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Is This Essential Element Missing From Your Business Plan?

In building your business, do you ever:

Feel out of control – you’re getting by, dealing with one crisis after another, but just barely hanging on?
Find that your longstanding products and services just aren’t selling like they used to, but you can’t find time to develop new offerings?
Think about retiring after selling out to a group of your employees, but you know that they (and you) are nowhere near to making that possible? (see our post on exiting your business for more on that)

A big step towards resolving these issues, and many others, is to have a business plan – an effective business plan.

Many businesses get by without one. “It’s in my head,” you might say. Or, it could be a document you put together years ago, maybe because your bank required it to extend financing, and you haven’t looked at it since.

According to a survey by business and finance software provider Exact, companies that have a business plan in place were more than twice as successful at achieving their goals than those that did not (a 69% success rate versus 31%).

What’s wrong with many business plans?

If having a business plan is so important, how can your company get the best possible benefit out of the work that goes into preparing one?

Our work here at the CFO Centre has found that while having a business plan helps, there are some important elements to success (many of these are presented in more detail in the e-book).

One is that the plan must be a living document – it needs to be something that you review frequently, updating it as circumstances change, and using it to provide guidance on what your daily, monthly and yearly priorities should be.

Another aspect of success, believe it or not, involves packaging. You may be aware that a business plan that is used as a finance-obtaining tool will succeed more if it features attractive layout and design. But having a document that’s pleasant to look at – not just text on a page – will work better even if it’s just used internally. That’s because the people who read it, including you, will have a greater sense of confidence that the ideas in it can be made to happen.

How a timeline helps make it all happen

But the one important aspect, that many business plans miss, is the element of time. Without a clear picture of what is to happen by what time, a business plan is just a wish-list.

The best way to help make sure that the business plan stays alive – and more importantly so that what’s in it comes to pass – is through including a timeline.

A timeline (or timetable, if you prefer) sets out the milestones of your business plan – the number of employees, number of locations, sales targets, net revenue expected and other targets – and indicates what date they are expected to be reached.

For example, let’s say you have a winning retail concept that you want to turn into a franchise. Maybe even a national franchise.

To do that, you need to determine what processes need to be implemented in order to manage a store like yours effectively. That, in turn, leads to a set of written procedures – such as the steps to be taken upon opening the store or on closing, how to make each of the products that are sold, and other aspects of success. Maybe then you need to establish a time by which you expect to have that first satellite operation running, maybe as a corporate-owned location, just to see what happens when you’re not on site to trouble-shoot all the time.

It could be that this sounds so complicated and intimidating that you never actually get your franchising idea off the ground.

Here’s how a timeline helps make your business plan happen:

It breaks down big, scary projects into smaller, bite-sized chunks you can actually do
It reassures you by pointing out that you don’t need to do everything right now
It moves you along because you see a deadline for one of those “chunks” coming up, so you can get working on it

Start with the end in mind, then work backward

This involves a 5 step process.

Get a firm image of your goal. Established business wisdom says to consider first where you want to be (say, 20 franchise outlets across the country, ten years from now) and then spell out in detail what that will look like. Going into detail gives you a more clear idea of what needs to be in place for that to happen. Set a date for that to happen.

Determine the big milestones along the way. This might include writing out the elements of success in your current business, creating written procedures, testing those procedures to see if they cover all reasonable contingencies, opening a second outlet to further test those procedures, selling your first franchise to someone you know already, and onwards.

Think of the resources you’ll need. For example, at some point, you’ll need to engage a franchise lawyer to consult and help in the preparation of a franchise agreement. Think of the finance you’ll need to have in place, maybe from a bank or friend-or-family source, to make the rest happen (to learn more about how to avoid cash-flow problems that might drag you down, see our post here).

Write out your timeline. It might be on paper, on a computerized document, on a calendar program that will remind you about deadlines, or whatever works for you. Maybe multiple formats will be a good way to keep you on track.

Implement. The rest is up to you and your team. Delegate tasks, outsource, do it yourself – but be sure to stay with your timeline.

5 key factors to help you sell your business

Any business owner will eventually be faced with the need to sell their business.

It could happen when a medical change or injury makes it impossible to continue, and you need to sell to secure your family’s future. Or maybe an offer comes along that’s just too good to refuse.

Regardless of the reason, it’s always a good idea to take steps to make your business ready for sale at any time. And as Chapter Seven of the CFO Centre’s book “Scale Up” points out, many of those steps will help make your business life easier, less complicated and with fewer unpleasant surprises, right now and ongoing.

