On PricewaterhouseCoopers' 2007 Budgeting and Forecasting Study

This morning I came across PricewaterhouseCoopers' 2007 Budgeting and Forecasting Study, a newly released report discussing the value to organizations in aligning financial plans to strategic initiatives. Without stealing thunder from the report, PWC research presents five key takeaways for us:

1. Budgeting and forecasting processes face significant transformation; linkage to strategy is top of mind.
2. Today's process is too granular and not focused on value-added activities.
3. Underlying technologies and applications lack integration.
4. Finance and operations must be more closely aligned.
5. Standardizing processes and systems is a primary focus of improvement efforts.

For those of us charged with positioning the business value of PerformancePoint, particularly in how the Planning features fit into the performance management picture (e.g., driver-based budgeting), I believe that objective, technology-agnostic reports like this are important.

What kinds of reports do you use to shape your arguments in support of PerformancePoint? Can anyone out there recommend further/better examples?

- Adrian Downes