Every Excel sheet is a “piecemeal version of the truth.” Not part of any central system of record of your ad agency.

In fact, each Excel sheet is the focus of a single team, to ensure immediate deliveries. Running your agency on hundreds of spreadsheets results in poor sync between your dynamic Ad Ops team & the all-important Commercial team. This results in too much dependence on individuals for timely billing, data & reporting.

The furious pace of your Ad Ops is driven by tight client deadlines and a constant demand for being creative & innovative. All this daily activity is controlled by client budgets, the market response & needs constant steering by client teams. But there’s also something equally important that needs to be ensured : your agency margins must be ensured during operations. (Not at the end of each month, when it’s time for client billing.) That’s why there’s a constant tussle between Finance & Operations teams over “the right numbers”.

A quick question: If your team is busy managing your clients’ needs, who is responsible for ensuring agency profitability?