Why a Better Month-End Close Starts With Workforce Planning

Three Steps to a More Resilient Month-End Close

If your accounting team is feeling increased pressure at month-end close, it’s time to take a step back and analyze your workforce strategy. In three steps, you can evaluate your organization’s current strategy, identify where gaps exist and determine the right mix of talent to address them.

Step 1: Evaluate Your Accounting Workforce Planning Strategy

Take a holistic look at your company’s current workforce strategy and ask yourself the following questions.

Is my hiring strategy reactive?

If you’re waiting until there’s a vacancy or workload spike, you’re creating an immediate problem that leaves your organization reacting when deadlines are already approaching.

Am I making the best use of my talent?

Are you preserving senior talent capacity for strategic work, or is their time filled with tasks that could be better completed by automation or entry-level talent?

Does my accounting team have an attrition problem?

Overworked, lean teams are more likely to experience burnout, which can lead to increased attrition. Your ability to retain experienced accounting talent is directly tied to a less stressful month-end close.

Am I considering long-term hiring needs?

Keeping ahead of succession planning can ensure your organization isn’t left scrambling to fill a crucial workforce gap after a retirement.

Step 2: Identify Where Gaps Exist

Once you've established a workforce strategy, evaluate your current team to identify where additional capacity, support or skills may be needed.

This proactive workforce planning allows you to identify potential gaps before they become urgent close-cycle problems. Month-end close brings multiple accounting and finance processes together on a fixed timeline, making capacity and skills gaps particularly visible.

Observe your workflow and note where your team faces the most challenges. Ask questions like:

• Where does work bottleneck consistently?
• Where is work routinely redistributed?
• Where are senior accountants pulled into transactional tasks?
• What skills are missing from your team that can’t be filled by upskilling?

Step 3: Consider Multiple Strategies to Fill Gaps

A strong workforce strategy is about making sure you have the skills, expertise and capacity available when you need them most. This may look like upskilling your current team members, turning to automation to help boost productivity, or filling gaps with permanent and interim hires.

Upskilling Current Team Members

Some gaps can be filled internally. Once you’ve identified missing skills, look for opportunities to offer training and upskilling to existing members of your accounting team. Besides filling workforce gaps, upskilling has the additional benefit of supporting employee engagement and staving off attrition.

Accounting Automation

Accounting automation tools, including robotic process automation (RPA), are increasingly helping teams boost productivity by taking on manual and repetitive tasks. Strategic use of accounting automation tools can help lessen workloads and keep senior talent focused on strategic priorities.

Interim Talent

Incorporating interim talent into your accounting team is a practical component of a broader workforce strategy designed around the predictable demands and vulnerabilities of the accounting cycle. Flexible talent models can give your organization another way to add capacity or specialized expertise during vacancies, workload spikes and other periods of elevated demand.

Interim accounting talent gives you access to in-demand accounting talent without increasing permanent payroll costs. This allows your accounting team to achieve business goals, including month-end close support, while keeping overhead costs low.

Permanent Hires

Review your budget and understand what resources are available to expand your permanent team. Consider which positions would benefit most from the continuity of a full-time employee. Take into account long-term business strategy, company culture, and the existing skill sets and seniority levels of the members of your accounting team and prioritize full-time hiring for roles that best support these.

Take the Stress Out of Month-End Close With Aston Carter

Effective workforce planning requires balancing long-term talent needs with immediate operational priorities. While some gaps may call for permanent hiring, interim accounting talent can provide the flexibility needed to support month-end close, manage workload fluctuations and maintain productivity during periods of change.

Aston Carter recruiters will work with you to understand your needs and source, screen and select candidates with the specialized accounting skills you need. We can connect you with in-demand accounting talent at all levels, including:

• Senior accountants
• Staff accountants
• SEC accountants
• Technical accountants
• Cost accountants
• Fund accountants
• Grant accountants
• Project accountants
• Revenue accountants

Contact us today to build the workforce capacity needed for a more resilient month-end close.