A dichotomy often goes unnoticed, yet impacts business efficiency within enterprise finance: the choice between out-of-the-box and customized solutions. This isn’t primarily about preferences; it reflects deeper organizational needs, operational complexities, and the pursuit of optimal performance.
Out-of-the-box solutions come with pre-packaged features and offer simplicity and immediacy. It caters to a broad business spectrum, providing standard functionalities that enable quick deployment. These solutions are adequate for companies with predictable and standard AR processes—those dealing with low invoice volumes and conventional pricing.
Beneath this convenience lies a rigidity that becomes apparent as companies evolve. The inflexibility of standard solutions often forces companies to adapt their processes to fit the software, rather than the software adapting to their unique workflows.
Growfin's philosophy
As enterprises grow and deal with high receivable volumes or complex AR processes, the limitations of out-of-the-box solutions become a hindrance rather than a help.
Our approach is about recognizing that true efficiency comes from solutions tailored to fit like a glove and enhancing performance without compromising on reliability or speed.
Consider MedUS Healthcare, a premier staffing company in the US. Their receivables process is anything but standard. Serving a diverse range of healthcare clients, each with unique payment schedules and requirements, they go through complexities every single day. Transactions with direct clients are straightforward, who pay immediately and communicate seamlessly.
However, the complexity multiplies when dealing with clients managed through a Vendor Management System. Payments funnel through the VMS, operating on a reverse invoicing system where discrepancies can lead to disputes and delays.
When MedUS approached us, we listened. We dove deep into their challenges, understood their surface-level issues and the underlying nuances of their operations. We customized our software to seamlessly integrate with their processes over a few weekly cadences, successfully set up a tailored solution for them and became a strategic partner to streamline their operations.
Out-of-the-box vs. a custom approach
Let’s take a step back: what truly defines these two solutions?
- Out-of-the-box solutions are designed for immediate deployment and offer standard features for different use-cases. They provide speed and simplicity, allowing companies to start operations without delay. However, their rigidity can become a hindrance, especially as companies grow and processes become more complex.
- Custom solutions are tailored to specific needs and integrate seamlessly with existing systems and workflows. While they may require a longer implementation period, the long-term benefits—flexibility, scalability, and alignment with business goals—outweigh the initial investment.
At Growfin, we recognize that the optimal approach isn't a binary choice but a spectrum. The best solution involves a blend of immediate efficiency and the nuanced benefits of customization.
Here’s how we look at it:
- For some customers, a standard setup meets all their needs, allowing for rapid deployment and immediate value.
- For others, tailored features, personalizations, dashboards, and integrations are essential to handle unique workflows and complex processes.
Our goal is to provide flexibility to the customer so they can choose the path that best aligns with their business.
What makes the cut
Understanding our customer’s needs at a granular level is vital to the decisions we make. We immerse ourselves in the daily realities of the finance professionals we serve to grasp the nuances of their challenges, processes, and goals.
Perspective
Daily challenges that the customer faces and the outcome they expect from the customization. For example, the expected outcome could be to solve visibility, manual effort, or siloed communication.
Next, we pass the request through the 3 core lenses of our evaluation framework:
Evaluation
- Alignment with our product vision: We try to understand whether the customer's challenge, requirement, and expected outcome matches our product vision.
- Business impact: The level of business impact for the customer who requests and other customers.
- Market impact: We’ll take a call on whether the market impact of the feature is widespread, and can be beneficial to other existing customers or future ones.
Decision
We’d decide to proceed with the request depending on its alignment with the vision and its level of business and market impact.
Examples of accepted requests
Example 1 - Data sync personalization
A customer needed to sync a custom field from their ERP, NetSuite, into Growfin. They had unique data structures, with fields like "name" and "real name," and wanted to ensure accurate data mapping.
- Alignment: Enhancing data mapping flexibility aligned with our vision of seamless integration.
- Business Impact: High, as it improved data accuracy and operational efficiency.
- Market Impact: Beneficial to other users with similar needs.
Decision: We developed a configurable field-mapping feature, enhancing our platform's adaptability. This wasn't just a one-off solution but a new capability rolled out to all users requiring a similar functionality.
