Adding Pre-Month-End Closing Meetings Can Enhance Financial Communications

I am always looking for efficient, creative, and low risk opportunities to improve financial communications. This usually involves both art and science, a mix of creative and structured tactics. Adding pre-month-end closing meetings is a value-added practice that takes advantage of both tactics with high upside potential for positive results.

Some of the best ideas are the most overlooked due to their simplicity. Often, all it takes is one casual comment and the light goes on. I was recently presenting at a nonprofit conference for finance professionals where I asked attendees to respond to how they have navigated disruptive challenges. One attendee said adding pre-month-end closing meetings with department managers was a lifesaver, filling the communications void resulting from remote working and virtual meetings. The light came on for me, such a simple yet powerful idea.

Although I had used pre-month-end closing meetings in one form or another in the past, I had not recently considered how this could be an effective tactic to repurpose in a virtual world.

So, what is a pre-month-end closing meeting? The answer is they can be whatever you want them to be. Pre-month-end closing meetings between the finance department and department managers and key project managers sit between best practices, compliance, and culture. There is no specific compliance requirement to hold pre-month-end closing meetings. They are usually not referenced in an accounting policies and procedures manual. Consequently, this allows you to be flexible and mold pre-month-end closing meetings to the needs and culture (ethos) of your organization and its managers.

From a structure point of view, they are either formal (expected, regularly occurring, and with recorded notes) or informal (at the discretion of the finance department with no specific format). I very much like the informal approach, allowing the finance department to meet with department managers when needed or on a rotational basis. For some departments or for certain times of the year the meetings may be unnecessary, which gives you the flexibility to avoid unproductive meetings.

For me, the beauty of pre-month-end closing meetings is that they appear to be less confrontational and lower-key in nature than meetings after financial reports have been issued. These meetings provide managers with more time to actively think through how to respond to financial results before they surface in financial reports.

Also, do not forget the benefits to the finance department. These pre-month-end closing meetings provide faster alerts to the finance department related to unusual transactions and changing circumstances so they can more efficiently complete month-end closing, with fewer stoppages to investigate discrepancies.

Planning Tip – Nonprofit organization finance departments need to raise the bar when it comes to financial messaging and communications. Although standard financial reports are issued in a set format, financial communications must be designed to meet changing conditions, as well as the evolving needs and sentiments of users of financial information. Use pre-month-end closing meetings with department managers to align financial messaging with changing conditions and evolving priorities. Solicit information from department managers to highlight any changing conditions and how management has reacted to these changes. Encourage project managers to be active in the financial messaging process by letting them draft the message or be directly referenced as an expert source of information.

Beware, however, that pre-month-end closing meetings can be counter-productive if they are not well thought out and efficient. Do not hold these meetings just to check a box. Finance departments need to stay vigilant and make sure the outcomes from the pre-month-end closing meetings are a good use of everyone’s time. Be flexible with the rotation and frequency of the meetings, be attentive to the needs of the department managers, and stay sensitive to the performance and delivery stresses these managers are responding to on a daily basis.