To get the best possible offer for your business when the time comes – and make your life easier now as well, here are five key points on help you sell your business:

Ownership

A potential purchaser will want clarity around the question of who currently owns the business. If you’re the sole decision-maker in the company, it may be best to have all the shares in your name.

But if you want to reward long-time employees, and support their continued loyalty, you may want to grant or sell some shares to them. If that’s the case, a potential buyer will want to see that there is an effective shareholder’s agreement in place. This reduces uncertainty for the buyer.

Real property

If your business owns real estate, you need to understand that a buyer may view this as a problem – particularly if owning the land is not essential to the success of the business. Consider separating the property from the business, so that a potential owner has the option of avoiding a commitment to an asset that they may not want. One way to deal with this is to put the land into a holding company controlled by you, and then set up a lease agreement for the business to use the property.

Intellectual property

Over the years your company has likely developed trademarks, patents, brands, and industrial processes that are important to the success of the business. You may not think of them as something that has value, however, anyone considering buying the company will want to be sure about the ownership of this intellectual property and its value. So, it may be good to have your company’s IP valued professionally – you may be able to increase the purchase price based on that valuation.

Customer contracts

Many potential buyers will base their purchase decision on the expected ongoing cashflow of the business. So, they’ll want to know about how much of that cashflow comes through dependable contracts. But they’ll also need to know if those contracts will transfer to the new owner – and if a high proportion of the company’s income is due to the customer’s personal loyalty to the owner. Accordingly, it’s good to carry out an analysis of the company’s major customer contracts to see if the future business is sound. Because cashflow is so important in putting a value on a business, consider some of the points raised in our blog post “How your business can fly away from cash problems.”

Financial records

Many owner-operated businesses are operated in a fairly ad-hoc way. If an idea sounds good, the owner relies on their intuition and experience to decide on the next steps.

Potential buyers need to know that there is a plan in place – including a budget each year that they can see closely matches what was actually spent. They need to know that there are not a lot of unnecessary expenses, such as a local softball team sponsorship that is due largely to the owner’s personal interest, rather than its marketing value.

This is one of the areas where an experienced financial professional from the CFO Centre can help. This person can work with you well ahead of time to build a business that is financially successful and therefore attractive to a potential buyer. You’ll also get help with finding out what potential problem areas might cause a potential buyer to lower their offer or just walk away, so you gain the most benefit from the hard work of building your company.

The difference between a CFO and a Controller

If you’ve ever looked through a storage box holding clothes you wore as a child, you may have wondered, “How did I ever fit into something that small?”

Your company may be in the same situation. The equipment, personnel, and premises that fitted well when the company was starting out, may be constraining its growth as it matures.

One of the most pressing areas for change may not be your production system, office space or loading dock. If you find that cash shortages are constraining your business, if you don’t know if you can afford to expand your product offering, or you have no real idea which of your products are the most profitable, you may have outgrown your finance function.

Child-sized clothing might have fitted you well when you were small, and it could be that the financial system you had when your company was young, did what you needed it to do. Most companies start out with the founder keeping track of everything, maybe with the help of a bookkeeper or accountant, later growing into a department with a controller at the head.

But there is a world of difference between the “controller” mindset and the benefits available through someone who is able to help you take your company to a higher level – a Chief Financial Officer, or CFO.

Having access to those skills is important. A CFO brings enormous practical financial and strategic skills and knowledge to your company.

A report by the International Federation of Accountants[1] quotes James Riley, Group Finance Director and Executive Director, Jardine Matheson Holdings Ltd.:

A good CFO should be at the elbow of the CEO, ready to support and challenge them in leading the business. The CFO should, above all, be a good communicator — to the board on the performance of the business and the issues it is facing; to his/her peers in getting across key information and concepts to facilitate discussion and decision making; and to subordinates so that they are both efficient and motivated.

In this post, you’ll learn about the difference between a controller and a CFO, and why it may be time you made the change – and how you can do that without putting an undue cost burden on your company.

The controller mindset: accuracy, compliance, tactics

All companies need someone with a controller mindset, even if they don’t have that specific title on their business card. The controller watches the details, so you don’t have to. The controller focuses on making sure that financial records are accurate, prepares monthly financial reports, ensures payroll is made on time, invoices are issued and collected and ensures compliance with regulations.

Essentially, the controller manages the company’s books and records and is responsible for the transaction processing in a company and reporting on those transactions. With the focus on recording and reporting on past events, the controller’s role is mainly backward-looking.

