The advantages and benefits of having a CFO make the professionals well-sought. However, unless you’re an enterprise-level company or in the finance sector, it’s unlikely you have a full-time chief financial officer.
The cost of a full-time CFO would make any small business seek alternatives. A part-time, outsourced, or fractional CFO is the answer. Here’s how a fractional CFO allows your business to take advantage of all the benefits of having a CFO without paying full-time costs.
Advantages of Having a CFO
- Remain Agile: Your books remain static unless a trained eye can tell you what the data means.
- Accelerate Software: Software value is linked to user ability. Superpower your software.
- Stay Protected: A CFO puts controls in place to avoid financial error and fraud.
- Forecast Cash Flow: A great CFO can forecast, manage, and make the most of your assets for optimal growth.
- Leverage Negotiations and Pricing: Gain a clear perspective of contracts and pricing.
- Gain Financial Experience: CFOs provide lending advice and better prepare you for financial offers.
- Make Informed Decisions: CFOs give the insight to make the most informed business decisions.
Improve Business Agility
You have your own set of skills and talents. Bookkeeping may not be one of them. That doesn’t mean you don’t need and deserve to know how your business is performing in real-time. A CFO can do the bookkeeping. But even better, a CFO can read or unveil what the numbers mean in relation to the current state of your business.
Accelerate Financial Software
Imagine financial software, such as QuickBooks, is your car in a race. It’s a powerful car, but do you have the racing knowledge to get the most out of the vehicle’s power? If not, you would hire an experienced race car driver, right? That’s where a part-time CFO comes in. Gain expertise in using QuickBooks in a new way. Unleash the power of QB custom reports for unparalleled business insight.
Avoid Financial Error and Fraud
A CFO helps your current bookkeeper avoid error by overseeing the books before submitting quarterly or yearly information to the IRS. A fractional CFO can be that integral team player linking your accountant and bookkeeper, or a part-time CFO can serve as a bookkeeper for a small business.
Forecast Cash Flow
Financial software allows users to produce reports for greater business insight. A chief financial officer has the analytical ability to combine different data from sectors of your business to produce insightful reports. For example, the ability to project the financial realities of your business at any given time. It’s an incredible advantage whether you plan on making conservative or bold business moves.
Leverage Vendor and Buyer Relations
Is your business losing money due to poor negotiations between one or more vendors? A part-time CFO can help you answer the question. Moreover, are your services and products properly priced, or is your bottom line at a disadvantage? A benefit of having a CFO is having someone who can oversee business operations, pricing, POS integration, and more.
Gain Financial Experience
You may have rich experience in providing a service but have never sought financial aid from banks and institutions. It’s a great benefit to have a CFO on your side, a team player who can provide counsel and oversee bank transactions. Moreover, a CFO can help your business be in a better position to receive outside funds.
Facilitate Business Growth
You didn’t start your business to slow down. Whether you have a desire to expand or pursue a healthier bottom line year over year, you can benefit from the insight a fractional CFO provides. Running a business is complicated. There’s a lot at stake, but a CFO helps mitigate risk by allowing you to make the most informed financial decisions.
Advantages of Having a CFO for Retail, eCommerce, and More
You may wonder if the cost of a fractional CFO will result in value for your type of business. As established above, any type of business can benefit from greater financial insight, business wisdom, and real-time agility. However, like any specialist, a fractional CFO’s true benefit will be customized to your specific needs.
However, consider the needs of a retail business as an example. A retail owner may want better data related inventory, especially if they are running multiple stores. Moreover, a retail owner will be anxious as to whether they could save the business money by negotiating vendor contracts or recognizing which ones need review. Also, POS machinery can be expensive. As with QuickBooks software, a POS system’s ability to inform is linked to proper integration and usage.
Next, think of the needs of a person who has an eCommerce company. They will want real-time data related to available inventory, website analytics, and competitive pricing. That requires experience with integration. Moreover, who is going to look at the data from a daily, weekly, or monthly basis? If an owner is not well-equipped in integrating and using software tools, they are at a loss despite having access to such.
Contact us for a discussion related to fractional CFO services. We provide truly customized attention to accelerate your business in addition to bookkeeping, QuickBooks training, and POS support.
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