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Welcome back to Count Me In,

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IMA's podcast about all things affecting
the accounting and finance world.

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This is your host, Adam Larson,

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and you're now listening to
episode 152 of our series.

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The guest speaker for this series is
Nishant Nair, CEO and founder of RecVue,

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a modern order lifecycle management
solutions provider. In this episode,

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Nishant speaks with Mitch about the
value of new financial systems over

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traditional legacy systems and the
importance of streamlining your corporate

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structure to enable further
innovation. Nishant believes businesses

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are walking when they should be running
through today's business landscape of

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adaptable digital technology.

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So keep listening to hear more of
what he has to say as we head to the

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conversation now.

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Why is it important now more than ever
for companies to implement new financial

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systems within their businesses?

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Oh, that's a great question. Which,

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a simple way to explain this would
be with an example that we are all

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too familiar with. Now,

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we don't go and get our movies
from Blockbuster anymore.

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We have Netflix, we have
Amazon, we have Hulu.

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Essentially we are in a digital economy
and companies are changing the way they

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do business. They're not
selling products anymore.

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They're converting the product into
a service and selling services.

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So if you look at the financial
and audit systems that

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were essentially designed for the
Blockbuster world just does not meet

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the needs of the Netflix
business model. I mean,

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they're just not designed for it.

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And it requires a
completely new technology

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architecture and thought process.

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Now with this new technology,
these new thought processes,

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obviously there are a
lot of opportunities.

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So for those businesses who are
working on traditional legacy

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systems,

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what are some of the main issues that
they are really coming across today?

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Sure, sure. So the main,
the main challenge, right,

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that we see with a
traditional legacy system,

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it's its inflexibility, ,

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inability to scale and the need
for an army of IT resources

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and business analysts to maintain it.

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Now compare that to modern cloud-based

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server-less platforms that
lets companies be agile, right?

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Modern platforms built on
cloud technologies make

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businesses nimbler and more flexible
to meet the customer's need. I mean,

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if you look at, you know,

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these modern cloud platforms
take away the whole operational

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aspects of running and managing
huge software applications so that

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companies can now solely
focus on growing the business,

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introducing new revenue models and
making the customer successful,

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and then modern systems don't
require an army of people to

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maintain it as well. So a lot
of things that a, you know,

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a lot of challenges that we see
with traditional legacy systems

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that, that, that we don't,

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or that can be avoided by transforming
or with modern technology.

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Now you've mentioned some of the
challenges that businesses are facing.

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And again, the opportunities,

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the more streamlined new
approaches that are available for

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listeners in business who are
interested in taking action,

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right? What are some of the key actions?

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these business leaders can take within
their organizations to accomplish a more

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streamlined, you know,
simplified corporate structure,

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where the army is not
needed, as you just said.

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So it all starts with aligning your

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finance, your it,

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and revenue operations team
towards a singular goal of

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transforming the organization and,

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setting the course to innovate and win in

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what we call a digital economy,
right? And, that requires,

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fostering a culture that
is receptive to change.

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That's going to be very important,
right? To streamline operations.

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And even for these digital
transformation projects to

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be successful, finally, it's the,

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it's the people that's going to
make or break any transformation,

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like this.

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And now you provided a great
analogy, right? Going from say,

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Blockbuster to Amazon and the
trends that are happening all across

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business. In general.

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I'm curious if you have recognized
and seen other trends, you know,

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are there other things
happening and obviously,

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particularly in finance
financial services,

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what are some of the trends that are
really exciting you and things that our

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listeners should be aware of? Maybe
a little bit more interested in.

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Yeah. From a, I mean, that is
a lot of innovation. I mean,

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a lot of innovation that is currently
happening in the financial services

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industry it's happening across,

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but specifically in the
financial services industry,

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there is a lot of innovation that's
happening that I'm really excited about.

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Right? I mean, if you look at, you
know, if you, if you go back 10, 15,

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20 years gone are the days when
you had one or two large financial

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systems doing a mediocre job of all
the different business processes.

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Now what I'm seeing is
companies coming up using

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these modern cloud technologies
and focusing on one particular

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business process and excelling it
and being the best at it, right?

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I mean, if you look at,

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Cooper is a good example
for procure to pay.

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And if you look at RecVue,

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which is for order to
cash are prime examples of

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cloud technology being
used to essentially improve

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or optimize a particular business process.

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And another area that I see is
with cloud technology and API

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based architecture,

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it actually allows different systems
to seamlessly talk to each other,

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and that's driving a lot of
adoption as well. I mean, people,

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especially the next generation users
are no longer compromising on any

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business process.

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They want a system that is
the best for that particular

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business process.

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And today with the cloud technology
and all the different integration

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platforms that are available,
it is possible, right.

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And they want the best solution for
each and every business process.

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And that is resulting in
a lot of innovation in the
financial services industry.