And just to repeat – you need someone who makes sure all of these issues are covered.

But your company, even if it’s small, also needs someone able to watch the big picture. And as it grows, that need becomes more acute.

By comparison, the role of the CFO is to provide forward-looking financial management. It’s a proactive role since it is concerned with the company’s future financial success.

What are the signs that you may need more than what a controller mindset can provide? Maybe — if you need to understand the risks your company is facing, or you need to know which of several possible ways forward is best to improve performance or help you grow profitability, or it could be that you need to someone to help align the organization by establishing performance metrics and mindset throughout the organization, or perhaps you need to know how to finance your growth.

In short, you don’t just need someone to provide a utility function – you need a combination of coach/advisor regarding the resources you need to make your intended future happen.

The CFO mindset: big-picture, advisor, strategy

The role and responsibilities of a CFO have expanded in the past two decades, according to the International Federation of Accountants. That expansion it says has been driven by complexity as a result of globalized capital and markets, regulatory and business drivers, a growth in information and communications, and changing expectations of the CFO’s role. Whereas the CFO was once seen as a company’s ‘gatekeeper’, he or she is now expected to participate in driving an organization towards its goals.

The CFO still has the responsibilities for overseeing the Controllers role in record keeping to safeguard the company’s assets and reporting on financial performance

By contrast with a controller, the CFO expands that role to focus on improving the operating performance of a company, analyzing the numbers and presenting solutions on how to make those numbers better. This can include higher sales, lower costs or greater margins.

A CFO will focus on strategy, helping to shape the company’s overall strategy and direction, as well as a catalyst, instilling a financial approach and mindset throughout the organization to help other parts of the business perform better[2].

The controller looks to the short term, the CFO is long-term. The controller helps make sure your company is compliant with issues such as environmental reporting and taxes; the CFO helps you design and implement a strategy. The controller seeks to maintain what you have; the CFO helps you expand.

If your company is in a growth phase – or you want it to be in a growth phase, the controller has your back – and the CFO helps you move forward. It means together you can achieve better results, faster.

Feel free to reach out to us here at the CFO Centre. We’ll sit down and have a talk, even if it’s phone or video call, to get an idea of where you want to take your company, and what your options might be to support the growth you want.

Many of the issues in this post are covered in the CFO Centre’s e-book “Financial Reporting,” which goes into detail about the insights that you can gain from a CFO’s strategic view of your company’s financials.

[1] THE ROLE AND EXPECTATIONS OF A FD: A Global Debate on Preparing Accountants for Finance Leadership, the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC), October 2013, www.ifac.org

[2] ‘Four Faces of the FD’, Perspectives, Deloitte, http://www2.deloitte.com

Thriving in a New World Strategist

by annbeldia

In the introduction to our CFO Contribution Series, Thriving In the New World Strategist, we suggested that most business owners may not be well served by high-level, third party driven, divergent strategic exercises. Certainly, there is significant value in undertaking far reaching, blue sky thinking. Most small to medium size organizations will be better served by incorporating their own foresight into targeted, most probable future scenarios developed by highly engaged participants directly linked to the success of the business.

There can be no doubt the Covid 19 pandemic has led to unprecedented change for most businesses. Revenue levels have plunged for some firms while others are experiencing unexpected increases in new customers and unforecasted demand levels. Supply Chains have been disrupted. Optimizing employee productivity and satisfaction have become more art than science. Short-term cash availability and long term capital requirements are highly uncertain. Even the most confident experts are reluctant to make a call on the economic climate we are likely to experience a year from now or even six months from now.

Success in this uncharted New World requires business owners to make effective decisions to address today’s challenges and to establish a strong market position in an uncertain future. We call this Future Proofing your business. The path forward will be unique for every enterprise. For most businesses, the contribution of an integrated senior financial leader can be a major factor in making the best decisions for steering the business towards a successful future.

Owner operators will particularly benefit by injecting their full time or part time CFO into idea

generation and implementation planning to future proof their business using the following four-step process.

Developing Most Probable Future Scenarios

The insight of the CEO along with sales and market-oriented management will understandably be

essential to develop and select three or four most likely market scenarios. Important dimensions for assessing your business’ future would include revenue outlook, new revenue sources, changes in access to customers or preferences of customers, competitive forces, regulatory factors and assessment of staff effectiveness. Identifying these factors specific to your business and your industry should be considered in conjunction with the team’s projections of potential future operating environments.

