One number, every page: how SHAPE Australia rebuilt its financial reporting with Workiva and VantagePoint

Goal & Challenge

‍SHAPE Australia’s half-year and annual reports were built across several Word and Excel documents, with an external provider preparing the financial statements. Every late change to a number had to be found and fixed by hand, and review comments arrived in separate files. As an ASX-listed business adding entities, regions and acquisitions, SHAPE needed reporting that could keep up.

Solution

VantagePoint implemented the Workiva platform in two phases, starting with the half-year report and moving on to the annual report and subsidiary financials. The general ledger now feeds a single linked document that finance, design, sustainability and the executive team all work in together.

Results

• First half-year report (31 December 2025) delivered on the Workiva platform
• Numbers linked across the financial statements, directors’ report, operating and financial review and ASX announcements, so a change made once flows everywhere
• Built-in blacklining and a full change history for the board’s Audit and Risk Committee
• Finance, design and sustainability teams working in one document
• Subsidiary accounts on track to move from mid-October to September
• A reporting platform ready to absorb new entities and acquisitions

Fifty places to change one number

SHAPE Australia is an ASX-listed fit out and construction services business with offices in every capital city and key regional centres, and more than 1,000 people.

Its reporting process had grown up around Word and Excel. Several documents ran side by side and came together at the end to form the annual report. The finance team spent much of its time on admin, and late changes were the hardest part.

“If we tweaked revenue by a dollar for a rounding, you’d have to go and identify 50, 60 places to change that number,” says Callum Murray, SHAPE’s GM Finance.

Scott Jamieson, now SHAPE’s Chief Financial Officer, first knew the business as its external auditor in 2001 and joined the business in 2008, saw the same pressure build as the company listed and reporting timelines tightened. Comments came back from multiple reviewers, and someone had to make sure every one was picked up in the right version.

“It just keeps going over and over again,” he says.

A platform Callum already trusted

Callum had used the Workiva platform in a previous role. When he joined SHAPE, finding software that gave the same confidence in the numbers was one of his first tasks.

“The Workiva platform was one that I’d already used. I had confidence in the product, and I introduced it to the CFO relatively quickly after joining. It was a bit of a no-brainer for the business.”

Choosing VantagePoint

Workiva put forward a shortlist of implementation partners and recommended VantagePoint, having worked with the team on earlier projects. SHAPE met the team and liked what it saw.

“They were really focused on us rather than trying to promote themselves,” says Scott. “And we had a lot of senior involvement. They didn’t just give us the juniors and send us away.”

Callum valued how closely they listened. “They deep-dived into how we were doing things, what we were doing, why we were going to Workiva and how Workiva could benefit SHAPE.”

Partners who said “here’s why”

The team worked through an agreed set of milestones, with regular meetings and plenty of contact in between. Scott noticed that decisions were talked through rather than handed down.

“There was always a discussion to understand why we were going to do something, the potential benefits, what the risks might have been, and then we would work as a team,” he says.

“They can quite happily tell us if we’re going down the wrong path, and why. Ultimately we end up with a much better solution.”

When the project hit crunch time, the team stepped in. “They were always saying, ‘Do you need help? How can we help you? Are there additional resources we can provide?’” says Callum. VantagePoint’s project director, Matt Roberts, was a phone call away. “Despite being in Singapore, he’d always jump on a call.”

The SHAPE finance team enjoyed it too. “The sessions were fun and engaging,” says Callum. “Even though financial reporting can sometimes be quite boring.”

The first half-year on the Workiva platform

SHAPE’s December half-year was its first reporting cycle on the Workiva platform, and it happened in a busier period than usual. New regional offices, a modular business and an acquisition all added disclosures.

“There was a fair bit of anxiety with the team thinking they’d have to work right through the night to meet those timelines,” says Scott. “But we had Workiva set up, we’d done a trial run, and when we came to 31 December we were straight into it. That anxiety soon diminished.”

The document came together quickly. Executives added comments directly in the Workiva platform, and the team actioned them on the spot. The board’s Audit and Risk Committee could see every tracked change, version and date stamp, with blacklining built in.

“We had some very positive feedback from the board members on that,” says Scott.

Confidence in every figure

Callum describes the core shift simply. “We can just upload a general ledger, everything’s mapped, and 90% of the document’s already done.”

That frees the team to focus on what the report says. “We have confidence the software can make those cross-checks for us, so the team can spend their time on the disclosures and the wording, and be comfortable that what we’re telling the market is consistent with SHAPE’s message.”

The design team now works in the same document as finance, rather than receiving a Word file late in the process. Scott also sees a development benefit for junior staff: working in a linked report shows them how disclosures connect and why things are done the way they are.

Built for what’s next

Phase two covers the annual report and SHAPE’s subsidiary financials, which have an October deadline and have historically run to mid-October. With a single general ledger upload feeding every entity, Callum expects to bring that forward to September.

“That should give the team more capacity to work on things that are more exciting and more valuable to the business,” he says.

Growth through acquisition is part of SHAPE’s strategy, and each new company needs to slot straight into the reporting. “Whenever we have more complexity, the platform is so easy to use that when we scale, it’s so much quicker than doing it manually,” says Callum.

VantagePoint is still close by. “They haven’t just finished the gig and let us go on our own,” says Scott. “They check in to make sure we’re using the system and getting the benefits from it, and that comes from the senior people at VantagePoint too.”

His summary of the partnership: “Truly collaborative, pragmatic and solutions-focused. It’s been a very organised, well-run journey, and an enjoyable one.”

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