When reporting no longer supports decision-making

When reporting no longer supports decision-making

Reporting rarely fails overnight. It gradually evolves until it no longer supports the way the business makes effective decisions.

Most SME reporting processes are not designed from the ground up. They evolve over time as new management questions arise, additional reports are created and spreadsheets are introduced to address immediate business needs. Individually, these changes make sense. Collectively, they create a reporting process that has grown organically rather than intentionally.

At the same time, organisations continue to evolve. Management questions become more targeted, information becomes spread across multiple systems, and greater effort is required to produce reliable management information. Reporting continues to function, but the management information it produces gradually becomes harder to trust, slower to deliver and more difficult to access, until it no longer supports effective decision-making in the way the organisation now requires.