April 10, 2025
The effects of new tariffs and trade policies are unknown, but what’s certain is that American manufacturing is going through a period of dynamic change right now. And with both positive and negative signs on the horizon, every factory will feel the impact. Decisions made in the coming months and years will be some of the most complicated and consequential choices manufacturers have ever faced.
Under conditions like these, financial planning becomes even more important than normal. Manufacturers that can accurately forecast their costs and revenues and extend the foresight far into the future can respond to market shifts proactively, to gain market share, rather than reactively, when market share is eroding.
Under those same conditions, however, financial planning becomes more difficult than normal. Whether due to policy changes or technological advancements, expectations are rapidly evolving, making existing planning models increasingly irrelevant. And even when companies finalize plans, unexpected economic forces could require them to make sudden or sweeping changes.
Knowing that financial planning is about to become more essential yet also more elusive, manufacturers need to be thinking about how to improve their planning process—to navigate instability and capitalize on opportunity.
Financial Planning Takes Integrated Data
Financial planning requires the most complete, accurate, and up-to-date portrait of financial performance available. Yet at many manufacturers, financial and operational data is scattered across different systems and spreadsheets, creating silos that inhibit financial insight and force someone to manually move data between systems.
The lack of integrated data compromises financial planning more than any other factor. It is also why so many financial planning solutions prove underwhelming; they add features when what manufactures need first and foremost is a single-source-of-truth for all the data involved with financial planning. Not only does having a single data source prevent errors, omissions, and outdated information, but it also eliminates all the time and energy spent manually moving and organizing data, which often dominates most of the planning process.
According to David Ryan, Consulting Manager at Guide Technologies, better planning yields significant rewards, but they can be elusive. “You know there's opportunities, maybe to lower your sales price to sell more or even to increase prices if the market would bear that,” he says. “But if you don’t understand those opportunities because you’re not able to track the information at a granular level, you have to plan in broad brushstrokes.”
For that reason, no solution, system, or strategy improves financial planning in manufacturing as much as adopting an ERP system like CloudSuite Industrial (CSI). ERPs offer powerful tools for analyzing, visualizing, and reporting on financial planning—but by far the biggest advantage comes from having all sources of data, financial and otherwise, available on one seamless platform.
With the data silos being dismantled, financial planning has the all-encompassing perspective it needs. Nothing makes that view as clear or comprehensive as an ERP system.
Leveraging ERP to Improve Financial Planning
ERP solutions like CSI create the interconnected data infrastructure on which financial planning relies, but data alone isn’t enough to turn accurate predictions into effective plans. These are some of the ways manufacturers leverage the singular strengths of ERP to improve upon the planning process:
- Dynamic Sales Forecasting – Having all historical sales data in one place leads to better insights about when and why demand changes and how current market forces compare to periods from the past.
- Precise Cost Structuring – Costs include everything from materials and shipping to labor and taxes, and when data from all these sources comes together the true costs of goods and the changes over time starts to clarify.
- Comprehensive Revenue Tracking – By linking sales and marketing departments to the production process, manufacturers can track revenue through its entire lifecycle and learn more about what drives financial performance.
- Granular Data Collecting – Planning only improves when decision-makers can drill into high-level financial metrics and see the data behind them, down to the product or part level, instead of relying on assumptions or intuition.
- Integrated Planning Tools – Integrating ERP platforms with other planning tools or manufacturing systems eliminates even more obstacles to planning by allowing data to flow to wherever it can answer questions or enrich analysis.
While the ways ERP can improve financial planning are copious, the technology has a simple purpose according to David Ryan: “Capture better information faster so you can make better decisions sooner.”
Guide Technologies: Implementing ERP, Optimizing Financial Planning
As transformational forces compel manufacturers to review and revise their existing plans, think critically about the planning process itself. Can it make sense of the uncertainty that lies ahead? Will it be able to adapt whenever and however required? Does the process inspire confidence that plans are correct?
Guide Technologies knows the impact of ERP after helping countless manufacturers implement and enhance their own solution. We also know how to use the rich data and powerful tools within a system like CloudSuite Industrial to improve the financial planning process—along with the outcomes.
Plan for stability and success, starting by adopting ERP. Contact Guide Technologies.