Involving a holistic professional with the ability to stretch the team’s future thinking to include the full spectrum of potential obstacles often leads to more robust, more complete future scenarios. Team members should expect the organization’s financial leader to embrace the uncertainties inherent in guessing at potential futures while also expecting them to act as a catalyst to describe the leading scenarios with sufficient clarity to facilitate resiliency testing and implementation planning.

Leveraging Emerging Technology

The pace of change over the past five to ten years combined with the recent accelerated societal and economic changes linked to the pandemic forces all businesses to adapt and respond quicker and more intensively than ever before. Adapting and responding effectively requires timely and appropriate application of emerging technology solutions to uncover new connections to customers and to unlock methods to streamline and enhance business processes.

A few of the more pervasive and perhaps highest potential technology trends destined to shape the future are Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain Technology and Internet of Things. Finance leaders bring essential analytical skills, as well as opportunity and risk assessment expertise. These attributes will help the business select the most advantageous solutions and deploy these applications to deliver favourable returns.

Stress Testing Scenarios and Strategies

Once the business has collaboratively generated their high probability future scenarios and articulated corresponding strategies to maximize results; a critical need emerges for disciplined evaluation to ensure the selected paths forward can stand up to expected obstacles and deviations.

The CFO’s involvement in scenario testing is likely to be most accepted and welcomed by the business owner and the future proofing team. A New World CFO is one that passionately embraces uncertainties and optimism while maintaining their proven ability to rigorously apply a check and balance approach to the team’s chosen future scenarios and strategies.

Commitment to Highest Impact Initiatives

The hardest decision for many organizations undertaking future proofing activities during today’s tumultuous environment will be to commit the necessary financial and human resources to those chosen few initiatives expected to best position the business over the next six months to five years.

Creating the internal and external confidence to act now often hinges on the development of concise, compelling business cases to define the initiative, its costs and expected profits. The involvement of your financial leader in the entire future proofing process will significantly enhance the quality and effectiveness of these strategic business cases. In situations where the organization is seeking external financing or participation from partnering organizations; the voice of an informed, engaged, credible CFO will be a significant factor in securing the desired external support.

Business owners and their management teams have the responsibility to navigate the firm through today’s urgent challenges and opportunities. They also bear the greater responsibility to establish direction and take action to prepare the organization to succeed for many years ahead. A New World CFO welcomes this responsibility and possesses the knowledge and dedication needed to deliver results today and in the future. Discover more.

Introducing the Thriving in the New World Series

by annbeldia

Thriving in the New World series is The CFO Centre’s unique approach on how we can truly make a difference to your business. Explore how a transformational CFO, as a Strategist, Operator, Leader and Guardian, is essential to future proof your business.

The Covid-19 pandemic has transported almost every business into a new reality with greater obstacles and greater, or certainly different, opportunities. Many business owners are operating at ground level to address challenges that threaten the livelihood of their employees, the continuity of their customers and the future of their business.

Now is not the time for strategic retreats, or high-level consulting reviews. Entrepreneurs that thrive in this new world will be those that combine their experience and knowledge with the insights and expertise of involved, committed individuals. These entrepreneurs will possess the mindset to navigate each day’s most pressing issues while charting the course for the business to move forward.

Now is the time to ensure your business is enjoying the leadership and hands on guidance of a New World CFO. Accenture defines the new CFO as a “value-oriented individual who views the world through a different lens” . They see themselves as value architects whose primary focus is helping the organization drive profitable growth.

All businesses have staff or advisors in place to manage the financial requirements of their business.

Perhaps more than ever before, businesses of all sizes, and all stages of development will benefit from finance oriented leadership that goes far beyond the numbers, far beyond basic reporting and far beyond being the controller or watchdog for the business.

If you own and operate a small to medium-sized business, you may have gotten by without access to the “C” level expertise of an experienced CFO. Thriving in your new world may require access to a proven, holistic financial leader driven to grow your business profitably.

This four-part – New World CFO series will provide specific, understandable and implementable information designed to help your business thrive and survive. Uncover more about the benefits of futureproofing.

Merger and Acquisition Strategies for Rapid Growth

by charlottenoble

If you want your company to enjoy fast, explosive growth, then consider merging with or buying a target company.

If you use the right merger and acquisition strategies your company could gain many competitive advantages and transform from a scale-up to a large firm.

It could also benefit from new technologies or skill sets, increased output, and more fixed assets. It could achieve an increased market share like Disney achieved with its $71.3 billion merger with 20th Century Fox in early 2019. The merger meant Disney boosted its domination of cinema with the newly merged company commanding 35% of the industry.

