Finance leaders are under more pressure than ever to act as strategic partners to the business and guide the future. According to a Forrester Consulting research study commissioned by Anaplan, organizations are shifting toward real-time, data-driven decision-making, with growing demand for agility, integration, and artificial intelligence (AI) across finance and the business.
Here are the five priorities defining modern finance leadership along with what they signal for the evolution of finance processes worldwide.
1. Integrating and scaling AI across finance
AI has moved from experimentation to expectation. Nearly half (49%) of all finance leaders surveyed are actively looking to integrate or improve AI usage for finance and accounting. The priority has moved beyond isolated use cases, with emphasis now on embedding AI directly into core finance workflows.
Organizations are looking to apply AI across:
- Budgeting and forecasting
- Anomaly detection to identify forecast values
- Modeling non-controlling interests (NCI)
- Scenario modeling
The study also identifies key AI-related capabilities as top priorities for 2026, including:
- Explainable and agentic AI
- Embedded AI and machine learning (ML) for predictive forecasting
This shift toward embedded, explainable, and agentic AI reflects a broader mandate: finance must evolve to deliver faster insights without compromising on accuracy or governance.
49% of finance leaders say integrating or improving AI use is a top priority for the next 12 months.
2. Integrating operational and financial planning
Disconnected planning remains a major barrier to effective decision-making. Finance teams face this challenge on two fronts: internally, actuals and financial planning often live in separate systems, making it difficult to ground future plans in real performance data. And externally, those financial plans are rarely in sync with operational drivers like sales capacity, supply chain constraints, or workforce changes. In fact, Forrester Consulting found that 85% of finance organizations use different, specialized platforms for financial consolidation and planning — and professionals toggle between an average of 4.6 distinct systems to complete critical processes.
Leaders are prioritizing a more unified approach to planning — replacing fragmented systems with a single, trusted foundation where financial and operational data work together. This enables:
- Continuous forecasting based on real-time, consolidated actuals
- Tighter alignment across departments on targets and performance
- A faster response to changes in demand or supply
The goal is to eliminate silos and create a single source of truth that reflects how the business operates.
3. Enhancing agility with scenario modeling
Scenario planning remains one of the biggest capability gaps in finance today, with 64% of finance leaders finding complex scenario planning and “what-if” analysis very or extremely challenging with their current technology.
To address this, organizations are prioritizing:
- Built-in “what-if” scenario modeling capabilities
- Real-time calculation and analysis engines
Improving agility in this area enables finance to respond faster to market volatility and guide strategic decision-making with greater confidence.
Explore how Unilever International Group accelerated key planning cycles from 45 days to four days — with some elements now completed in as little as four minutes.
4. Strengthening data governance, auditability, and compliance
As finance becomes more data-driven — and more reliant on AI — trust becomes critical.
Leaders are prioritizing stronger data governance frameworks to ensure:
- Data accuracy and consistency across systems
- Transparent and auditable decision-making processes
- Compliance with evolving regulatory requirements
This is especially important as AI adoption increases, where explainability and auditability are essential for both internal stakeholders and regulators. A finance function that can't explain how it arrived at a number, or trace a forecast back to its inputs, will struggle to earn the organizational trust it needs to act as a true strategic partner.
46% of finance leaders cite improving data governance, auditability, and regulatory compliance as a top priority for the year ahead.
5. Driving operational efficiency and cost management
Efficiency remains foundational, but expectations have evolved. The study underscores that many finance teams are still constrained by legacy systems and manual processes. In fact, 57% of finance leaders say their financial consolidation software cannot easily handle complex business requirements, as well as one-third of respondents stating their processes frequently revert to spreadsheets due to tool limitations. The downstream effects are significant:
- Slower planning cycles as FP&A teams wait on consolidated actuals
- Limited responsiveness to market or business changes
- Less time available for strategic work as skilled professionals are consumed by manual data reconciliation
At the same time, finance leaders are being asked to support:
- Significant organizational change
- Faster, more data-driven decision-making
This is driving a renewed focus on:
- Automating manual processes
- Streamlining consolidation and reporting
- Enabling real-time data insights
The goal is not just cost reduction, but freeing up capacity for the strategic work that actually moves the business forward.
Turning priorities into execution
The priorities outlined in the Forrester Consulting study — AI adoption, integrated planning, scenario agility, governance, and efficiency — are widely recognized. The challenge is execution.
Delivering on these initiatives requires more than incremental improvements to existing systems. It demands a unified approach to planning and consolidation — one that connects data, people, and decisions across the business in real time.
Anaplan enables this shift, providing a unified platform that brings financial and operational planning together, embeds intelligence into workflows, and supports rapid, data-driven decision-making.
With Anaplan, your organization can:
Embed AI into planning and forecasting
Apply AI-driven insights directly within finance workflows to improve accuracy and proactively identify risks.
Streamline and simplify complex consolidation
Automate intercompany eliminations, currency translation, and changing ownership structures to accelerate consolidation and improve confidence in reporting.
Connect financial and operational planning
Align finance with key business functions, such as sales, supply chain, and workforce planning, through a single, unified model.
Accelerate scenario modeling and responsiveness
Run real-time “what-if” scenarios using live data to evaluate trade-offs and respond quickly to change.
Strengthen governance and auditability
Maintain transparency and control with built-in audit trails, versioning, and structured data models.
Improve efficiency at scale
Automate manual processes, reduce cycle times, and enable finance and accounting teams to focus on higher-value, strategic work.
As finance continues to evolve into a more strategic function, the ability to execute on these priorities quickly and at scale will be a key differentiator.