Sikiru Urges Finance Teams to Strengthen Cash-Flow Playbooks Amid Volatility

Benson Michael

Financial expert and Associate Chartered Accountant, Sikiru Ayoola, has said that corporate finance teams in Nigeria are rethinking their cash flow strategies as borrowing costs remain high and currency fluctuations introduce new layers of uncertainty.

Sikiru, who brings a background spanning investment banking, audit, corporate finance, and bank M&A analysis, explained that companies are now adopting more cautious approaches, shortening planning horizons and tightening assumptions to avoid liquidity shocks.

According to him, Nigerian treasuries are factoring in foreign exchange volatility, import duties and energy costs alongside payroll, tax obligations and vendor terms. To accelerate decision-making, many businesses are linking enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to treasury workstations, creating automated cash sweeps and layered policies for managing surplus funds.

Sikiru noted that scenario planning is gaining sophistication, with models now embedding supplier prepayments, customs clearance timelines and hedging requirements. Boards, he said, are increasingly relying on dashboards that connect forecast accuracy to executive incentives. “Treat cash like inventory,” he advised. “Visibility reduces waste and funds growth.”

The prolonged era of high interest rates has also reset how companies treat liquidity. Well-governed firms, Sikiru said, are segmenting cash into operating, reserve and strategic pools, aligning maturities with operational needs and enforcing counterparty limits. He added that procurement and finance teams are collaborating earlier in the supply chain to sequence purchases more closely with cash availability — a shift that reduces working capital pressure on smaller vendors.

Auditors, meanwhile, are urging finance teams to document assumptions, track version control and enforce sign-offs to tie forecast revisions back to source data. Sikiru argues that such practices are vital in building resilient, repeatable processes capable of withstanding staff changes and market shocks.

Looking ahead, he calls for wider use of bank APIs, rolling 13 week forecasts and AI-powered anomaly detection across receivables, inventories and tax reporting. But he cautioned that tools alone are insufficient without strong financial discipline.

“Good forecasting rests on timely inputs, accountable owners and swift escalation when numbers drift,” he said. Sikiru Ayoola offers valuable expertise in aligning forecast accuracy with employee incentives. This approach enhances organizational resilience, particularly in an environment characterized by elevated interest rates.