For the Controller
The close is a cleanup pass because the entries arrived dirty.
Most of what makes a close long is not the close. It is correcting entries that should never have been posted the way they were, in a period that is now trying to shut.
What you are measured on
- Days to close, and how many of them are corrections
- Sub-ledger to control account agreement
- Audit findings and the size of the adjustment list
- Whether the numbers hold up when someone asks about them
Where the leak hits your number
Every entry that posts wrong becomes work twice — once to post, once to find and fix. The second cost is invisible because it is just called the close.
What changes in your week
- Entries reach the ledger balanced and supported, in the open period
- The sub-ledger agrees to the control account daily rather than monthly
- Intercompany is agreed by both sides before either posts
- The books are reportable on the day the period ends
What you would ask in the first meeting
01
Does this create a second ledger I have to reconcile?
02
What does it do to my chart of accounts?
03
Can I see why it decided something, months later?
04
What happens when it cannot classify an entry?
No second ledger — your ERP stays authoritative and OHM posts into it. Every decision leaves an immutable trail of what was checked, what was found and who released it. Unclassifiable entries queue with a reason, they do not guess.
Ninety days of invoices answers this better than a meeting.
One export, findings back within a working day, with the invoice attached to each.
$Check your savings→