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It's a very exciting
times with both, you know,

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technology and the business
knowledge pretty much aligning with

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each other.

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And what happens if businesses
essentially don't take your advice, right?

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Everything we're talking about here,

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if a business chooses to
continue using its legacy,

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the antiquated processes and systems,
if they haven't gone digital,

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what are the risks? You know,

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what would you predict will
happen to these businesses?

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The world is changing. The world
is changing. We all recognize that.

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I know the common example is
obviously Blockbuster to Netflix,

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but what I see is that same
change happening in each and

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every industry that we operate
in that particular change.

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And,

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with the legacy systems,

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the most common phrase that I hear
from businesses running legacy

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system is that they are there
to keep the lights on. Right?

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And that's the most common phrase that I
hear when we talk about legacy systems,

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what are you using your
legacy systems for,

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or they are just there to keep the

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lights on now, companies
can differentiate,

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accelerate the growth and own the
digital economy by just keeping the

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lights on, you've got to change.
Companies have realized it,

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that companies have to change.

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They've got to transform or essentially
risk being obsolete. I mean,

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those are the,

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I believe the two to two
choices that companies have in

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a digital economy where things
are changing so rapidly,

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new revenue models are being introduced.

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More complex revenue models
are being introduced every day.

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So you better have a
system that can handle it,

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that's agile and scalable enough to
take you into the next, you know,

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that can make you leaders in the next,

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I would say, in this economy.

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Now, obviously the current
state of, you know,

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the global business economy,

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we went through a lot right in the
last year and a half or more with the

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pandemic and a lot of businesses. I'm
sure a lot of those who were on these,

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you know, traditional systems,
had to make major adjustments.

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They had to adapt very quickly
and hopefully, you know, most did.

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And with that being said, assuming that,

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you know, anybody in business is
aware of the possible consequences,

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as you just said, of becoming obsolete,

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what is your vision
for business? You know,

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finance post pandemic, how do you
see things potentially rebounding

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and, you know, what will this global
business competition look like again?

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Sure, sure. I mean,

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I think the pandemic,
right. Pandemic, I mean,

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people talk about pandemic
and it's true that what

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was going to happen in 10 or 20 years

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timeframe, the pandemic has definitely
accelerated that whole process. Right.

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And then that whole
process of cloud adoption,

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where we are looking at,

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we are no longer looking at a
hundred percent going back to

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offices, everybody's talking
about hybrid remote models,

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and working remotely.

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And that essentially brings
in the need for modern

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collaborative platforms on, right. I mean,

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if you're running an old
legacy, on-brand solution,

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that's no longer connected to the world.

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You're not going to be able to run
your businesses anymore. Right.

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And it's not collaborative.

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And it doesn't scale plus it doesn't you

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know, it does not work,

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when most of your employees
are global and working

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remotely, and that's a huge change.

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And I think that that's going to
bring about an acceleration in the

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adoption of, cloud technologies
and modern platforms,

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which we are actually seeing it today.

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We are seeing a huge
demand post pandemic for

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modernizing legacy
applications all across the

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financial services space.

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So I just have one more question
to wrap up our conversation today.

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And I think you've shared a lot
of great insights on this topic.

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you were just talking about
modernizing legacy systems and,

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and allowing for business to rebound and,

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you know, employees to collaborate
teams to work together remotely.

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I'm just curious if you have
any thoughts in regards to other

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possible innovations when it comes
to modernizing these systems,

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you know,

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are there certain opportunities that
you see that you think businesses might

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start to take advantage of as they
begin to implement some of these either

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more modern systems or, you
know, potentially new ideas?

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Yeah. So, in terms of,

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in terms of new ideas, I
think everybody all, I mean,

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like I said,

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the ecosystem for innovation
is ripe at this point, right.

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And companies are innovating
and obviously, right.

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There's a lot of talk

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around artificial intelligence and
automation technologies like RPA.

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So I see those two areas, which is very
interesting. That's essentially right.

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I mean, what you want to do is
you want to do two things, right?

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You want to give people the information
or the insights that they need

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at their fingertips. That's one,

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and you would want to
automate any repeatable tasks,

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any tasks that can be, can be
automated and that's repeatable,

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you would like to automate it that
rather than a human actually going

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through that processing back. Right.

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And then those are the two
areas that I see are ripe for,

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you know,

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for disruption now is mainly the areas
of artificial intelligence where,

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you know, you can get more of a predictive
capabilities in different areas.

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And, and even, you know,

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just like you have self-driving cars, we,

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in the next step one or two years,
you're going to have self-driving.

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And then some of,

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some of the features that already come
out where there's going to be a complete

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self driving financial systems,
that's going to operate on its own.

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And it's going to require
human intervention only
when there is an exception,

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right? And that's the world that
we are going towards. And that,

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that is one space that's pretty exciting.

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This has been Count Me In,

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with the latest perspectives
of thought leaders from

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