How can data in finance be best used to facilitate growth? This is just one of the co.nversations taking place at Talking Tech in September. Mark Donaldson, CEO of Roveel will be giving finance tech advice at the event, so we grabbed 5 minutes with him to find out more.
Tell us who you are, what you do and something people may not know about you!
I’m Mark Donaldson, a qualified accountant but a bit different. My love of all thing’s tech has been evident from an early stage in my career. Training at Larking Gowen I led our systems technology and was responsible for an online internal forum for sharing of ideas and processes. Using tech throughout my work life and personal life (I’m sometime called Mr Gadget!) has led me to using both my accounting skills and tech by founding a software company; Roveel. We provide SMEs with valuable financial analysis of their business. As the CEO it is my responsibility to explore new opportunities, grow the business and strategic partnerships and lead the team. I am an avid Spurs fan and have been since a very young age and can remember my grandfather (he was an Arsenal fan) making me watch Arsenal vs Tottenham when we visited him in London (we generally lost!). I love F1 and motorsports owning both a Focus RS as my main car and a Caterham Seven – which is used on the track mainly. I have a young family and enjoy going away in our VW campervan. The beauty of the business is I can work from anywhere with a phone signal, be that besides the beach or even a different country…although I’m now excited to be getting back into the office in Norwich after 18 months!
You will be talking about how data in finance can be best used to facilitate growth and the benefits new data and links to new finance systems can bring to business at the Talking Tech event – can you give us a quick summary of why it is important for businesses to embrace technology when it comes to finance?
Embracing technology across the whole business is important not only from a finance perspective but in every aspect as it often provides those in the business with the tools they need to better perform in their roles. In Finance that may be a simple system of processing and scanning receipts automatically into the accounts system or in the case of Roveel, providing detailed analytics to help improve decision making and giving instant access to insights to help them. Tech is there to assist people in their roles and not replace them. Tech should be used to take away those laborious tasks and enhance the value that employees can bring to their businesses.
When it comes to finance tech, what is one way that businesses can implement this in their business right now?
My advice would be to look at the existing processes which finance staff are performing. There are often lots of manual tasks which can easily be automated. I would recommend looking at the integrations available for your accounting software, be that Sage, Xero, Quickbooks or any others. There is a wealth of partner integrations which can automate existing business processes for a cost effective monthly fee. Evaluate the time spent by finance staff processing manually or creating reports etc and compare the cost saving! Make a plan for the implementation, take a free trial to evaluate and introduce the final solution to the team with training. Don’t try and change too much in one go either!
Can you give us some hints as to what other takeaways businesses will get from your talk at the event (without giving too much away!)?
An insight as to how easy it is to implement change within a business, the impact it can have and how it can revolutionise business performance and growth. Growth opportunities are all around – it is being able to identify and quickly respond to them which is the key. I will show you how.
Mark Donaldson will be a flash mob speaker at Talking Tech 2021, on Thursday 16 September, 9am-2pm at The Space in Norwich. For more information and tickets visit: www.norfolkchamber.co.uk/talkingtech21