Example 2 - "Good Customer" workflow
Another customer requested a workflow to automatically tag their customers with outstanding balances under $1 million as "good customers." This feature would streamline their AR process, allowing them to focus efforts where it mattered most.
- Alignment: Customizable workflows align with our vision of empowering users.
- Business Impact: High, improving operational efficiency.
- Market Impact: Valuable for other customers seeking personalized workflow criteria.
Decision: We expanded our workflow engine to allow custom tagging based on user-defined parameters. This enhancement allowed all users to create workflows that align with their business models.
Example 3: Altered sync source
A customer requested to sync invoices from Salesforce CPQ, instead of the ERP. This happens because the invoice source is within another tool and the user wants to ensure only the correct invoices are within Growfin.
- Alignment: To not penalize data discipline, we wanted to ensure that we are syncing from the right source of the data system.
- Business Impact: High for this specific customer to maintain data sanity.
- Market Impact: Given the specialized nature, and considering its business impact, we implemented this as a one-off customization.
Decision: Custom functionality enablement for one customer—providing a tailored solution without reallocating resources from widely beneficial projects.
What doesn’t cut it
After thorough evaluation of the request based on the three factors, there are times when we must respectfully decline a customization request to maintain the stability & effectiveness of our platform. This happens when there is a misalignment with our long-term vision, or there's a minimal business or market impact.
For example, say a request has the potential to cause complexities to future updates or enhancements, has minimal business/market impact, and has only one use-case, we would not go ahead with the request, since It would also set a precedent for similar requests, leading to a fragmented and less cohesive product.
Release hygiene, implementation experience & support
Release cycle
Weekly enhancements and fixes show our commitment to perpetual refinement. Each week, our engineers delve into the subtleties of user feedback, market shifts, and technological advancements. Continuous improvements are baked into Growfin without causing the slightest disruption to your operations.
Every two months, we unveil new features. New rollouts are carefully crafted innovations that undergo rigorous testing with the customer, getting their feedback and incorporating them for the stable release.
Scoping and planning
For large modules and new integrations, we engage in extensive scoping that spans two to three months. This period is collaborative, involving multiple teams within Growfin and select customers who provide invaluable insights.
Feature enhancements, while smaller in scale, receive no less attention to detail. These improvements are typically delivered in one or two weeks. Subtle tweaks and minor customizations are deployed within days.
Controlled rollouts
At Growfin, we believe in controlled rollouts that ease new features into the ecosystem. ß-testing with select customers allows us to place new functionalities under the microscope of real-world usage. This involves fixing bugs and understanding the nuances of user interaction and the feature's impact on workflows.
Engagement with our broader customer base follows, where we strive to assess the value addition of new features. This is a dialog, an exchange where your experiences shape the evolution of the platform.
Implementation experience
Data integrity, operational continuity, and the learning curve are valid concerns that we take to heart when it comes to ensuring that customers get started with stable and error-free operations.
Our track record speaks for itself
- Rapid implementations: Our ability to offer both quick standard setups and efficient customized solutions is born from a wealth of experience and a finely tuned 5-step process. Time is of the essence, and we respect that urgency without compromising on quality.
- Regular updates: The world doesn't stand still, and neither do we. Our regular updates are agile and stable. We keep the platform at the cutting edge while ensuring that your operations remain uninterrupted.
- Consistent uptime: Maintaining a 99.9% uptime is a standard we hold ourselves to.
Straight from the heart support
Tech is only as effective as the support that stands behind it. If anything were to go wrong, you can expect the following from our team:
- Prompt support: Available by phone, email, or chat, our support staff is there to help you 24 hours a day, five days a week.
- Proactive monitoring: Our systems are designed to detect anomalies and address them promptly, often before they ripple into your operations.
- Continuous feedback loop: We seek your feedback, cherish it, and incorporate it into our development process.
The Growfin® Advantage
Customization doesn't have to be risky or cause delays. With Growfin, you gain a reliable, scalable, award-winning solution trusted by high-performing finance teams around the globe. We bridge the gap between standardization and personalization, ensuring you aren't confined by the limitations of generic software or the challenges of building one from scratch.
At Growfin, we walk this path with you, balancing flexibility, stability, innovation and reliability.
