"In planning alone 50 % faster"

"Riiiiiicolaaa!!!" - There will hardly be anyone who doesn't know the sound of the company's name in advertising. The traditional Swiss company Ricola, manufacturer of herbal sweets and teas, attaches great importance to quality. In its productions it processes a total of 13 herbs, whose blossoms, leaves, roots and stems form the basis of all its products. And so that the herbs can be freshly processed directly after harvesting, all the cultivation areas are located exclusively in Switzerland. A rounded and coherent concept.

From now on, the processes were to be just as rounded and coherent, not only in production, but also internally in integrated corporate planning, reporting, forecasting and risk management. A system had already been in use for several years, but it proved to be very complex and costly; in addition, the company was always dependent on the support of external consultants. And this was precisely the reason why the requirements for the new system had already been largely defined: They wanted to work internally as much as possible themselves and independently of consultants; they were looking for a system that was uncomplicated to use and with which things could be implemented quickly. In addition, there were of course other wishes that they had for the system: input masks had to be quick and easy to create, drilldowns were discussed as well as the customizability of the data cubes or the reports that should be made by the admin. In the selection process, three manufacturers were shortlisted, and after various reference visits and a proof of concept, the choice very quickly fell on Unit4 Prevero, a provider of business intelligence (BI) and corporate performance management (CPM); among other things, it was able to score points with the great flexibility and intuitive operation of its software.

"The new system must carry the conceptual thinking"
Norbert Hirtz, Head of Controlling at Ricola AG in Laufen: "We started with corporate planning and reporting, both of which are very important to us in every respect. In the process, we took another very close look at the old processes and changed and improved a number of things." This is not only due to the system, but also to the logic, the concept and the process. And not because the system demanded it, but because they realized for themselves that processes could be improved: "In our new tool, we now work with significantly more automatisms, the employees can enter the figures faster and have to enter less data than in the old system. It was and still is important that the new system supports our new conceptual thinking. This realization has carried us a long way in the entire conversion process: Of course, the selection of the new tool is important. But it is almost more important to make the right conceptual decisions so that the work is goal-oriented and the employees enjoy what they are doing. And the system has to support exactly this approach and thinking."

Transparent corporate development
The fact that this works can be seen very nicely in the way the planning is currently set up: "We first enter a year number, whereby the input mask is set up in such a way that you only enter the seasonality, and this is then distributed to the individual accounts." This, he says, has significantly reduced the amount of time required. In the old system, he says, you had to call up a second screen each time to even compare numbers. "Today, we have implemented this in such a way that we enter the previous year's, budget and planned figures periodically in the same columns in the same report. This way we can see very nicely in which direction everything is developing." This has also been a very important step towards data reliability, Hirtz adds. They pull the data out of SAP, see the data source, and can look at and compare each piece of data. "Any discrepancies are immediately visible, we can look at the tables directly in the data cubes, everything is very transparent."

The topic of self-service is also important to them - in other words, the fact that employees can make their entries decentrally: "This is particularly important when it comes to the budget. Each cost center and marketing manager enters his or her own figures. This is indispensable because our users are spread across different locations in Switzerland, Germany, Italy or even the USA and can thus work with maximum independence." With a total of 90 users, this is a huge relief.

Integrated risk management
Risk management is also an important area; all in all, the "Ricola Risk Management" committee has defined 45 risks; these could be, for example, loss of data, loss of major customers or insufficient personnel resources. This area is structured as follows: There is a risk owner for each risk. The risk owner defines the risk, takes responsibility for it and specifies what must be done to minimize the risk. The risk owner must also assess the risk, including the probability of occurrence and the extent of the damage. Hirtz: "If the probability of occurrence is high, this results in an assessment in terms of risk points and Swiss francs. And from this, in turn, an estimate must be made of how high the loss of reputation is for the company." This risk assessment is carried out twice a year and handled by a workflow process.

If there were changes in the assessments, these would have to be explained. In their new system, an input mask has been defined in which the measures to be taken or that have been taken can be recorded and tracked; corresponding documents can also be stored. All these steps have to be revised in detail annually by the respective risk managers; in addition, it is determined whether the measures are still active or not and what the consequences are.

Proactive working is supported
Hirtz: "We have set up various reports. One of these reports contains a matrix that shows how risks have shifted, whether they are classified higher or lower, whether the associated measures have been updated, and how well they are working. In addition, we can store a workflow in the system where the risk owner has to confirm that he has revised a risk accordingly. And higher up, there's a risk committee that evaluates the overall risk situation twice a year." It begs the question whether the risk management system now makes you more sensitive to certain risks, or whether you are identifying more risks than before. Hirtz knows the answer: "Today we are much more active in this respect. In the past, we had an Excel sheet for each risk, and we'd take a quick look at it, but now we work very proactively with it, for our own benefit."

50% faster in planning and a single point of truth
And how does Hirtz rate the collaboration with Unit4 Prevero in general, were their expectations met? Hirtz: "We are very satisfied, we were able to implement exactly what we had imagined." This applies in particular to the autonomy in the implementation of the individual projects, but also to the conceptual work in which the system has supported them: "In terms of business planning, we have become about 50% faster, also in risk management we have become faster, but above all much more accurate. All in all, the bottom line is that we feel good that we can rely on the numbers from the system to 100% because we have an integrated system and therefore a single point of truth."