OREANDA-NEWS. July 06, 2009. At the “Corporate Performance Management: from strategic objectives to tangible results” business breakfast, PricewaterhouseCoopers held an interactive business survey in which CEOs from approximately 40 major companies took part, reported the press-centre of PricewaterhouseCoopers.

60% of respondents indicated that they felt they were sufficiently prepared for the crisis, while 22% admitted they were poorly prepared. 65% of respondents at the same time considered that other companies were sufficiently prepared, with 35% considering that other companies were poorly prepared.

Anastasia Osipova, Partner in Performance Improvement at PricewaterhouseCoopers:
“The companies that were best prepared for the crisis were those that had additional reserves and which were able to adapt successfully to the new economic climate. It is important that a company’s performance management system is sufficiently flexible to be able to adapt quickly to changing market conditions.”

When asked who they believe should play a leading role in a company’s performance management, the overwhelming majority of respondents answered general director (70%), with the second most popular choices, with 13% each, being director of finance and director of strategy.

The speed and accuracy of management accounting are the most important requirements for companies today: these factors polled 26% and 22% of votes respectively. 73% of respondents remarked that, in the present circumstances, greater importance is now attached to implementing the right performance management approach.

According to 61% of respondents, during an economic downturn it is essential that a company’s set of KPIs are adjusted; however, 33% indicated that they didn’t consider this to be a significant issue.

50% of the companies questioned are switching to flexible budgeting, while another 25% are seeking to simplify the approval process.

Microsoft Office and Business Intelligence (BI) polled 36% each, emerging as the most popular planning and reporting tools in the present conditions; 26% of respondents choose ERP-based tools.