The Crucial Role of Telecom Cost Clarity in Financial Management Oversight

In today's digital age, telecom services have become a critical backbone of organisational operations, supporting customer transactions, cloud platforms, and global collaboration. However, a significant challenge lies in managing these expenses effectively, a challenge that many organisations are currently facing.

A common issue is the lack of data to monitor whether suppliers consistently meet performance thresholds in Service Level Agreements (SLAs). This gap in information can hinder financial governance and cost control, particularly as telecom expenses grow in complexity.

Recognising this, leading finance teams are treating Information and Communication Technology (ICT) spend with the same rigour as any other strategic supplier category. They understand the need for real-time visibility for governance, cost control, and operational resilience.

Enter Calero's OneView, a telecommunications cost management platform designed to address these challenges. OneView offers advantages such as automated data aggregation, real-time spend dashboards, SLA monitoring, cost anomaly detection, and usage-based optimisation recommendations.

By providing a unified platform for real-time visibility, control, and optimisation of telecom costs, OneView consolidates usage, contracts, and billing information into a single, accessible view. This consolidation helps finance, IT, and procurement teams collaborate more effectively, as they now have unified, real-time data, a shared view of spend, performance, and supplier contracts.

Old-fashioned approaches to telecom expense management, such as quarterly reconciliations and manual spreadsheets, are no longer sufficient in the face of modern finance demands. The fragmented approach to telecom cost management limits each team's ability to manage risk, control costs, or optimise service levels.

OneView helps organisations transition from fragmented oversight to actionable insights, transforming telecom from a risk area into a controllable and optimised component of financial governance. Without accurate, real-time data on telecom costs and supplier performance, finance leaders cannot course correct effectively.

Ignoring telecoms spend patterns can lead to complexity, operational dependency, waste, and inefficiency, potentially resulting in damaging supplier lock-in. A shared, data-driven, and transparent governance model is needed for effective telecom cost management. Modern tools for technology expense management, such as OneView, can help address this lack of management and provide the visibility needed for budgeting, financial planning, and risk management.

Kelly Battles, CFO of Quora, echoes this sentiment, stating that valuable data resides across the business, implying that telecom expense management should be a priority. A free Telecom Cost Audit, offered by Calero, provides clear, objective insight into an organisation's telecom environment, helping to avoid the negative situation of a fragmented telecom spend blind spot.

In conclusion, the integration of telecom expense management into the CFO's responsibilities for financial governance and cost control is not just a recommendation, but a necessity in today's digital landscape. With tools like OneView, organisations can transform their telecom expenses from a reactive expense to a controllable, strategic spend category, ensuring operational efficiency and financial resilience.