate overages as much as possible.
- A project ended up being much more complicated than anticipated, and in the middle of the creation stage the Finit PM identified more time and budget would be needed to complete the project as scoped. Understanding the client was sensitive to budget, several options were presented including no budget change with build reduction, no budget change with a timeline extension and more human resources from the client to help close the gap, or build maximization and understanding a threshold for likely incurred cost. The client was able to make an informed decision and the project plan was updated accordingly. With less experienced teams, these situations tend to be identified much later – and thus are much more disruptive. However, thanks to the experience, training, and tools that Finit provides our PMs to identify the risk and flag it early, we were able to mitigate the risk and course-correct without a major change.
At Finit, we take pride in providing exceptional service – including project management. Our people possess the skills necessary to deliver on the capabilities mentioned above and are supported with the tools and training necessary to ensure Finit continues to Deliver Amazing. Roadblocks, risks, and barriers are inevitable in an CPM implementation, but our PMs spend time each week surveying for and assessing these risks so that we can mitigate them as efficiently as possible. Don’t make the mistake of under-resourcing your project management. If you would like to learn more about how a Finit PM can service your upcoming OneStream implementation, reach out to us at info@finit.com.