Benchmarking is a valuable exercise for companies as a way of determining how to prioritize transformation efforts.  Benchmarking is a great way of holding your organization accountable for the costs incurred in delivering finance and accounting services.  Of course, benchmarking has value beyond the cost dimension, particularly around cycle times and quality.  For now, this series of posts will focus on the cost perspective.

A common challenge is that it can be difficult to determine which costs to include to get arrive at a realistic assessment of process cost.  At Pangaea, we believe there are five main categories of costs that companies must incorporate into their benchmark assessment.  They are:

1. Personnel costs

2. Systems costs

3. Overhead costs

4. Outsourcing costs

5. Miscellaneous costs

In subsequent posts, we delve into the individual categories to define the exact costs that should be captured as part of a benchmarking project.