Platinum is the highest level of partnership with OneStream, Finext is one of the few consultancy organizations to have this level of expertise. The main goal of the 5-day training was to share experiences and knowledge, so that both OneStream and the consultants could learn from each other.

Which of these lessons learned can you apply to your own organization? Today we will share the top-3 best practices for OneStream implementation projects and how to apply them.

Best practice 1. Don’t live in the moment

Ideally, you want a Future Proof Financial model. However, most meetings during the design phase, focus on the current goal only. Say you want to improve the consolidation process by implementing OneStream, followed by the forecasting process a year later. Far too often, both implementations will be viewed as separate projects.

The solution is easy, but it does demand extra time at the start of your first project. Take enough time to discuss the future projects, to set expectations and to create awareness about requirements and design. The time you invest now will be more than compensated in the future.

Best practice 2. Remember performance

To be honest, not focusing on performance is an ironic mistake to make as performance is one of the main tool selection criteria for many organizations. However, during the implementation there are many choices to be made, both technical and functional. And any of these choices can impact the performance.

You should not only look at the hardware and architecture, but at the functional choices as well. For example, many organizations want detailed information about their sales. Well, OneStream can give you as much detail as you want. However, if you want to report on for example product level and you’re selling a lot of different products, this will affect the performance. Ultimately, performance is a choice. What information is crucial? And which information is nice to have, but not so nice to have that you want to trade it for performance?

Best practice 3. Make life easy for your end user

How much harm can there be in letting the end user do one extra task? If you consider how many end users there are, it may dazzle you how much extra time this one task adds up to. So, make sure the extra task is done during the implementation. Create a smart setup of financial processes in the platform, for example workflow and security design. Many companies like to have each step in the data set signed off. This can be implemented in a workflow that streamlines the process and reminds each user to complete his step. It’s not only more efficient, but a lot friendlier for the user as well.