Unlock the Door to Automation: 3 Tactics to Retain your Credit Collection Team

One in four employees plans to switch jobs in 2022, disrupting financial and strategic goals. This poses new challenges for CFO offices to hire, engage and retain skilled employees.

Experts predict this figure is even higher among millennials whose expectations are very different. They look for diversity and don’t want to do mundane tasks that add little value on a day-to-day basis. 

“Seven in ten finance teams (72%) spend up to 10 people-hours per week or 520 hours per year on AP-related tasks that could be automated.”

CPA Practice Advisor, 2020

With a sudden increase of resignations in the finance department, CFOs need to start focusing on ways to improve the employee experience, freeing up valuable time that can be spent on more important and rewarding tasks.

So, how will automation increase employee satisfaction?

Outside of offering flexible working hours and models, automation helps employees reach their full potential, upskill, and feel like they are making a real difference. 

Below are 3 quick wins that can help you address the issue of employee retention.

Streamline and Shorten Mundane or Repetitive Processes

Automation allows financial processes to be streamlined, providing one version of the truth, and significantly reducing the risks of costly, manual errors. 

Insightful dashboards keep your teams up to date with crucial metrics that help make accurate decisions and give you the ability to quickly change course if needed.

According to Forrester, when automation is introduced, close cycles take on average, three to five days, and audits take 40% less time. 

Collaborative checklists and AI-driven transaction matching help teams stay connected and on track while delegating tedious tasks to automated systems that can process information quicker and more accurately.

The ability to interpret and action this information empowers employees to make decisions that have a positive impact on the customer and the business.

Keep Up to Date with Digital Innovations

Learning and development programs are a great way to promote employee engagement. Employees feel more connected to a company when they feel they have learned something, or they can apply a method that was taught to them that makes a noticeable impact.

Key finance function competencies have extended from technical accounting and financial reporting focus to the ability to leverage digitalization and efficient data analytics.

To develop world-class capabilities, Finance leaders should equip staff in critical roles with the necessary level of experience, leadership mindsets, and authority to influence the business. By expanding capabilities, talent pools, and leveraging powerful technology, teams can take on new operational practices and support complex processes that add more value to the organisation.

Increased Collaboration and Teamwork

As well as broadening skill sets, automating processes brings together different departments to positively impact the customer experience.  

Access to huge amounts of data in real-time will enable you to understand patterns, predict changing customer buying behaviour, innovate quickly, and provide insightful, accurate information to stakeholders. 

Teams all contribute to the same system, in the same way. No more working in silos, and no more cumbersome sharing of data. A seamless experience for the customer from the point of order, to taking payment. 

Tackling the Robot Speculation  

As technology is increasingly woven into everyday life, automation becomes more of a hot topic, with speculation around its impact and whether it will replace jobs in finance.  

The simple truth is no. What is more, it is becoming increasingly clear that finance teams who are not leveraging automation and AI for collections, credit, and disputes, risk rapidly losing market share to their competitors who are.

Although this is changing the way many finance teams operate, there are many opportunities to embrace this chance and replace manually intensive processes with more critical and strategic projects for the organisation. 

A recent automation study from Salesforce confirmed that 89% of users feel more satisfied with their jobs, as a result of using automation in the workplace. Technology also reduces errors in work (66%), lessens menial tasks in day-to-day work (47%), and helps make faster decisions (86%). 

Ultimately, investing in the latest technology will accelerate customer satisfaction and increase staff retention. 

High automaton rates in the credit and collection team, for example, can increase productivity by 40% enabling teams to focus on other high-value items that impact decision-making and improve business performance.

Technology and RPA are taking mundane, repetitive tasks out of the finance day job, freeing teams to interact more on both a human and intellectual level. 

Asserting judgments and creating the ability to make a strategic impact will enable CFOs to quickly demonstrate value from their investment and create a more well-balanced, motivated, and empowered team. 

Click here to watch how automation is benefitting companies like yours.