Case Nizo – N2SK INTUITION & METHOD

Cashflow forecasting

From bottleneck to flow: improving the financial planning cycle in 3 months

Summary

Our client, a leading food research and development company, was looking for a better way to forecast cash flows. Their setup relied on spreadsheets, assumptions and manual updates, which took a lot of time and often led to mismatched timing between incoming and outgoing cash flows. In just three months, we worked together to make the process clear, accurate and easy to manage. Now they can see exactly what drives their numbers, trust their forecast, and plan finances with more confidence.

Context

Our client is a leading food research and development company well-known for its innovative capabilities and quality. As they grew, managing cash flow became more complex. Their existing forecasting relied on spreadsheets and manual updates, which worked in the early days but were now taking too much time and effort.

Challenge

The manual process meant that incoming and outgoing cashflows often didn’t occur as planned. This created uncertainty and made it harder to plan for growth or respond quickly to changes in the business. The team needed a way to see the bigger picture, spot potential gaps early, and base decisions on reliable numbers.

Our approach

We started by building a shared understanding of their current forecasting model and processes, making sure everyone was on the same page. Next, we took a deep dive into the business assumptions that formed the foundation of their model – aspects such as payment cycles, seasonal trends, and project timelines.

With this foundation, we rebuilt the cashflow model from scratch, using their existing setup as a starting point and removed the inefficiencies. The new model was designed to be easy to update, accurate and transparent, so that the team can see exactly how their numbers were calculated and what was driving the results.

Results

In three months, the company moved from a time consuming, error-prone, process to a reliable streamlined forecasting process. The team can now:

Understand the key drivers of their cashflow
Trust the numbers in their forecast
Make informed decisions faster
Plan with greater confidence for both short-term needs and long-term growth

Before

Assumptions not documented
Cashflow calculations performed in different tabs
Deviations unexplained and not labeled

After

All assumptions documented on one tab
Cashflow forecast in one single place
Cashflow timing and value deviations labeled

How our work feels in practice

“Our new cashflow forecast is great! It has created more transparency on the underlying drivers, helped to improve forecasting accuracy and enabled us to better analyse large variances. With that it also brought us efficiencies in our financial planning cycle. We are happy with the outcome”