{"id":9976,"date":"2021-04-29T15:22:00","date_gmt":"2021-04-29T19:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/?p=9976"},"modified":"2025-07-17T13:55:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-17T17:55:05","slug":"mental-health-nonprofit-transforms-finance-and-gains-agility-amidst-major-industry-shift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/mental-health-nonprofit-transforms-finance-and-gains-agility-amidst-major-industry-shift\/","title":{"rendered":"Mental health nonprofit transforms finance and gains agility amidst major industry shift"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"entry-header has-dark-background-color entry-header--has-illustration entry-header--has-illustration--generic\">\n\t<div class=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__row row align-center\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"col col-lg-7 col-xlg-6 entry-header__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"component component-single-header\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__misc text--subtitle text--uppercase text--small\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/category\/trends-insights\/\" class=\"entry-header__link\">Trends &amp; Insights<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-title-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h1 class=\"entry-title\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tMental health nonprofit transforms finance and gains agility amidst major industry shift\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"entry-header__description\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\t<div class=\"single-post-details container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"col\">\n\t\t\t<span class=\"posted-on \"><time class=\"entry-date published\" datetime=\"2021-04-29T15:22:00-04:00\">April 29, 2021<\/time><\/span><span class=\"reading-time\"> min read<\/span>\n\t\t<button\n\t\t\ttype=\"button\"\n\t\t\tclass=\"social-share-button button button--icon button--secondary js-social-share-button\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-title=\"Mental health nonprofit transforms finance and gains agility amidst major industry shift\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-url=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/mental-health-nonprofit-transforms-finance-and-gains-agility-amidst-major-industry-shift\/\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-text=\"Please read this interesting article\"\n\t\t>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__share-label\">Share<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-label\" hidden>Copy Link<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-tooltip\" aria-hidden=\"true\" hidden>Copied<\/span>\n\t\t<\/button>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-post-author has-dark-background-color alignfull\">\n\t<div class=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"col\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"co-authors\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t<div class=\"entry-author-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"entry-author\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/author\/andrew-sevillia\/\">\n\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"40\" height=\"40\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/08\/andrew_sevillia_profile.jpg\" class=\"entry-author__image\" alt=\"Andrew Sevillia\" \/>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"entry-author__name\">Andrew Sevillia<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>Behavioral Health Resources (BHR) has been providing essential mental health services in Washington state since 1956. It\u2019s the oldest and largest mental health center in Thurston County, where it was formed out of a grassroots movement by citizens wanting to help youth facing poverty, abuse, and neglect. With a mission to support and strengthen individuals, families, and its community, the nonprofit serves a vital role in promoting mental health and substance use disorder recovery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While clinicians focus on this mission, BHR\u2019s finance team supports them by managing reporting across departments and programs, preparing monthly financials and consolidations for the board, and handling a billing workload that has increased exponentially since the state shifted to a Managed Care Organization (MCO) model for Medicaid administration. Recently, we had a chance to learn about how the agency uses Sage Intacct to help with these efforts when we caught up with Eric Jensen, CPA and BHR\u2019s director of finance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We highlighted several of his team\u2019s impressive results in our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/success-stories\/behavioral-health-resources\/\n\">newest customer story<\/a>, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Cutting 20 hours from manual monthly close tasks<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Freeing 15% more time for strategic initiatives<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Achieving agility amidst a major industry shift<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Gaining multi-dimensional visibility to foster accountability&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>By migrating from an outdated Microsoft Dynamics GP system to our modern, cloud-based solution, the organization began a powerful transformation. Jensen shared that, \u201cWe are much more efficient with our day-to-day bookkeeping tasks, and that\u2019s something that was absolutely necessary for me when we were looking for a new solution. Thanks to Sage Intacct\u2019s automation, I do very little transactional work anymore, and have shifted 15% more time towards supporting the business.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The value of trusted partnerships<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With its Medicaid funding split between fee-for-service, case rates, and cost reimbursement programs, and now coming in as smaller, more frequent payments from various MCOs, BHR\u2019s invoicing and receivables get quite complicated. As opposed to receiving all distributions directly from two main county-run organizations at the same time every month, the agency now has to submit claims to several insurance companies and juggle billing exceptions and reconciliations surrounding frequent rejected claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On top of wanting to ease this burden, the finance team\u2019s main driver for making a system change was that they simply could no longer rely on a clunky accounting system that required its own dedicated on-premises server (which might crash at any time). \u201cWe knew that the price for a cloud-based subscription over the course of its lifetime would be significantly lower than implementing on-premises software, maintaining a server in-house, and dealing with all the related issues,\u201d Jensen said. \u201cAnd as a member of the AICPA, it\u2019s endorsement of Sage Intacct spoke to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He also saw the value in working with a team of experienced, certified implementers, like Sage Intacct partner <a href=\"https:\/\/clarknuber.com\/sageintacct-software\/\">Clark Nuber<\/a> PS. \u201cWith the help of the wonderful experts at Clark Nuber, our implementation was smooth\u2014I couldn\u2019t recommend them more. They helped us keep our tight timeline on track with checklists, milestones, and regular meetings as we got our entities, accounts, departments, projects and other dimensions set up,\u201d recalled Jensen. \u201cIt was definitely worth the cost to have somebody who knew what needed to happen and what questions to ask and made sure we avoided potential pitfalls.