This article explores the primary features of Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations, which are engineered to make it easier for you to manage and process data on a daily basis. We dive into the features that improve the accuracy of your data and enhance the efficiency of your workflows.
When your finance and operations teams efficiently manage their data, you always have it on hand and in a format that’s easy to understand. You also pave the way for managers and employees to make accurate data-backed decisions. Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations features streamline your daily data management, creating a consistent, dependable system you can use across your teams.
We dig into the potential of the Dynamics 365 Data Export Service. Using this tool, you can ensure external systems get the finance and ops data they need to perform analysis or in-depth reporting. With Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations as part of your digital infrastructure, it’s easier to engrain a data-focused mindset into your company culture.
Benefits of Using Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations for Data Management
Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations (D365 F&O) integrates data from supply chain management, finance, and operations into a single enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution. Using D365 F&O, your organization can automate elements of your operations, better manage your finances, and fine-tune business processes. Some of D365 F&O’s benefits include:
- Built-in analytics. In addition to helping you store and manage data, the solution comes with built-in analytics tools that give you real-time insight into operations, financial performance, and factors connected to your supply chain, such as inventory levels.
- Power BI integration. D365 F&O also integrates with Power BI, making it easier to create interactive dashboards and reports while taking advantage of Power BI’s data visualization tools. For example, your finance team can identify a KPI, such as cost of goods sold (COGS), and use a Power BI-generated dashboard to track it in real time.
- Azure AI. Azure AI provides you with predictive analytics and automation tools that make it easier to foresee risks and identify trends. It can also assist your finance team with optimizing cash flow.
To illustrate, let’s say you want to motivate your sales team to hit a quarterly quota two weeks ahead of schedule—without surpassing a set overhead limit. Using the Power BI integration, you can create an interactive dashboard to which each sales team member has access. The dashboard can feature a running pie chart that shows how far the team has to go to reach its goal, as well as how much sales revenue the team has already generated.
Alongside the chart, you can position a bar graph with yellow, red, and then orange lines indicating when the team is getting dangerously close to surpassing its overhead limits.
Each sales team member can also click on the portion of the chart that displays sales revenue and see a breakdown of which sales comprise the total.
Every time a sale gets processed, the system automatically integrates its data, resulting in a real-time breakdown of the team’s progress.
The benefits of these Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations Features merely scratch the surface. There are more tools that create easier workflows, particularly when it comes to making data management easier.
Key Features for Streamlining Daily Data Management
Microsoft built Dynamics 365 F&O to streamline daily data management for your team. It gives you:
- A single platform for managing operational and financial data. You get a single pane of glass for sales, inventory, production, and more data essential to your operation.
- Automation tools that save time. Your system can manage crucial documents, such as purchase orders and invoices — while also reducing the amount of time it takes to input information by sharing information across forms.
- Features that enable easier reporting. You can quickly generate reports from within D365 F&O and then use these for business insights or in communications with customers.
- Tools that streamline the audit fulfillment process. Since D365 F&O tracks every transaction and change, it’s easy to satisfy audit requirements because you have a running record of everything that happens within your system.
How D365 F&O Features Optimize Workflows and Improve Accuracy
With D365 Finance and Operations features, you can eliminate much of the manual steps needed to manage and process data. By removing the human element, you reduce the probability of error. Also, because the system can perform so many little steps automatically, each workflow takes less time. For instance, you can:
- Automatically align incoming payments to their associated invoices
- Have D365 F&O recommend inventory levels that can prevent stockouts or overstocking
- Integrate procurement data with your financial system so you can see how each purchase impacts your overall financial picture.
While these benefits can drastically improve your team’s efficiency, they’re of little benefit to others — until you factor in the Dynamics 365 Data Export Service.
Using Dynamics 365 Data Export Service for Finance and Operations
Armed with the D365 Data Export Service, your users can duplicate data from D365 F&O inside a SQL database. This makes it available to external systems, which can then use it to generate reports, analyze trends, or integrate it with other applications.
The Value of Data Export for Finance and Operational Teams
The real-time, accurate data available via the Export feature ensures finance and operational teams can provide access to a single source of truth to their most important data.
If, for example, another team wants to use a third-party app to process financial data to make predictions, the Export Service ensures the information they use is accurate.
Or, suppose an executive needs to have access to accurate data so they can present it to shareholders and other investors. There’s no need to worry about whether their figures represent the actual state of the company if their data comes straight from a reliable SQL database linked to your F&O system.
Here’s a quick-start guide so you can begin setting up exports today:
- Make sure you have access to the connections you need. For example, if you’re an Admin, you have access to all connections and can create new ones. A Contributor, on the other hand, only has access to certain connections. You can see which ones are in the Your Permissions column. A Viewer can’t create connections and can only view reports, not create them.
- Navigate to Data > Exports.
- Choose Add Export to start creating a new export.
- Inside the Set Up Export pane, choose the connection you want to use.
- Enter any necessary details, and choose Save to create your export.
To save you even more time, D365 F&O also enables you to automatically run exports at pre-determined times. This way, you don’t have to navigate to your export pane every time you want to send data to another entity.
For example, let’s say your operations team wants to export inventory levels to your procurement team on a daily basis. With this data, the procurement team can decide which components to purchase without surpassing — or falling short of — target stock levels.
You can simply schedule an export to run at an interval of once every day. There’s no need to send emails or direct messages back and forth or ask the procurement team to check with the inventory team before finalizing a purchase.
When you can manage your financial and operational data, you can more easily guide your organization toward a more profitable future. At the same time, with the Data Export Service, you can make accurate data available to everyone in your organization, incorporating a data-driven culture into your organization’s DNA.
Use Dynamics 365 Finance and Ops Features to Start Accelerating Growth
Growing your business and streamlining your operations is easier when you have the data you need in a central location, as well as ways of sharing and processing it — in moments instead of hours. With D365 F&O’s analytics, it’s easy to harvest insights from data, and you can use your data to quickly make business intelligence tools with the Power BI integration. The Data Export Service breaks down silos between your finance and operational data and anyone else who needs up-to-date access.
By using D365 F&O features to the full, you reinforce your data-driven culture, giving all teams the tools they need to analyze and interpret the information they need to excel at their jobs.
Learn how to capture and use the right data and insights for meeting customer expectations in our on-demand webinar.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 can help you connect sales and marketing, modernize service experience, create a resilient supply chain, and optimize financial models. As a Microsoft partner, our consultants have hands-on experience deploying and integrating Dynamics 365 packages to meet your business needs. Learn more
