Part 7 of 8: How Finance Unsticks Stalled Workstreams

Every strategy hits friction.

A project slows down.

A workstream loses momentum.

A team gets stuck on something “small” that ends up costing millions.

And most organisations lose real money while waiting for it to resolve itself.

Most organisations wait for someone senior to intervene.

But the truth is simpler than that.

The person who asks the right questions and creates clarity becomes the de facto leader in the room.

And that’s where Finance shines.

Stalls Happen for Only Three Reasons

After 20 years of watching workstreams derail, one pattern keeps repeating.

They do not stall because people are incompetent. They stall because clarity is missing.

Every blockage fits into one of these buckets:

1. We don’t have the data

2. We can’t quantify the decision

3. We don’t know the next step

Finance can solve all three.

1) “We Don’t Have the Data.”

Finance can generate the data fast.

Not perfectly. Just fast enough to move.

Operations is stuck guessing.

Supply chain is arguing.

Sales is “pretty sure.”

HR is emotional.

Finance walks in and asks a simple question. 

“What data do we need to move?”

Then finance either:

• builds a quick extraction,

• creates a mini model,

• digitises a manual process,

• sets up a simple tracker, or

• creates a temporary form to capture missing data.

Sometimes all you need is a one-week snapshot.

Suddenly the bottleneck disappears.

2) “We Can’t Quantify the Decision.”

Finance turns confusion into clarity.

Every stuck conversation eventually becomes a question of:

• What is the financial impact?

• What is the opportunity cost?

• What is the payback?

• What is the sensitivity?

• What is the risk?

Finance can build a two-minute projection that unlocks a stalled decision.

Examples:

• Should we outsource? Run the cost and cycle-time model.

• Should we change suppliers? Show the landed effect on GP.

• Should we run overtime? Compare the cost to lost revenue.

• Should we scrap or rework? Show the yield economics.

When Finance quantifies the trade-off, people stop arguing.

They start deciding.

3) “We Don’t Know the Next Step.”

Finance provides the structure.

Most workstreams stall for procedural reasons, not technical ones.

Finance introduces:

• a simple three-step plan,

• a RAG status,

• an owner and a due date,

• a baseline and a target,

• a weekly milestone,

• a one-page canvas,

• a risk log, or

• a shared sheet that tracks progress.

This is the “drumbeat” in action.

Rhythm replaces ambiguity. Ambiguity is what causes most stalls.

Where others see chaos, Finance brings order.

Finance is The Unsticker-in-Chief

Most people don’t want to lead.

They want someone to create clarity.

Finance does not push workstreams forward by authority. It pulls them forward by clarity.

When Finance shows up with:

• a question,

• a graph,

• a projection,

• a template,

• a plan,

• or a funnel movement,

the workstream moves.

Sometimes in minutes.

This is why the organisation quietly starts turning to Finance:

“Can you join this session?”

“We’re stuck. What do you think?”

“Can you help us size this?”

“We need your clarity.”

Finance becomes the most reliable problem-solver in the system. 

Connect Back to the Funnel

Every time you unstick a workstream, you move a row:

• from Idea to Validate,

• or Validate to Implementing,

• or Implementing to Implemented,

• or Implemented to Realised.

This is how Finance keeps the entire value pipeline flowing.

Stalls shrink.

Momentum grows.

Value accelerates.

Not through heroics, but through disciplined movement.

And Finance becomes indispensable.