Getting Started with AI and Integrated Planning for Banks

In today’s fast-paced environment, banks must navigate market volatility, regulatory pressure, and increasing customer demands that make strategic planning essential. Banks thus face growing challenges, from optimizing capital reserves and managing liquidity risks to meeting compliance standards. As Forrester warns, “If you haven’t started moving, then you’re already behind.”

By combining AI with integrated planning, however, banks can stay both competitive and resilient. Integrated planning offers a unified approach to strategic, tactical, and operational planning across key functions — finance, risk, treasury, and compliance — boosting decision-making and agility. With AI-driven insights, banks can streamline operations, enhance cross-function collaboration, and get positioned for sustainable growth in an ever-evolving industry.

Understanding Integrated Planning

Integrated planning goes beyond traditional forecasting to offer a comprehensive approach that connects strategic, operational, and financial planning across the organization. For banks, such planning unifies core functions — treasury, accounting, and finance — to drive a shared vision and create resilient, agile operations.

AI-powered integrated planning allows banks to leverage real-time data and predictive insights, enabling decision-makers to anticipate changes, minimize risk, and optimize resources. By ensuring planning is rooted in current, actionable intelligence, this data-driven approach fuels growth and supports compliance.

The Interconnected Roles of Treasury, Accounting, and Finance

A bank’s financial health requires the seamless collaboration of treasury, accounting, and finance. Through these functions, an interconnected system is formed — one that relies on shared data and coordinated actions to ensure stability and growth. AI-powered integrated planning brings these departments together in real time for precise reporting, agile decision-making, and quick responses to market changes.

In traditional banking setups, fragmented processes result in data silos, inefficiencies, and missed opportunities, which can prevent timely, informed decisions. For example, if treasury’s liquidity forecasts aren’t synchronized with finance, outdated budgeting models can lead to inaccuracies. Likewise, compliance risks and reporting errors may arise if accounting isn’t updated with treasury’s adjustments.

AI-powered integrated planning avoids these issues by creating a unified, automated data platform. As an example, imagine treasury, accounting, and finance operating in sync, sharing real-time data on liquidity, cash flow, and loan loss forecasts. Treasury’s cash flow updates feed directly into accounting records and financial forecasts, giving finance the data to build responsive, accurate capital deployment strategies.

The collaboration accelerates functions like the financial close, enabling faster reporting cycles to meet regulatory deadlines, reduces manual work, minimizes errors, and drives cross-department accuracy. Real-time integration then facilities quick pivots during market shifts, transforming reactive planning into proactive risk management.

This interconnected approach also fosters better communication and alignment with functions such as risk management, compliance, sales, and HR. When treasury, accounting, and finance work as a cohesive unit, the insights enhance organization-wide decision-making in capital allocation, workforce planning, and risk management.

Extending Integrated Planning Beyond Core Finance

AI-powered integrated planning extends across the entire bank, promoting a cohesive approach to operations. Connecting planning across other departments including sales, HR, risk management, and compliance, integrated planning aligns the organization around shared goals that support both financial performance and regulatory compliance:

• Sales Integration: Sales data is critical for revenue forecasting and financial planning. With integrated planning, finance can leverage AI-driven insights to project sales trends, adjust budgets, and set growth targets. AI-powered forecasting models help sales and finance identify emerging customer trends, aligning sales objectives with financial goals to drive sustainable growth.
• HR Integration: Effective workforce planning balances operational needs with cost control. Integrated planning enables HR to forecast staffing, plan compensation, and align workforce management with financial objectives. With AI, HR can create staffing scenarios that flex with business shifts, reducing costs and maximizing productivity.
• Risk Management: In banking, managing risk is essential for stability and compliance. Integrated planning provides risk teams with a unified view of data, enabling risk assessment and mitigation across the bank. AI-driven analytics allow banks to spot risks earlier, integrate them into capital planning, and adjust strategies in real time. In turn, banks remain prepared for economic downturns or regulatory changes.
• Compliance: Compliance teams rely on accurate, timely data to meet ever-evolving regulatory standards (e.g., Basel III and Dodd-Frank). With AI-enabled integrated planning, compliance teams gain access to real-time data across departments, facilitating faster, error-free reporting. Automation also ensures financial records are audit-ready, helping banks avoid costly regulatory penalties and enhance transparency with auditors and regulators.
• Marketing and Product Development: For banks aiming to differentiate, integrated planning provides insights that inform marketing and product strategies. Marketing can align budgets and campaigns with revenue forecasts, while product teams can time launches or enhancements based on financial goals.

Getting Started with AI and Integrated Planning

Implementing AI-powered integrated planning can be transformative for your bank, but a strategic approach is essential. Here’s a guide to get started:

1. Assess Your Current State: Review existing integrated planning processes to identify where AI can add the most value. Look for common banking challenges (e.g., liquidity forecasting, risk modeling, and compliance reporting) — areas often plagued by data silos or delays.
2. Define Clear Objectives: Set specific, measurable goals for AI in integrated planning. Examples might include improving risk assessment accuracy, reducing cash reserves, or enhancing responsiveness to regulatory shifts.
3. Invest in the Right Technology: Choose AI tools that align with your integrated planning needs and seamlessly integrate with core banking, ERP, and treasury systems. Look for platforms with machine learning, predictive analytics, and automation capabilities for credit risk, stress testing, and more.
4. Manage Data Effectively: AI thrives on high-quality data, so ensure you have strong data management practices, including data cleansing, integration, and governance. Such practices are essential for banks to maintain compliance and improve the predictive accuracy of financial models.
5. Build a Skilled Team: Train or hire experts in AI, data science, and financial planning who understand both integrated planning and banking-specific requirements, such as regulatory compliance and capital allocation.
6. Start Small and Scale: Pilot AI in one area (e.g., loan loss forecasting or cash flow management) where results are measurable. Based on pilot success, expand AI across additional planning areas.
7. Continuously Monitor and Improve: Regularly monitor performance, gather feedback, and adjust your approach to keep pace with regulatory demands and market trends. Staying updated with AI advancements ensures your bank remains competitive.

Conclusion

With AI and integrated planning, modern banks can gain a strategic advantage, optimize operations, enhance decision-making, and maintain regulatory compliance. Banks can also streamline processes, foster cross-departmental collaboration, and build resilience against market fluctuations by connecting critical functions under a unified integrated planning platform. By using a strategic approach with clear goals, data quality, and phased implementation, banks can unlock long-term growth, regulatory readiness, and agility.

Learn More

Ready to learn more about how OneStream’s integrated planning solutions can support your bank’s journey toward efficient, data-driven planning? Visit our Integrated Business Planning page.