The Roadmap to Financial Expertise: Steps for Mid-Size Businesses to Secure the Right Support

Mid-size business leaders are constantly managing changes that manifest when challenges and opportunities arise. Having an experienced financial partner helps leaders manage those changes by ensuring their business has complete and accurate financial records. Financial professionals who are experts in forecasting, budgeting, bookkeeping, and best practices can highlight areas within your organization that need to be improved and then execute the changes needed to secure new opportunities.

So, it’s safe to say that having reliable strategic finance support for your organization is crucial for growth and compliance. Unfortunately, identifying and implementing the right people for the job is easier said than done. What type of financial support does your organization need? Do you need a bookkeeper, accountant, or something else? What steps do you need to take to fill in the financial gaps holding your company back?

Having a roadmap to follow can help answer those questions and give you an actionable plan to follow. Keep reading to learn more about the steps you should consider to secure the best strategic finance support for your mid-size business.

Key Takeaways From The Article:

1. Core Financial Functions: Identify and focus on essential financial areas like strategic planning, tax support, accounting, revenue management, system optimization, and bookkeeping.
2. Specialized Financial Support: Recognize the need for diverse expertise in financial roles to avoid overburdening staff and to ensure accuracy and compliance.
3. Strategic Finance Support: Utilize fractional CFOs or controllers for high-level financial strategies, risk management, compliance, and financial planning.
4. Bookkeeping Importance: Employ professional bookkeepers to maintain accurate records, prepare for tax season, and ensure efficient financial operations.
5. Accounting Expertise: Accountants provide deeper financial insights, analyze financial health, and assist in strategic decision-making based on bookkeeping records.
6. Forecasting and Budgeting: Engage experts to develop actionable growth plans, optimize cash flow, and align financial strategies with company goals.
7. Hiring Criteria: When seeking third-party financial experts, look for market awareness, clear communication skills, and problem-solving abilities.

What Core Financial Functions Does Your Mid-Size Business Need?

Having a roadmap for acquiring the right type of support is crucial for businesses of all sizes, not just small companies. For mid-size businesses, however, getting started with this process can seem daunting. That’s especially true if you already have a financial team that is incomplete or unable to meet your needs.

Understanding the core financial functions your business needs will help you focus on the kinds of experts you need to work with as you continue to grow. Those include:

·         Strategic Advisory

·         Tax Support

·         Accounting Operations

·         Revenue Processes

·         Back Office System Optimization

·         Proactive Bookkeeping

Types of Financial Support Needed to Grow Your Mid-Size Business

Each of the best practices listed above requires distinct, unique skill sets. Unfortunately, many businesses adopt a “one size fits all” approach when it comes to their financials. For example, they may ask bookkeepers to oversee tax-related work. The problem with this approach is that it compromises the bookkeepers’ quality of work. When you put an under qualified worker on a task they’re not suited to handle, a host of costly mistakes can be made from both a monetary and legal standpoint. That’s why, when it comes to your financial processes, you’ve got to have the right people in place.

Strategic Finance Support

Having access to informed strategic financial advice is important for any growing business. Typically, this type of responsibility is handled by a fractional CFO or controller. The best fractional CFOs assist with crucial tasks such as:

·         Creating and Managing Financial Plans

·         Managing and Mitigating Financial Risk

·         Providing Financial Reporting and Analysis

·         Managing and Ensuring Regulatory Compliance

·         Overseeing Your Budget and Cash Flow

Another significant area that requires constant evaluation is price analysis and planning. As your business evolves, you need to ensure that you are achieving the right margins to support growth and scale. Understanding how to price your goods or services is a constant evolution, and a strategic advisor can help you stay on top of it.

Financial analysis is a critical aspect that spans across your entire business. These models can help identify areas where you are over-investing or under-investing in your business. It can be challenging to analyze every aspect of your business frequently on your own. But with a strategic finance expert by your side, you can step back and examine your business objectively to ensure you’re operating efficiently.

When Should You Hire a Strategic Finance Expert or Fractional CFO?

The most celebrated business decisions are executed with exceptional financial expertise. In today’s marketplace, however, many business owners can’t justify hiring a full-time CFO or controller. If you need a trusted advisor to ensure your company’s financial health but can’t justify hiring a full-time CFO, hiring a fractional CFO could be a game-changer for your growth strategy.

Bookkeeping Support

Simply put, bookkeeping experts upkeep your books. Sounds obvious, right? But what do great bookkeepers actually do? The truth is that their responsibilities change depending on the needs of your mid-sized business. Generally speaking, though, a bookkeeper’s goal is to maintain your company’s books. Here are a few ways they do so:

·         Balancing Your Business Accounts

·         Reconciling Your Bank Statements

·         Monitoring Expenses and Transactions

·         Analyzing and Preparing Payroll

·         Creating and Paying Invoices

·         Prepping Your Books for Tax Season

Imagine how much time you could save if you didn’t have to handle all the bookkeeping duties yourself. Bookkeepers are there to help you free up your schedule and focus on the vision you have for your business. When you work with a professional bookkeeper, you can also minimize the chances of errors and ensure that your financial data is accurate. Moreover, during tax season, a bookkeeper can help you prepare your books for accurate filing. In case of an IRS audit, clean and accurate bookkeeping records will be your best friend.

