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Case Study
Company: Growing Internet Retailer and Government Contractor with 15 employees
Challenges: In the transition to internet retail, the Company experienced a significant increase in transactions, adding more work using weak systems to the administrative staff member. This relatively capable office administrator was hampered by the need to diagnose system issues and implement accounting solutions. Financial statements were continually incorrect making the information not trustworthy. Cash was tight, and the company leadership team was frustrated. One of the leaders knew me from LinkedIn and retained me as their Fractional CFO to help out.
Solutions: I recommended the following solutions and helped the Company make the needed changes.
• Established a weekly cash flow forecast process.
• Cleaned up financial statements and established solid month-end close processes using set templates and checklists.
• Identified several key financial metrics, such as gross margin by product, average order size, average margins, and freight cost-to-revenue.
• Held regular, transparent monthly meetings with the entire staff so that financial understanding could be consistent and motivating.
• Documented all processes.
Results:
• Experienced fewer surprises in financial information
• Ability to make better decisions based on timely, accurate financial statements
• Increased the freight net contribution margin over 100% and transformed freight to an important profit center
• Saw financial results grow from net income less than 1% to 19.8%
• Increased the value of the company
• Reduced stress of administrative staff by executing solid, repeatable processes, helped by checklists.
• Reduced stress of owner and leadership for dealing with fluctuating numbers and varying results.
• Provided a way to refresh and train staff as needed now and in the future with documentation and improvement mindset.
• Converted to a more “open book” culture within the entire company increasing pride in being on the team and allowed for all to contribute solutions to problems.
Within two years, the company was operating much more effectively with improved teamwork. As of this writing, they are projected to quadruple their net income this year.