Data Fluency & Reporting in Treasury

Cash flow, data access, and reporting sit at the center of treasury—and treasurers say they’re also the areas causing the most concern. In this edition of Inside Treasury4, we sit down with Chris Blow Head of Treasury at Twilio, to explore what data fluency really means for treasury teams. Chris shares how his team transforms complex data into insights that shape big decisions, designs reports stakeholders actually use, and builds trust in the numbers across the business.

Plus — this month’s top treasury jobs, upcoming events, and more inside.

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“Nearly 60% of treasurers say data accuracy and availability are their top challenges.”— J.P. Morgan, Digital Transformation of Treasury

If you’ve ever burned hours reconciling bank files, cleaning up ERP extracts, or explaining why today’s cash position doesn’t quite tie out—you’re not alone. Treasury has no shortage of data. The problem is access and trust.

The real challenge: fragmented, messy data

Treasury lives in a fragmented data environment:

• Bank statements arrive in multiple different formats and cutoff times.
• ERP extracts are missing detail, or worse, don’t line up with actual bank activity.
• Forecasts are aggregated together from Excel files owned by different regions.
• CFO and audit requests pile up faster than the team can respond.

The result? Hours spent reconciling, explaining exceptions, and manually fixing what technology should be solving. Instead of delivering insights, treasury gets stuck just producing a report that may already be outdated.

Consider this: If your treasury analyst spends 15 hours weekly on data reconciliation instead of analysis, that's 780+ hours annuallyof strategic thinking lost to manual processes. At a $150K fully-loaded cost, that's $56,000 in opportunity cost—per analyst. The impact hits even harder as a solo treasurer.

Time spent on manual data work is time stolen from strategic impact. Time that could be spent on cash optimization, risk management, or strategic initiatives that actually move the business forward.

 

• Clean, consistent visibility into global cash and exposures, available on demand
• Standardized reporting so the CFO sees a single version of the truth—without caveats or exceptions
• Team-level understanding of what drives liquidity swings, FX movements, and working capital shifts

Data fluency turns raw numbers into insight. Instead of spending hours reconciling mismatched reports, treasury can focus on explaining why cash is moving, what risks are emerging, and how the business should respond.

When treasury is fluent in its data, reporting evolves from a defensive exercise (“why doesn’t this tie?”) into a forward-looking capability (“here’s what’s changing, and why it matters”)

“The ability to tell stories based on that data to drive outcomes—that’s where the world is going, and the role treasury has to play.” - Chris Blow, Senior Director of Treasury at Twilio

In practice, that’s meant:

• Using cash flow data (not just accounting close data) to give leadership a live view of liquidity before the books are finalized.
• Spotting unusual patterns in collections—like customer payment timing or quarter-end cutoffs—and acting before surprises hit.
• Building reporting that flexes by audience: analysts can self-serve detail, while the CFO only sees the 3–4 metrics that matter.
• Delivering quick wins by leveraging treasury’s existing systems and datasets—proof that you can deliver “something for nothing.”

🎥 [Watch the full interview →]

Quick Win Tutorial: Build a Cash Flow Forecast Report in Under 5 Minutes

The best forecast reports don’t bury people in spreadsheets or overwhelm them with endless tabs. They deliver the right level of insight to the right audience.

A clear forecast report should:

• Grab attention fast with a top-line takeaway
• Highlight key trends in a simple chart or summary
• Provide deeper context for anyone who wants to dig in further

That way, whether you’re talking with the CFO, the board, or an analyst on your team, the forecast stays relevant, focused, and actionable. No endless Excel scroll. No “everything but the kitchen sink” dashboards. Just insights that drive better decisions.

To show what this looks like in practice, Cooper Strout, Data Analyst at Treasury4, walks through how quickly a cash flow forecast can be built—and how Sigma visualizations embedded in our platform deliver best-in-class dashboards that scale from CFO to analyst.

🎥 [Watch the 5-minute episode here→]

Final Thoughts

Data fluency is a team capability, but it only works when the technology behind it is solid. The right platform gives treasury clean, consistent data every time—so reporting is accurate, repeatable, and trusted. That’s what turns endless reconciliations into clear answers the CFO can act on. It’s how treasury moves from reactive reporting to proactive insight.

How much of your team’s time is still spent reconciling reports instead of analyzing them?

🚨 Hot Treasury Roles Open Now

1. Head of Treasury | Zūm | Redwood City, CA | Apply Here
2. VP Treasury Purchasing Power | Atlanta, GA | Apply Here
3. VP Treasury & Risk Management Verint | Remote | Apply Here
4. VP Treasury Fanatics | Jacksonville, FL | Apply Here
5. Corporate Treasurer | Faraday Future | Gardena, CA | Apply Here
6. Director, Global Treasury | Vail Resorts | Broomfield, CO | Apply Here
7. Director Corporate Treasury | Circle | Houston, TX | Apply Here
8. Senior Director, Assistant Treasurer | Herbalife | Torrance, CA | Apply Here
9. Assistant Treasurer, Operations | Wabtec Corporation | Pittsburgh, PA | Apply Here

At Treasury4 , we help treasury teams build the foundation needed for what’s next, starting with clean, connected, and audit-ready entity data. Because Treasury4 is built on Snowflake, with Sigma and AI reporting embedded, treasurers don’t have to wrestle with exports or spreadsheets. You get clean, connected cash data and reports that are ready when you are.

From cash visibility to compliance reporting, we make treasury data cleaner, more accessible, and built to scale. Let’s put your treasury data to work. Book a meeting with us →