A family wealth management organization based in the Midwest, managing $9 billion AUM across 170 entities, providing investment oversight, accounting and administration for a multigenerational family’s financial interests.
Manual data entry, paper-based record-keeping and a decade-old desktop system left the finance team buried in inefficiency — limiting visibility, delaying analysis and keeping skilled staff from higher-value work.
Armanino helped migrate the organization to Sage Intacct with integrated tools — automating investment data, simplifying reporting and providing a scalable, cloud-based foundation for future growth and transparency.
With automation and centralized reporting, the family office gained weeks of time, faster closings, real-time cash flow visibility and a confident, future-ready finance operation delivered on time and under budget.
When a new Vice President/Treasurer/Controller joined a family wealth management (FWM) office based in the Midwest, she came in with a mission of modernization. This office oversaw more than $9 billion in assets, but its legacy systems couldn’t keep pace with growth. The organization’s Sage 500 platform had been implemented in 2013 and was showing its age.
“We were very heavily paper-based,” explained the VP. “Every journal entry was printed, backed up and filed in hundreds of cabinets. When you needed history, you’d have to go find it. We needed to get rid of that.”
Beyond paper, every investment statement was keyed in by hand. The team had to manually enter thousands of transactions.
“It was clear we needed a system that could bring all our entities together,” she recalled. “And to automate as much as possible.”
The VP had prior experience leading accounting software implementations and understood the scale of effort ahead. But she also knew success would depend on timing and trust.
The decision to replace Sage 500 had been made before the VP’s arrival, but the right technology was still an open question.
“We wanted a cloud-based system that was flexible enough to handle 170 entities and still be efficient,” she said.
After evaluating multiple options, Sage Intacct emerged as the right choice.
“It was the best system out there for our scale and the kind of reporting we needed,” the VP said.
The organization initially explored other implementation teams but ultimately chose Armanino as a top Sage Intacct advisor with deep experience in family-office structures.
Armanino advisors came ready to help the office shift from manual data entry to a smarter, more efficient process, and to build the trust that would anchor the entire project.
Armanino kicked off the project in January 2025, with a target go-live of July 1, a six-month window the client was determined to meet. Many implementations for these offices take a year or more.
The Armanino team began by defining the dimensional structure, the backbone that allows Sage Intacct to report across 170 entities cleanly. Dimension planning ensures that every entity rolls up correctly, reducing extra manual work.
To build confidence, Armanino used a visual, proof-of-concept approach, showing what reporting would look like in the new system.
That buy-in extended from leadership to long-time staff. Armanino experts helped the office staff get training to help them become comfortable with the new system.
The implementation connected Sage Intacct with Gusto for payroll, Velixo for Excel-based reporting and Datablend for automation of investment and banking data.
“Gusto was simple — no issues,” the VP said. “Velixo works great for our analysis as it pulls data straight from Intacct into Excel in real time. But Datablend was challenging. It works for our purchasing integration, but the bank feeds were unreliable. We just had to adapt.”
Even with a few bumps, the automation delivered major gains. Sage Intacct allows the office to include reporting groups and dimension filters, eliminating the need for copy-and-paste.
Throughout the rollout, communication remained constant to drive transparency and address issues that arose to keep the project on track and under budget.
At first, the wealth management office was cautious. To build confidence, Armanino introduced a hands-on testing phase. As the FWM team engaged directly with the process, they recognized that Armanino approached the work not as contractors, but as collaborators.
That realization — and the ease of working with Sage Intaact — transformed skeptics into advocates who took real ownership of the project’s success.
The VP agreed.
“Some of our staff are already 50% to 100% more efficient. I have an entry that used to take two to three days to post,” she said. “Now it takes 15 minutes. That’s huge.”
The project’s success wasn’t just technical — it was cultural.
From the start, the VP involved her entire accounting team in demos and planning sessions.
“If staff don’t have buy-in from the beginning, they’ll never have buy-in,” she said. “We had everyone on the implementation calls so they’d know what was coming.”
That inclusive approach paid off.
“By the time we went live, everyone was trained and working independently,” said the VP. “We didn’t need daily support. For a team our size, that’s a big accomplishment.”
With Sage Intacct live, the Family Wealth Management team quickly experienced the flexibility and speed they’d hoped for — with the ability to reconcile weekly and see cash positions right away instead of waiting for statements.
“It’s extremely easy to move around in,” said the VP. “We can edit entries instead of reversing and re-entering them. Reports that used to take hours now run in minutes.”
Going live on time and nearly on budget was a major milestone — but the impact runs deeper.
The team now closes the books faster, runs cleaner reports and can analyze data across all 170 entities without manual consolidation.
Bank reconciliations that once took 45 to 60 days now take about 15. Journal entries that once required physical backups are fully digital and searchable. And historical data from 2020 to 2025 has already been loaded — with prior years being added steadily.
“We’re bringing Intacct up to date from 1990 forward,” the VP said. “It’s not difficult anymore. The setup is simple and it scales.”
The team was given the choice of importing their historic data into the system (with Armanino instruction) or we having Armanino do the import.
They opted to import the data themselves, deciding that it was more efficient to do so on their own time.
There’s a saying in the family office practice: “When you’ve seen one, you’ve seen one.” Each is different and requires more than a standard template. Listening, adapting and preparation are the cornerstones of a successful collaboration.
The VP echoes that sentiment.
“You need someone on your team who understands both accounting and technology,” she said. “Without that, you’ll spend time redoing things. And also, someone who knows exactly what reports you need so you don’t buy modules you won’t use.”
She also appreciated the honesty along the way.
“When I asked if we needed the advanced ownership consolidation module, Armanino said, ‘I don’t think you do.’ That saved us time and money. That’s the kind of professional relationship you want.”
Today, the family wealth management office has a stable, scalable platform that can grow with them — and a relationship with Armanino built on candor and capability.
“This system should last us a long time,” the VP said. “We’ll keep adding integrations as we go. Sage Intacct gives us the flexibility to do that.”
For Armanino, it’s another example of what happens when trust meets technical excellence. It’s never about forcing a fit but rather building something that works for that specific client.
The transformation from a manual, paper-driven process to an automated, cloud-based financial system has given the family wealth management office a foundation for the future.
“We can finally focus on analysis instead of data entry,” the VP said. “That’s what modernization is supposed to do.”
Ready to move beyond manual systems? Discover how Armanino’s Sage Intacct experts help family offices streamline operations, gain real-time visibility and focus on growing wealth with confidence.
Gain back time and deliver more value. Contact our Sage Intacct experts today to learn how to start modernizing your family office operations.