Your company could enter or expand into other markets or territories by merging with or acquiring a company that already has a strong presence there.

Acquiring firms can get substantial cost or revenue synergies from the merger or acquisition. For example, the company could benefit from the increased buying and negotiating power it has, thanks to the merger or acquisition.

It could achieve vertical integration, with potential cost and efficiency savings. Some of the business units within the merged firm could be consolidated.

A successful merger or acquisition could mean that your company could raise prices, sell more products or services, and even change market dynamics.

With an expanded business, you could benefit from internal economies of scale. Your business could get access to raw materials or gain control of your supply chain.

Your business could achieve a virtual monopoly in your market through horizontal integration. That is, acquiring or merging with a company that is on the same level in the production supply chain as your own.

A successful M&A in another country could provide substantial tax benefits too. Many governments offer substantial tax benefits to companies that merge with or acquire local companies.

All of this can be achieved in the short term rather than the years it might take if you rely solely on organic growth.

However, before you start looking for target companies, it’s essential to undertake strategic planning. You and your Board of Directors need to consider your company’s goals, resource allocation, business portfolio, and plans for growth.

You can then better decide if merging with or buying another business fits with your company’s strategy and goals.
It’s far better to do this early on rather than after you’ve acquired companies.

Raising finance to fund the merger or acquisition

If you decide that a merger or acquisition will fit with your goals, then you’ll need to consider how to finance your merger and acquisition (M&A) deals.

Borrowing from third party lenders makes an acquisition or merger possible for growing SMEs. There are of course other ways to finance a merger or an acquisition. They include exchanging stocks, taking on debt, issuing an IPO, using cash, and issuing bonds. Some of these might not be feasible for SMEs.

Banks are still the main source of primary loans, but there are several alternatives to consider. They include direct lending funds and private placement markets.

You can use debt capital, equity capital, mezzanine capital, or convertible debt to complete your merger or acquisition.

The benefit of using debt capital in which you borrow against any debt-free assets is that you won’t have to give up equity in your company.

With equity capital, you sell a portion of the equity you own in your company. Private equity groups will offer to fund you in return for a stake in your company.

You could consider applying for a private placement loan. With that, you sell shares in your company to a select group of investors. The advantage of a private placement loan is that it can be a cheaper and quicker process than a public share offering. It is less regulated too.

The benefit of getting an asset-backed loan from a direct lending fund is that the fund manager may offer a more flexible deal structure than a bank. You will also keep control of your business.

Mezzanine capital is a hybrid of debt and equity capital. Lenders will look at your cash flow and your company’s future growth rather than its assets.

If your company is classified as high risk and you’re unable to get credit, you could raise funds through convertible debt. A creditor will loan you the money in return for a mix of equity in your company and debt-free assets.

Use experts

Many financial and legal factors need to be considered before merging or acquiring a business. Mergers and acquisitions require analysis of the following:

Market opportunity
Company resources
Company’s liquidity (to ensure it can make and sustain the investment
Statutory and regulatory restrictions (especially linked to competition)
The speed of the process
Impact on customers (especially if the M&A results in market domination and a price hike)

In the medium and long term, the success of the operation depends on three things:

The size and global scope of the resulting business
The capacity of the management team
The integration of strategic and operational functions.

It’s crucial that you understand the market your target company is in, identify entry barriers, and evaluate its potential for growth.

Your due diligence should include the company’s intellectual property, its contracts, balance sheet, management, staff, benefits packages, property, leases, and stock.

That’s why a successful merger or acquisition relies on the help of external M&A advisors who have expertise in this area. They can carry out due diligence, provide advice, and even negotiate on your behalf. They can also save you from making a costly mistake.

Many mergers and acquisitions fail due to factors like poor research of the target company and due diligence being carried out by buyers who have no experience in M&A transactions.

They can also suffer from too much focus on post-merger cost-cutting rather than growth, as was the case with the merged Kraft Heinz.

A mismatch of cultures or even IT systems and other technology can also result in M&A failure. This was the case when the German car manufacturer Daimler Benz bought the American Chrysler car company for $36 billion in 1998.

While the German company catered to an affluent market, Chrysler offered its cars at competitive prices.

The union didn’t work and in 2007, Daimler Benz sold Chrysler to Cerberus Capital Management for $650 million.

That’s why it is so vital to use advisors who are well-versed in M&As. They’re likely to be doing M&A deals on a day to day basis.

So, if you want your company to grow dramatically, acquire new customers, and enjoy a sustainable competitive advantage, start looking for target firms that are ripe for acquisition or a merger. But talk to the M&A experts at the FD Centre first. Call 0800 169 1499 now.

