Reinventing tax management in business, finance strategy

A tax strategy must be intrinsically linked to the commercial and overall strategic objectives of an organisation. This is because poor tax management and lack of governance can have a negative commercial impact on the business.

It is worthy of note that many organisations are now required to legally disclose their tax strategy and in doing so, they need to ensure that they can confidently talk about tax to a range of stakeholders to ensure that what they say externally aligns internally.

Of course, this requires a new approach to setting a tax strategy, connecting with wider finance and operations stakeholders to define the role of tax management within the organisation.

It also requires a consideration of how the latest innovations in tax technology can be utilised to make the management of tax more efficient and effective.

For the strategy to be implemented effectively, ensuring that tax is at the heart of the enterprise wide framework for risk and opportunity management is a requirement that is increasingly being driven by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which now have a clear view on how large organisations should approach the management of their tax control framework.

Obviously, making sound tax decisions as businesses change their commercial and operational models in a disrupted world is challenging.

Furthermore, doing this in a world of unprecedented scrutiny upon tax affairs of corporations, while the international tax system goes through a period of transformation, including demands to be transparent, is even harder.

The tax has escalated to become a priority area of focus for chief executives and boards and leading organisations are responding to this with confidence- setting a strategy, which flexes to meet the business’ changing needs and putting in the place the right people, processes and systems to enable them to deliver effectively.

KPMG said it ventured into Tax Reimagined Solution, to ensure that companies’ tax system aligns with the overall business and finance strategy, as well as helping large corporate organizations to manage their tax functions for better operations and efficiency in the Nigerian economy.

The Partner and Head, Tax Regulatory and People Services, Wole Obayomi said the initiative is a well-thought-out package designed and tailored for corporate organisations in accordance with their unique needs and levels of operations.

Obayomi stressed that new product is a new way for corporate organisations to design and implement a strategy to manage their tax affairs in the ever-changing landscape of taxation.

According to him, corporate organisations are facing common issues in today’s fast-changing world, but solutions needed to help them comply with their tax obligations in the different markets they operate are unique to each client.
He added that the newly launched product is a technology-driven solution that is customised to each client’s peculiar circumstances and needs.

Corroborating, the Head Of Tax, South Africa, Dermot Gaffney, added that the solution is a service where KPMG facilitates the in-house tax function of its clients to re-invent the clients’ tax functions to enable organizations to focus on their key issues and risks so that their (KPMG clients) tax strategy aligns with the overall business and finance strategy.

“It is important that the tax function is clearly able to articulate its mandate to the wider organisation and demonstrate the value they bring to the business”, he said.

Also speaking, KPMG Germany and EMA Region Architect, Ralf Bauer, noted that there are many global trends and disruptors that are placing increasing pressure on large organisations, adding that the number of new technologies available to the tax function can be confusing sometimes.

“Thus it is imperative for the Head of Tax in any large organisation to understand the range of solutions and sourcing options in the market who is able to identify which is the best suited to his business organisation” he said.