What are your business’s Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)? Are you even keeping score of your business’s performance? When it comes to business results, leaders often have a target in mind (i.e. make more money this year than last year.) You probably have some specific hopes and goals and are trying to move your results toward …
What’s the Score? Track Your Key Performance Indicators Read More »
Learning how to mentor a controller to think more like a CFO is an important investment for any organization that wants to grow and succeed. As a fractional CFO, I have worked with many accounting managers and controllers over the years, in different industries and in different stages of their careers. One of the most …
From Controller to CFO: Nurturing a Financial Leader Read More »
If anything highlights the importance of maximizing cash flow and reducing the cost of leverage, it is the surge in interest rates: from 3.75% in December 2021 to 7.5% at the close of 2022. As we embark on this new year, all small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) need to set targets for improvement – the …
Great. Good. So-So. Bad. It’s been quite a year for all of us. As I look back on this year and think about my clients’ results – determining wins and losses with hard, comparable data on sales, margins, efficiency, and profitability – it is sometimes still hard to quantify a year as a great year, …
The old saying “grow or die” is now “scale or die.” I love the Grateful Dead song, “Uncle John’s Band.” There are so many great lyrics … When life looks like easy street, there’s danger at your door … but the lyric that hits me is Woah, oh, what I want to know, where does …
It’s the fourth quarter and your team has the ball on the 10-yard line. The score is tied with two minutes to go. Football is particularly exciting (or nerve-wracking) as the game winds down and the score is close. What happens in that last quarter determines who wins the game. The fourth quarter of your …
Working with businesses to standardize and improve their processes is one of my favorite things to do. I just finished working with a medium-sized business whose owner was very engaged in every aspect of the business and every decision needed to run through him. We flow-charted and documented each substantial process by function, including sales, …
Business owners face many challenges today – cash flow being one of the most challenging. Attracting and retaining top talent, marketing strategy and establishing a strong brand, business growth, time management and delegation, and communication are also on owners’ minds. But from a financial perspective, cash flow is often the biggest problem owners face today. …
It’s that time of year again – the first half of 2022 is already over. We’re at half-time, just like in a football game. This is when the coach takes the team to the locker room to examine how they’ve performed so far, give some leadership inspiration, and reinforce the plan to regroup and outperform …
Small business is not as small as you think. Did you know that there are 32.5 million small businesses in the United States and that they generate approximately 45% of the US economy? A small business is defined as a company with less than 500 employees. 80% of these small businesses have NO employees! The …
Process Makes Perfect: Helping Your Small Business Avoid Failure Read More »