PROFIT IMPROVEMENT – Driving profitable growth – Part II

How a part-time CFO will help to boost your profits

The CFO Centre will provide you with a highly experienced senior CFO with ‘big business experience’ for a fraction of the cost of a full-time CFO.

This means you will have:

One of Canada’s leading CFOs, working with you on a part-time basis
A local support team of the highest calibre CFOs
A national and international collaborative team of the top CFOs sharing best practices (the power of hundreds)
Access to our national and international network of clients and partners.

With all that support and expertise at your fingertips, you will achieve better results, faster. It means you’ll have more confidence and clarity when it comes to decision-making. After all, you’ll have access to expert help and advice whenever you need it.

In particular, your part-time CFO will help you to boost profits.

There are four things you can do to increase your company’s profitability:

Sell more
Increase margins
Sell-more frequently
Reduce costs

If you can do all four at once, your profits will increase dramatically. Even changing one of these four factors will boost your profits.

Your CFO will help you to identify the ways in which you can sell more, sell more frequently, increase margins (without losing customers) and cut your costs.

Selling more and selling more frequently

Driven by a need to make more sales, most business owners will chase new customers.

This can be a costly exercise since it will often involve more expenditure on marketing and advertising. Acquiring new customers can cost as much as five times more than satisfying and retaining current customers, according to Management Consultants Emmett Murphy and Mark Murphy.

That’s because convincing people to buy from you for the first time is difficult. Prospective clients are scared of making a mistake: of choosing the wrong supplier and wasting their money.

If your sales are low, it’s better to focus attention on your existing and previous customers and find ways to encourage those people or companies to buy more and to do so more often.

Your existing and previous clients do not have the prospective clients’ fears and objections to doing business with you. You’ve already demonstrated that you can deliver the benefits they want from your products or services.

On average, loyal customers are worth up to 10 times as much as their first purchase.1

There are other benefits to selling to existing and past clients too: it cuts your refund rate, raises the likelihood of positive word-of-mouth, and lessens the risk of your clients buying from your competitors.

A 2% increase in customer retention has the same effect as decreasing costs by 10%.

Even better, a 2% increase in customer retention has the same effect as decreasing costs by 10%, according to Emmett and Mark Murphy. Cutting your customer defection rate by 5% can raise your profitability by between 25% and 125% depending on the industry.2

Customer profitability tends to increase over the life of a retained customer. In other words, the longer your clients are with you, the more they will spend.

When working with you and your management team, your part-time CFO will investigate ways to get customers to return to you more often and buy more when they do make a purchase. The methods include:

Using a strong follow-up sequence.
Leveraging scarcity by using time-limited or limited availability offers.
Using up-sells, down-sells and cross-sells.

Raising prices

All too often, business owners believe their prices must be lower than their competition. They also believe if they increase their prices, they will lose customers. Both assumptions are false.

It all comes down to the perception of value. People will happily pay more for a product or service they perceive as having added value.

If your products or services are on par with your competitors, your prices should be similar or higher.

Even a small price rise will have a positive impact on your profit margins. After all, the larger the difference between the cost of a product or service and the price it sells for, the higher the profit.

Reducing costs

Companies that fail to control their costs are often forced to borrow but then find that servicing that debt erodes their profits still further.

The benefit of cutting your costs is that it will have a direct short-term impact on your bottom line since a dollar saved in expenses might mean an extra dollar in profit.

Your CFO will encourage you to consider the likely impact of any cost cutting on the quality of the products or services you provide before you take any action.

Your CFO will also help you to identify the major cost centres in your company. These might be:

Purchasing
Finance
Production
Administration

Your CFO will also help you to identify the profit drivers in your company.

Typically, profit drivers will be to increase sales, reduce the cost of sales and to reduce overhead expenses but they could be any of the following:

Financial drivers (which have a direct impact on your finances)

Pricing
Variable costs (cost of sales)
Sales volume (for example, generate more prospects, convert more prospects to customers, retain current customers, increase the size of each purchase, increase the sales price, etc.)
Fixed costs (for example, overhead expenses)
Cost of debt (for example, interest rates on debt)
Inventory

Non-Financial drivers

Staff training
Product innovation
Market share
Productivity
Customer satisfaction
Product/service quality
Analyze every area of gross profit to understand where the biggest opportunities lie and to determine how to reduce less profitable activities.
Find your most profitable customers (those who consistently spend more with you).
Find the customers who you are currently serving but who are not profitable.
Analyze return on investment on capital and product development expenditure.
Ensure your management information is up to date and in a format that is useful and reliable.
Educate the senior team about the importance of Critical Success Factors (CSFs). These are the activities that your business must do to survive. You can determine your CSFs by answering the following questions:
- How is our business better than our competitors?
- What do our customers like about our products or service and the way in which we operate?
- What don’t our customers like?
- What would make our customers stop buying from us?

