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Business Partnering Is Not a Helpdesk for Planning Forms
That sounds deliberately sharp at first. But when I see how much time goes into coordinating partial budgets, explaining variances and consolidating forecasts, and how little into the question of which options exist and what they achieve, it is not an exaggeration.
What steering sessions need is the ability to decide under uncertainty. That is where business partnering becomes concrete. Controlling becomes a sparring partner when it can show, for every important question: which drivers move the result? How sensitive are we on price, mix, capacity, materials? Which measures take effect when, and what do they cost?
The tool for this is simulation. Not as an elaborate model-building project, but as a decision format: a focused driver tree, clear logic for measures, and scenarios instead of point values. Nothing more is needed, as long as results arrive fast enough to respond within the management session.
An example: a customer’s newly hired CFO wanted to get oriented on the business model quickly. He was given a driver model and worked with the sliders. What happens with a changed product mix, with rising material costs, with capacity constraints? He discussed the results directly with the people accountable.
That was faster than any deep dive into the reporting packs, and it surfaced clear priorities immediately.
If controlling is to develop towards business partnering, the methodology has to keep up.