Frank H. Brod.

• Author: Schulman, Donniel S.
• Position: Manage Your assets - Brief Article

Frank H. Brod

Vice President and Controller The Dow Chemical Company

Complexity has become a significant operational and financial burden and therefore a true hindrance to sustaining a competitive advantage. As a global company, The Dow Chemical Company has 165 manufacturing sites in 37 countries and $40 billion in sales to customers in 175 countries. As such, Dow recognized early on that "simplification" is the key to success, and reducing complexity became a strategic theme. Simplification is needed to create a real-time, proactive performance culture versus a reactive reporting culture. For example, at Dow we chose to operate four financial global service centers and utilize common processes and procedures. By utilizing a single ERP system, our 404 compliance was completed at a cost significantly lower than our peers, and our 10-K was filed a month early!

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In addition to the common process and procedures that we use in Finance, Dow utilizes common global work processes in manufacturing design and operation. This allows our company the...