Improving the efficiency of your finance team
With limited resources and a long list of responsibilities, school finance teams can find it difficult to cover their operations while having time for their core focus of supporting quality education. Juggling accounting and admin tasks with a growing number of compliance requirements means team members often find themselves stretched for time.
Small schools may only have one business manager looking after the whole finance remit, while larger schools will have varying degrees of support. With resources on the ground as the biggest challenge facing school finance teams, finding a way to streamline operations is crucial to success.
In this article we explore a number of ways you can improve the efficiency of your finance team regardless of the size of the team or the resources available.
Leveraging the audit report
The audit process is an opportunity for school finance teams to reinforce operational direction as well as providing guidance on areas for improvement and growth. It does not provide specific strategies to be undertaken by schools, but rather describes the current state of a school’s finances. Senior staff can use these findings as valuable guidelines to develop their plans and improve the future financial outlook of the school. Issues or recommendations raised in the report should be noted, and leveraged to strengthen financial controls, reduce risk, and streamline operations.
Some of the advice schools can take from their audit report include tightening up stocktake processes, identifying financial security risks, and getting a better understanding of state and government requirements. For example, the finance team at The McDonald College in NSW used their audit report to highlight control and procedural issues that needed to be addressed and used the opportunity to take action on these.
Streamline accounts payable
A core function of any finance team, accounts payable can take up a lot of time and resources. Utilising technology can streamline accounts payable, freeing up time for other roles. Adopting software platforms for internal management of payments and getting customers to use online forms reduces time spent on data entry, and can provide valuable insights for decision-making. An example of this is Alii who have developed a purpose built platform for Australian schools that protects and streamlines their accounts payable and procurement functions.
Reducing paper is another easy win. Converting paper based receipts and invoices into digital formats through platforms like Xero minimises finance team workload particularly for teacher’s expense reimbursements. What was a time consuming and cumbersome process is solved with a few clicks.
Focus on team culture
Creating an innovative culture where open communication is encouraged helps increase team efficiency and productivity. Increased operational performance, employee satisfaction and greater innovation have all been linked to strong company culture.
Collaboration with teachers and the wider school team will also help to ease finance team workload. Facilitate building relationships between employees so they are confident working together, helping to ensure the correct information is shared between teams in a timely manner. Schedule regular meetings with other teams to address finance issues and let team members get to know each other at the same time.
Keeping morale high is a key factor in strong team culture and performance. One of the harder responsibilities a finance team undertakes can be having difficult conversations with families about money. At Wild Cherry School in Victoria, the finance team haven’t had to worry about having these conversations since they started using Edstart Plus. With Edstart’s expert customer success team taking care of fee management, they have become more upbeat and proactive, getting things done on time and focusing on other value add initiatives.
Training and professional development
Training for finance team members ensures they have the necessary skills to do their job and shows you are invested in them at the same time. Industry conferences, webinars, and workshops are ways to build professional development, as well as encouraging team members pursue relevant qualifications. Well-informed finance professionals are better equipped to handle complex issues, and will get the job done more effectively in less time.Improve accounts receivable
Another critical function of the finance team, accounts receivable can be made more efficient by streamlining processes and utilising technology. Establishing clear communication channels with families and providing detailed information about fees, due dates, and payment options can help to avoid delays. Make it easier for parents to settle their accounts with online payment portals and streamline invoicing with automated billing systems.
Additionally, the use of Edstart Plus reduces time spent processing payments and following up with parents about fees, allowing finance teams to focus on other work or initiatives. Before using Edstart Plus, Wild Cherry School said they were spending days worth of time to follow up with families which can now be put towards other initiatives. At Border Rivers Christian College in Queensland, since using Edstart Plus only processing one payment for each student per term compared to weekly or fortnightly has saved them significant amounts of time.
About Edstart
Edstart is a leading technology and financial services company providing funding and payment services for education. We offer fee management solutions to schools and flexible payment plans to parents to help make school fees easier to manage.
To see how we can help you, visit our main website.
Find out more
Edstart is a leading technology and financial services company providing funding and payment services for education. We offer fee management solutions to schools and flexible payment plans to parents to help make school fees easier to manage.
To see how we can help you, visit our main website.
Find out more