Case 2: 📊 Forecasting in Silos – How Planning Costs Escalate Without a Unified Approach
A mid-sized consumer goods group based in Lucerne, Switzerland, with four brand divisions, faced a common yet critical challenge:
Aligning planning and forecasting across decentralized teams.
Each division used its own budgeting spreadsheets, KPI definitions, and forecasting cadence. The group finance team spent days reconciling numbers, resolving logic mismatches, and preparing executive reports that were already outdated by the time they reached the board.
🧩 The Traditional Way – Complex, Costly, and Siloed
Effort Breakdown (Typical Scenario):
TaskResource TypeEstimated TimeCost EstimateConsolidation of brand forecastsInternal FP&A (2–3 staff)20–30 hours€2,500–4,000Review and adjustments by controllingInternal controllers15–20 hours€1,500–2,000Consulting support (e.g. external PMO, tool config)External consultants25–40 hours€5,000–8,000Final report creation, cleanup, formattingInternal + Consultant10–15 hours€1,200–2,000
Total Time: ~70–100 hours
Total Cost: €10,000–16,000+
And this is often repeated each quarter.
💡 Where It Goes Wrong
- ❌ Errors from version mismatches and manual copy-paste
- ❌ Misalignment between top-down targets and bottom-up reality
- ❌ No ability to simulate real-time scenarios or quickly test assumptions
- ❌ High dependency on consultants to fix Excel logic or drive meetings forward
✅ The Efficient Alternative – AI-Augmented Planning Support
At Dr. Zwezich Consulting, we work with finance teams to modernize their planning processes without bloated implementation projects.
We focus on:
- Helping you select or adapt modular tools that fit your actual team structure
- Using AI agents to pre-check assumptions, detect anomalies, and propose improvements before review meetings
- Reducing consultant dependence by empowering your own team with prompt-based guidance and custom scenario templates
- Accelerating closing cycles with automated variance analyses and dashboard-ready output
🧠 Why It Matters
Most CFOs don’t lack tools – they lack the time and confidence that their planning data is aligned and actionable.
By working with us, you’ll reduce the typical overhead of group planning while regaining control and transparency over the numbers – cheaper, faster, and with fewer sleepless nights during planning season.