You measure your CSFs by using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Systematically analyze relevant KPIs and trends to identify potential hazards before they become a problem.
Review arrangements with your main customers to see if there is a more profitable way to supply them.
Review pricing arrangements with existing suppliers.
Research alternative suppliers across all areas of the business.
Research sources of grant funding.
Determine your company’s eligibility for Research and Development (R&D) tax credits.The tax relief will either reduce your tax bill or provide a cash sum. To receive R&D tax credits, you must show that your company is carrying on a project that seeks an advance in science or technology and how it will achieve it. The advance being sought must constitute an advance in the overall knowledge or capability in a field of science or technology, not just your company’s own state of knowledge or capability.
Develop effective incentive schemes for staff to encourage productivity and to manage risk.
Prepare customer surveys to understand what the market really wants (and then sell it to them).
Analyze competitors to find out what is working well and what isn’t and course correct accordingly.
Review significant overheads and isolate opportunities to reduce expenditure.
Investigate exchange rate hedging and planning.
Create a realistic and achievable action plan then communicate it to all your employees.
Increase prices.
Explore online selling.
Explore more cost-effective ways of marketing by forming strategic alliances and joint ventures with companies that deal with your prospective clients.
Arrange for business mentors to give advice and share experiences with you.
Review organizational structure and delegation procedures to maximize efficiency.
Develop customer retention strategies to prevent loss of revenue.
Evaluate business location and determine possible alternatives (to save costs on production, delivery, etc.).
Outsource some functions (and so save on wages) or employ someone on a part-time rather than full-time basis.
Look at the viability of redundancies. If you’re making people redundant, you will need to fund redundancy payments. You will also need to ensure you meet current legislation and standards regarding consultations with employees, the grounds for redundancy and the selection of employees.
Introduce an expense control program. Your CFO will challenge expenses in all categories, large and small. Besides cost-cutting measures, your CFO will also ensure you tighten your control on costs. If you don’t already have a purchase order approval policy, for example, you’ll be encouraged to introduce one.
Look at your bank charges. Your CFO will question all bank fees on your statements and compare them with what other banks charge.
Check invoices from suppliers for overcharging (incorrect charges, missing discounts, double billing, etc.).
Get rid of inefficient systems (for example, paper-based systems).
Measure the return on all your advertising and stop using whatever hasn’t worked in the past
Replace frequent small orders with bulk buy discount orders.

As you can see from this, profit improvement is not an emergency fix. It’s something you and your organization need to plan for and follow consistently. If you don’t, there’s a very real danger that once you return to growth, you’ll get swept up with the day-to-day demands of running your business. That increases the risk you’ll find yourself back in an unprofitable position.

As with many challenges facing growth businesses, the solution lies in good planning for profit improvement on the one hand and an ability to stick to the plan, month in and month out, on the other.

Profit improvement should be seen as an ongoing project. It takes some time to establish systems, which enable your business to maximize its profitability, and then it takes focus and resources to maintain the monitoring process.

That’s where part-time CFOs can help. They can take care of the finance function and the support systems within your business, which frees up your time to focus on growing your business.

Conclusion

Most business owners say making a profit is the number one reason they are in business. Everything else (passion, purpose, mission) is subordinate.

Profit is an expression of getting the most out of your business for the least amount of effort. It is a reflection of your efficiency.

Building a large company and being able to cite impressive revenue figures are often the wrong drivers for business owners. Again, this is not to say that increasing sales is the wrong approach – on the contrary – it is merely to point out that selling lots of product without a full understanding of the profitability of the product can be a waste of valuable resource.

A compact, efficient business which operates under tight management procedures is nearly always a happier place to work than a chaotic business which is able to boast significant revenue figures.

Expanding overseas, taking on more staff and resourcing up may well be the right way for you to take your business. It could equally be the case that you may be able to enjoy increased profitability (and an improved lifestyle if this is an important driver) without expanding rapidly, but merely by improving profitability.

The path you follow will be determined by your objectives for the business and that’s something your CFO will help you to clarify and then achieve.

