IT Financial Management Challenges Faced by ARM
ARM faced several challenges in managing their IT costs:
Complexity of Managing IT Costs
ARM’s IT costs were split between corporate-managed expenses (services used across the business) and operationally managed expenses (IT costs managed by individual mines). This division made it difficult to understand the total IT spend across the organisation.
Lack of a Centralized General Ledger (GL)
There was no single centralized GL to identify corporate and operational expenses in one place. The existing GL provided limited information, complicating the process of monthly billing and financial management.
Unstructured and Inaccessible Data
While most of the data was available, it was stored in various files not accessible to all stakeholders. This unstructured format inhibited stakeholders such as CFOs from communicating effectively with other stakeholders.
The Need For An ITFM Solution
ARM required an ITFM solution to streamline the capturing process for the general ledger, improve the monthly billing process and gain transparency into individual costs for each mining operation. MagicOrange was selected to provide this solution, integrating their ITFM tool with Microsoft Productivity tools for automation and data transformation. The implementation involved:
Enhanced Capturing Process for the General Ledger
Streamlining the monthly billing process and gaining transparency into individual costs of each mining operation.
Improved Communication
Facilitating better understanding of cost allocations among different mines, improving communication and relations.
Automation and Transformation
Using MagicOrange and Microsoft Productivity integration as a middle layer to automate and transform data, providing ARM with a future-proof solution to plan and improve business operations.