When Should You Hire a Professional Bookkeeping Service?

If you find that you’re spending more time trying to oversee bookkeeping – time that you could be spending on growing your business – it might be time to hire a professional bookkeeper. Similarly, if you’re struggling to understand your books, a bookkeeper can help you sort them out. As most business owners lack financial management expertise, bookkeepers can be a great resource to help you optimize your business.

Accounting Support

A bookkeeper is responsible for maintaining and updating your financial records, while an accountant utilizes those records to evaluate your finances, provide you with financial insights, and determine the financial well-being of your business. They can help you make informed financial decisions for your business, evaluate profitability, and identify opportunities to enhance your bottom line. A bookkeeper handles the administrative aspects of bookkeeping such as data entry and monitoring, while an accountant analyzes those records.

Typically, an accountant is responsible for tasks such as:

·         Managing Bookkeeping

·         Creating and Analyzing Financial Statements

·         Assistance with Financial Forecasts

·         Assistance with Tax Returns

An accountant’s responsibilities typically require a higher level of expertise than a bookkeeper but both roles are considered basic building blocks of a solid financial foundation.

When Should You Hire an Accounting Service?

Working with both a bookkeeper and an accountant is a common practice. While bookkeepers are responsible for managing your financial records, accountants use that information to provide expert advice. You can hire a bookkeeper at any time, but an accountant can only do their job effectively with a reliable bookkeeping process in place. If you’re already working with a bookkeeper and seeking deeper financial insights for your business growth, it may be time to hire an accountant.

Forecasting Strategy Support

One way to prevent and rectify the negative effects of ineffective financial management is by hiring forecasting strategy and budgeting experts. These professionals encourage participation from every department of your organization, allowing you to mitigate cash flow problems, optimize profitability, and evaluate your progress toward your objectives.

A company providing forecasting and budgeting services will help ensure that:

·         You Have an Actionable Groundwork for Growth

·         You have Access to Essential Budgeting Models

·         Your Directors, Bookkeepers, and Accountants are Aligned with Your Company Vision

·         You’re Aware of and Prepared for Revenue Shortfalls

Once your mid-size business is set up for long-term success, your interim budget and forecasting expert should teach your team about the tools and models needed to maintain and grow cash flow.

When Should You Hire a Forecasting and Budget Strategy Expert?

Great forecasting and budgeting reveal new pathways to success and also help you address areas of improvement that are holding your company back from reaching its goals. If you don’t have forecasting processes and budgeting models in place to optimize your cash flow and mitigate future expenses, it’s probably time to hire a professional.

Three Skills to Look for When Hiring Third-Party Finance Experts

At this stage of your company’s growth, trying to oversee all the financial aspects involved with your mid-size business is impossible. If you’re like other leaders, hiring an entire in-house finance team is next to impossible, too. That’s why you’ve got to rely on experts who have built careers around providing services like bookkeeping, accounting, budgeting, forecasting, best practices, and more.

Here are a few mandatory skills you should keep in mind when hiring financial experts for your mid-size business.

Awareness of Your Market

It is important that every member of your finance team has a thorough understanding of your business environment. This includes staying up-to-date with market trends, industry developments, and economic factors, as well as keeping an eye on competitor activities and market opportunities. Hiring candidates with a strong knowledge of your market will allow you to make well-informed business decisions and develop a solid financial strategy.

Clear Communication

As we mentioned above, many business owners don’t have formal training in accounting, bookkeeping, forecasting, and other such processes. Working with a finance expert who is able to translate complex financial jargon into easy-to-understand concepts used for decision-making is essential.

Ability to Problem Solve

There’s no way around it: Issues arise when you’re running a business. When they do, it’s imperative that members of your finance team be able to find solutions quickly. These solutions shouldn’t be proverbial “Band-Aids.” They should be data-driven and backed by analytics, so make sure your finance experts pay close attention to detail and can sift through datasets to spot problems.

The Roadmap to Financial Expertise Starts with CFO ReStart

As a mid-size business owner, you face challenges that are unique and different from small and enterprise-level companies. Your business is growing quickly, but your financials are suffering. You know that it’s only a matter of time before a small issue turns into a big cash flow problem.

If you don’t have the “bandwidth” to focus on critical financial tasks or a reliable strategic finance division to support your continued growth, CFO ReStart can help. We act as “truth tellers” within your organization, working alongside your staff to provide unbiased perspectives and comprehensive insights to drive decision-making. Contact our office today to learn why CFO ReStart is your one-stop shop for financial excellence.