Increase your profits with the help of a part-time CFO

Don’t miss this opportunity to talk to a part-time CFO about how you can improve your profits. To book your free one-to-one call with one of our part-time CFOs:

tel: 1-800-918-1906
email: [email protected]
www.thecfocentre.ca

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1. Source: White House Office of Consumer Affairs, ‘75 Customer Service Facts, Quotes & Statistics: How Your Business Can Deliver With the Best of the Best’, Help Scout, www.helpscout.net

2. ‘ Leading on the Edge of Chaos: The 10 Critical Elements for Success in Volatile Times’, Murphy, PH.D., Emmett C., Murphy, MBA, Mark A., Prentice Hall Press, June 15, 2002

PROFIT IMPROVEMENT – Driving profitable growth

“Without an understanding of profitability, every business, no matter how successful is a house of cards” – Mike Michalowicz, Entrepreneur and Author.

There are four ways you can improve your profits: sell more, get customers to buy more frequently, increase margins and reduce costs. If you can do all four at once, your profits will increase dramatically. Even changing one of these four factors will boost your profits.

In these articles, we will cover the main reasons for low profits and how a part-time CFO will help you to boost your profits.

Introduction

Profits are vital for your company’s growth for the following reasons:

They provide a return on your investment capital.
They provide opportunities to reward staff.
They make it easier to attract investors and customers.
They make it easier to borrow money and negotiate a lower interest rate on the money it secures.
They can be reinvested in the business to expand into new markets, products and locations.
They provide a buffer against economic downturns and changes in market conditions.
They make it possible to hire more people.
They allow you to develop and test new products or services.

While many business owners experience a decline in their net profit margin (the percentage of total revenue that’s profit) at one time or another, they are usually able to continue to trade, albeit with the aid of a short-term loan and some heavy duty cost-cutting.

Sadly, unless you identify and address what’s causing your profits to shrink, the problems are likely to get worse. For it often follows that poor profitability leads to reduced cash flow. When profits are low and cash flow is weak, businesses can slip into a downward spiral.

Your profits tell you how well or how poorly your business is performing. For example:

Gross profit (the total amount your business makes minus the cost of goods sold (COGS) indicates how efficiently your business uses resources to produce your products or services.
Operating profit (gross profit minus operating expenses, depreciation,andamortization) indicates how efficiently you produce and sell your product or service.
Net profit (the amount of money left after paying all the business’ expenses including interest, taxation, etc.) indicates how well your business is generating healthy results.

These figures alone won’t give you the whole picture. You’ll need to compare them with previous annual and monthly profit results. That’s where ratios come in: they can be used as a benchmark against which you can measure your business’ performance.

Profitability ratios help you evaluate your company’s ability to generate profits.

They include gross profit margin; operating profit margin; and net profit margin.

Gross profit margin – your gross profit divided by your sales is a useful indicator of your company’s financial health. It shows how efficiently your business is using its materials and labour in the production process and gives an indication of the pricing, cost structure and production efficiency of your business. The higher the gross profit margin, the better. That is because the higher the percentage, the more your business retains of each dollar of sales, which means more money for other operating expenses and net profit.
Operating profit margin – calculated by dividing your operating income by your net sales during a period reveals how much revenues are left over after all your company’s variable or operating costs have been paid. It also shows what proportion of revenues is available to cover non-operating costs like tax, interest, and distribution to your company’s owner. It is useful because it shows you whether your operating costs are too high.
Net profit margin – calculated by dividing your after- tax net income (net profits) by your sales (revenue) shows the amount of each sales dollar left over after all expenses have been paid. The higher your net profit margin, the better because that shows your company is more efficient at converting sales into actual profit. A low net profit margin might mean that your business is not generating enough sales, your gross profit margin is too low or that your operating expenses are too high.

The main reasons for low profits

Falling revenue

Your sales or revenue slump could be due to internal and external factors such as:

Inadequate marketing programs. To be effective, your marketing needs to convey the right message to the right target audience and convince them to take a desired action like call your company to purchase a product or book your service.
Poor pricing strategies.
Increased competition.
An inability to keep up with market changes.

Excessive expenses

Budget overruns or unexpected costs will chip away at your net profit.

High variable costs

The higher your variable costs, the lower your net profit margin will be. High production costs or purchase costs can result in insufficient funds to cover expenses. When variable costs rise to the point that there are not enough funds left to support all expenses for the period, a net loss will occur.

Follow us in part II of the profit improvement article to learn how a Part-time CFO can help you drive profitable growth! Coming up soon.

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