Top 5 Tips for Integrating with Sage Intacct
Does the thought of an integration give you nightmares? Does the mere word “integration” spike your heart rate as much as being thrown out of an airplane blindfolded, without a parachute? What if instead of feeling like you’re free-falling you could prepare for the unknown and feel confident that your parachute will open for you at the exact right moment? I bet the experience might even be enjoyable. I would even dare to say you’d probably want to do it again. Integrations should not be nightmare-inducing events. In fact, when done correctly with enough forethought, preparation, and proper execution you’ll find yourself asking what a lot of clients I’ve worked with do: “why did I waste so much time with dual entry?” and my favorite response: “what else can I integrate now?”.
Today, we’ll walk through the top 5 things you should consider in preparation for an integration.
How to Prepare:
- The Crew: The most important thing: do you have a team you think can handle and has time for a project like this? An integration (just like an implementation) will take up extra time on top of your team’s normal daily activities. Identify the team you’ll need and make sure they can dedicate time to make the project a success (and of course this same list will come in handy when you’re ready to send those “thank you” gift cards at the end of the project).
- The Treasure Map (aka Data Object Sync Map): Understand the data you plan to integrate. You’ll want to identify what objects you’re using in your other software (are there custom objects?) and what objects they need to sync with in Intacct. What information needs to be brought over? I recommend drawing up a Visio document to map it all out. That will help you decide how to integrate: a prebuilt integration, a middleware (like Workato), or completely custom.
- The State of Affairs (of your Data): The state of both sets of data. Do you have some cleanup to do beforehand? Does one of the software packages require an update for mapping? (Most frequently GL accounts and dimensions to match Intacct). Find out from your software providers how much time that might take in advance. There is no harm in starting the data cleanup/mapping without an integration project even on the horizon. You will thank yourself later on down the road. If you do not do this ahead of time, you will be forced to fit this into the project timeline and risk delays which as most know delays generally come with a price tag.
- Prepare for the Unknown: Prepare for unique or complex situations. Identify these. In the case of a SalesForce and Intacct integration, is there a situation where you need to send the invoice to one person but record the revenue to another? Like a reseller? (See the blog post here on a suggested solution!) The better understanding you have, the better you’ll be able to explain it, and the more information that is known upfront the smoother the project will be.
- Keep the End Goal in Mind (aka Keep Your Eye on the Prize): It’s easy to get wrapped up in details midway through a project, thinking you need to integrate every last field and object. That’s not always necessary. Identify the purpose of the integration: reporting needs and operational requirements. Otherwise, you risk over-complicating the process and potentially never achieving your goal. Keep in mind changes can likely be made in the future if needed.
Have an integration in mind but don’t know where to start? Reach out to us here!
Kathy Jastrzebski is a manager with CLA’s Intacct team. CLA is an Intacct Premier Partner with a partnership that spans over 20 years and more than 1,000 successful implementations. Kathy brings five years of accounting experience along with seven years of Sage Intacct implementation experience. Along with her accounting experience, she has a passion for leveraging technology to lead finance teams worldwide through system implementations with a mission of increasing department efficiency through business process improvements.