THE CHALLENGE

With a massive global footprint, Nasdaq operates in 26 countries across 6 continents. While expansion is paramount to the company’s strategy, the growth has added tremendous complexity to accounting and operations. According to Mike Galus, vice president, finance and accounting, at Nasdaq, “We have a massive global footprint, touching customers everywhere. That’s created a strain on the finance and accounting resources of the company to keep up with the different businesses we have.”

The accounting and finance teams relied on Excel-based templates and macros to support reconciliation. “It was a very manual, cumbersome process. There wasn’t a lot of standardization, which made it difficult to summarize information, especially when you had to search through different Excel files all with varying degrees of support and standards. We were also getting pressure from our internal and external auditors to get control of the process.”

WHY BLACKLINE

The push toward a more efficient, automated reconciliation process started and was spearheaded by employees who had used BlackLine at previous organizations. “When I came on board and looked at the reconciliation process, I noticed it could use some improvement,” says Daisy Pitre, director, consolidations, at Nasdaq. “I had been part of the BlackLine implementation team at another company, so I knew there was a better way to do it.”

According to Denise Zerega, managing director, global consolidations, at Nasdaq, “Daisy had so much knowledge of the product that it seemed like a no-brainer from our end. We took ownership and pushed it forward.”

The team reserved three months for implementation, rolling out the system across both US and non-US offices. States Galus, “It’s a testament to BlackLine that we rolled out a fairly significant improvement across our company with a very light touch. It was not a very difficult implementation to put in place. This is certainly an added benefit to any potential user who is thinking it’s going to be difficult to switch over. We found it not very difficult at all.”

THE RESULTS

Improved financial accuracy by switching from quarterly to monthly reconciliations. The previous spreadsheet-driven process was so onerous that reconciliations review only took place once a quarter. By automating the entire process, Nasdaq is now processing 5,000 reconciliations every month. “With BlackLine, instead of 4 reviews a year, we’re getting 12,” says Galus. “What we’ve seen is what wasn’t getting reviewed until the end of the quarter is now getting reviewed every month. As result, quarterly financials are prepared more quickly and accurately.”

Implemented standards across entire organization. Nasdaq now has consistent reconciliation and standards across the entire organization. “Everything is prepared the same way now. Now, we can very quickly, before we release earnings, give confidence to the controller that the entire balance sheet of the company has been reviewed and prepared in accordance with our policies,” says Galus.

Enhanced global visibility and transparency for staff and auditors, regardless of location. Staff—and internal and external auditors—can access BlackLine from anywhere in the world. “People aren’t tied to an office anymore. BlackLine makes it very convenient, as people can log in from anywhere and complete their tasks,” says Galus.