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Efficient multi-entity financial management<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The biggest improvement Jensen cites thus far is the time saved during each month\u2019s financial close, which he estimates at around 20 hours across the team. These efficiencies come from several convenient imports into Sage Intacct, which eliminate manual data entry for payroll, accounts payable, and bank reconciliations. Specifically, the team saves a full day on payroll journal entries, and at least a few hours on recurring rent payments. Jensen noted, \u201cSince we import bank transactions for our reconciliations, Sage Intacct finds all the checks and matches those up, so we don\u2019t have to go through each one line-by-line, which definitely saves time as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In addition, BHR\u2019s finance team benefits from going paperless and being able to work from home during the pandemic, thanks to cloud-based workflows. Things like Sage Intacct\u2019s automated intercompany transactions, which are self-balancing, also help. \u201cIf we make a mistake and deposit a check into the wrong entity, for example, we can simply go in and change the tag on the transaction, and the system will put it through all the necessary \u2018due tos\u2019 and \u2018due froms,\u2019\u201d said Jensen. \u201cAs part of our closing process, we simply run a quick report that matches up all of those line items across each entity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sage Intacct\u2019s powerful multi-entity capabilities also speed consolidations, which previously required several tedious workarounds. \u201cIn Dynamics, three of our four entities were in one file, so basically only income statement accounts were really being tracked between them, which wasn\u2019t ideal,\u201d Jensen explained. \u201cAnd since we had a completely separate file for the foundation\u2019s activity, when it came time to consolidate all of the entities together for an audit, it would take a lot of spreadsheets. In Sage Intacct, I can pull a report that has the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/what-is-a-trial-balance\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">trial balance<\/a> of all entities, or any one individually, and it just works.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Easy-to-use, granular financial reporting<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of Jensen\u2019s favorite features in Sage Intacct is its departmental reporting, which is much improved from their previous system. \u201cI couldn\u2019t figure out a way to get good reporting out of Dynamics, so it was a completely manual process. I would pull a profit and loss for every department and copy and paste them over into an Excel worksheet,\u201d he commented. \u201cWhereas, with Sage Intacct, I created a pre-set report group that has everything I need at the push of a button, including separate reports for every single department.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>BHR especially benefits from month-to-month departmental P&amp;Ls. Jensen shared, \u201cSage Intacct shows what happened every month with different accounts, revenue, and expenses going a year back. That\u2019s great because it highlights when we\u2019ve got an issue. If revenue for a particular department is down 30% this month, we can quickly look at what might be missing or why it\u2019s actually accurate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And because the system can dynamically report on anything the organization needs, Jensen can pull information for ad hoc requests quickly rather than manually trying to create reports from payroll and electronic health records (EHR), which would take a lot of time. Ultimately, having up-to-date, granular visibility helps drive accountability across the organization\u2019s managers, most of whom are clinicians, and less used to focusing on financial numbers. Next up, Jensen is hoping to integrate Sage Intacct with the agency\u2019s EHR system, so that revenue and receivables deposits could be fed in directly through journal entries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To learn more about the benefits BHR enjoys as a result of migrating from Microsoft Dynamics GP to Sage Intacct, read our full <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/success-stories\/behavioral-health-resources\/\n\">customer story<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"single-cta\">\n\t<div class=\"single-cta__positioner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__wrapper has-dark-background-color\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"single-cta__title h3\">Case Study &#8211; Behavioral Health Resources<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__description\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<p><!-- wp:paragraph --><\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Mental health agency builds agility and accountability with Sage Intacct<\/p>\n<p><!-- \/wp:paragraph --><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a\n\t\t\t\t\t\thref=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/success-stories\/behavioral-health-resources\/\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"single-cta__button button button--primary\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tid=\"cta-id-18423\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tdata-button-location=\"cta_box\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t>Download<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1440\" height=\"810\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1210536654-1440x810.jpg\" class=\"single-cta__image\" alt=\"One-eyed woman discussing with an older woman\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1210536654-1440x810.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 48em) 33vw, 100vw\" \/>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"single-cta\">\n\t<div class=\"single-cta__positioner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__wrapper has-dark-background-color\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"single-cta__title h3\">Subscribe to our Sage Advice Newsletter<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__description\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Get our latest business advice delivered directly to your inbox.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a\n\t\t\t\t\t\thref=\"#gate-ab515c6e-7e90-4c2f-a67e-113872516e8b\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"single-cta__button button button--primary\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t>Subscribe<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1440\" height=\"810\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1073797282-1440x810.jpg\" class=\"single-cta__image\" alt=\"Working from home with tea in hand\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1073797282-1440x810.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 48em) 33vw, 100vw\" \/>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Behavioral Health Resources (BHR) has been providing essential mental health services in Washington state since 1956. It\u2019s the oldest and largest mental health center in Thurston County, where it was formed out of a grassroots movement by citizens wanting to help youth facing poverty, abuse, and neglect. With a mission to support and strengthen individuals, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1446,"featured_media":14320,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sage_video":false,"post_featured_image_hide":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[257,420,279],"business_type":[312,41],"lilypad":[],"context":[418,429],"industry":[451,58],"persona":[150,100],"imagine_tag":[209,436],"coauthors":[613],"class_list":["post-9976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trends-insights","tag-boomer-consulting","tag-cloud-financial-management","tag-sage-events","business_type-accountants","business_type-growing-business","industry-healthcare","industry-nonprofit"],"sage_meta":{"region":"en-us","author_name":"Andrew Sevillia","featured_image":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/02\/shutterstock_1434290372_c2222.jpg","imagine_tags":{"209":"Accounting","436":"Intacct Accounting"}},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"Sage Advice US","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1446"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/14320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"business_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/business_type?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"lilypad","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/lilypad?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"context","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/context?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"persona","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/persona?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"imagine_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/imagine_tag?post=9976"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-us\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}