At every growing business, there comes a point where the finances become too complex for a CEO to feasibly manage. While hiring a full-time CFO may be the norm in large, established firms, many innovative and growing companies are now leaning on fractional CFOs to drive growth at an earlier stage. These experienced financial executives provide services on a contract or project basis.
An outsourced strategic advisor’s outside perspective, from deal sourcing to M&A due diligence to closing, can help make the process more efficient, mitigate risk and maximize value.
Many businesses face the question of whether to embrace remote work and all its potential by integrating it into their business model or return to an onsite-only policy. Adjusting to remote work solutions has not been without its challenges, but it has also enabled the democratization of talent, in that companies can increasingly attract and retain highly qualified professionals they previously wouldn’t have had access to.
Your gut reaction to to the ASC 842 Lease Accounting Standard may be to think it’s for the other party—those that lease real estate, vehicles or equipment to others. However, the greater impact is on the lessee doing the borrowing, rather than the lessor. Any contracts signed where you’re using another company’s property with the expectation of returning it or buying it at the end of the contract term will fall under the new standard.
At a high level, operating lease obligations that are included in footnotes will now need to also be recorded as assets and obligations on your balance sheet. As is often the case, when you begin to assess the scope of the project and its impact, you’re sure to find that the devil will be in the details.
Regular financial forecasting that incorporates multiple scenarios provides important insights to help businesses achieve growth goals.
Financial controller leadership can add significant value for a business by implementing and optimizing processes and providing recommendations to executives.
Knowing where you’re going starts with knowing where you’ve been. You must plan, track and monitor your organization’s performance with a financial model if you want to grow steadily and profitably.
And with financial planning and analysis serving as the backbone of sustainable growth, budget variance is the finger that points the way. Budget variance shows how to move forward based on how your business has performed versus your expectations.
With recent shifts in available tech tools, as well as openness to non-traditional financial resourcing solutions, finance departments are able to take on a more strategic role.