As part of its trajectory toward becoming a high-performing organization (HPO), Vesteda’s finance function also decided to transform into a high-performance finance function (HPFF). Our colleagues at Cm: spoke with CFO Frits Vervoort. “Vesteda wants to be the best landlord in the Netherlands. That also requires a best-in-class finance organization.”

Vesteda, a residential real estate investor and property manager, started its journey toward becoming an HPO in 2013, before CFO Frits Vervoort joined. By now, the Finance & Control department has joined that journey with the ambition to transform into an HPFF. Shortly before the COVID-19 lockdowns, the entire Finance & Control department attended a workshop together.

A multi-year transformation

Vervoort: “It takes quite a number of years before an organization has transformed into a high-performing organization. We have now been working for a few years on a number of trajectories that should lead to that. Ultimately, you have to score an 8.5 on all HPO factors for a number of years in a row. We are not there yet, but we are moving toward the 8.5. If we ultimately want to become an HPO, then Finance & Control also has to achieve a higher score.”

Moving to one location

Until 2016, Vesteda was still spread across three locations: the head office in Amsterdam, property management in another Amsterdam area, and the departments Finance, IT, HR and part of Operations in a regional office elsewhere in the country. Vervoort: “In 2016 it was decided to close the office in Maastricht and move all activities to Amsterdam. A limited number of people moved along, so a completely new Finance & Control department had to be set up. All processes were initially transferred one-to-one into the new finance organization. That was also a consequence of the HPO way of thinking, more collaboration. Ultimately, in 2017 all of Vesteda was physically brought together. Apart from our employees in the region, we now all work from Amsterdam. We are on the first floor in one of our own apartment complexes, so with our tenants directly above us.”

A new ERP system

“With the move to Amsterdam, we chose to implement a new ERP system. That took us about two years, including selecting the package and all preparations. Last June the actual implementation took place,” Vervoort outlines another important milestone in the run-up to the decision to want to become an HPFF. “It was a logical part of the transformation we already started in 2013 and a logical consequence of a number of improvement trajectories, including the start of a completely new F&C organization. In recent years, we have invested a lot in the organizational side, with new systems and processes. Now it is time to pay more attention to the people side.”

Improvement initiatives often lose momentum over time

Over the past few years, Vesteda has gone through a number of improvement initiatives. In many organizations, those kinds of initiatives fade after a while. There are always other priorities and daily demands. “The great thing about HPO and HPFF is that you have a framework to connect those improvement initiatives to,” Vervoort answers when asked why they chose an HPFF trajectory. “HPFF fits within the HPO initiative within Vesteda, it is a logical part of it. Everyone understands it.”

What are the 5 HPFF factors?

1. Finance function improvement

2. IT focus

3. Personal development

4. Role clarity

5. Strategic role

“The team of André de Waal has already conducted a lot of research at companies, so you can score yourself very well compared to other organizations. That way you know where you stand. And a lot of thought has been put into how you can embed that in the organization,” he continues. “With the five HPFF factors, you can assign actions within the organization, with a very clear methodology. That gives you very concrete tools for improvement actions.”

Workshop with the whole team

Early this year, Vesteda received an HPO score that showed Finance & Control also really needed to make a step forward to achieve a higher score. Vervoort: “With a few senior managers, we thought about how we could shape a workshop with the finance team. We used the HPFF methodology for that and scored the department on the five HPFF factors.”

Then, in early March, the workshop for the whole team was organized, just before lockdown. The morning was spent discussing the outcomes of the survey. Then the team worked in groups on the questions:

1. What do the research results mean?

2. What does the ideal finance function look like?

3. What actions do we need for that?

“The big added value of this workshop is that you have the whole group together,” Vervoort says. “And that everyone talks about issues they run into, improvement points they see and how we can ultimately become a better finance function. You see different people in the organization who stand up to tell their story, or who moderate part of the workshop. That is very nice to see. You get a lot of dialogue. That alone is a very good outcome of the day.”

“It still takes some blood, sweat and tears,” Vervoort believes, “but the nice thing is that after the workshop there is a positive vibe.”

Getting to work concretely

The team that prepared the workshop also picked up the follow-up. All outcomes were discussed and worked out per HPFF factor, and the team created a spreadsheet with all actions. “After that we drew up an action plan, per HPFF factor and with a timeline,” Vervoort says. “In early July the action plan was finished and we shared it with all finance employees in a virtual meeting via Teams. The presentation was very concrete: What are the outcomes and what are we going to do with them? We invited people to contribute to the plans and a number of people actually signed up after the meeting. We also received good responses to the presentations and the follow-up steps we mentioned. In October there is a follow-up meeting to report back on which initiatives have been started. What did we promise? What did we do?”

“Of course, it is not the case that everything is solved next month,” Vervoort continues. “But we try to involve the group and provide a lot of feedback about the actions we take. And hopefully as many people as possible want to be involved. Then they can also see that something really happens with their input.”

What are the improvement measures?

The improvement measures in the action plan are structured by HPFF factor. What does the plan deliver concretely in terms of improvement measures? Vervoort: “From the ERP implementation there are still some short-term improvement points. For example, there are some implementation issues, things that are not going well yet. But there are also items that need to be improved within now and a year. A number of improvement measures also follow from that.”

“In recent years we have invested a lot in the organizational side. Now it is time to pay more attention to the people”

“In the HR area, personal development is very important. We had already started with a Real Drives program. In it, teams get to know each other better by getting to know and understand the drivers of the team members. One person is very much focused on structures, another wants to pick up speed, the next focuses more on connection in the team. If you know each other’s drivers, you can assign certain tasks better in the team and you can complement each other better. We had already started that, but we want to roll it out more within the teams. The team dynamics improve as a result and you can also create development plans.”