Recently I was talking about the idea that businesses need to reinvent themselves and to be very
creative in order to assure their success.
Because of the scarceness of resources for business ( you never have enough of what you need ) why not go for the outsourcing option.
The outsourcing of topics like Customer Care , Call, Centres, IT , Tech Support, etc is a very common and widely accepted topic.
What about the outsourcing of your CFO function ?
I am using the term CFO for a senior finance professional or executive
To get a clear answer about this potential , partial or complete outsourcing of your CFO function you must first clarify the following essential aspects:
- Do you know what a CFO is doing ? What is the role of the CFO in an business ?
- Do you as a business owner realize that your business has grown and that you need a something or somebody to help you more with your business numbers ?
- Are you ready to empower and trust somebody to take care about a part of your business ?
- Do you want to move on further with your business ?
- Do you want professional help and support for your business support services ?
1-st step before going further with this outsourcing is to ask yourself what do you want for your business and what do you expect from an outsourced CFO .
1.1 What do you want for your business ?
Well this is pretty obvious you might say , you want to develop your business .
This is all fine and fair , the only thing is that you might want to grow in a way that you are certain that you can count on the healthy growth of your business.
This kind of a growth is not easy to manage
…you are right when you say growth is growth ergo it is OK.
Well not really , you must grow in a consistent way and not too fast. The growth rate of your business must be in sync with the rate that your organization can adjust and accommodate the growth.
Consistent growth means that you have to have a pretty good ideea about your business on at least mid term if not long term. From the CFO perspective this would mean that you have a strategy that will grant you some predictability and easier planning.
1.2 What can you expect from an outsourced CFO
For sure you can not expect , OK small correction , you should not expect that you got rid of your problem, the healthy growth of your business. It is still you business and you are still in charge and fully liable about what your doing.
This outsourced CFO function can give you as a business owner the breathing space to focus on the actual business development like promoting sales, developing your product and/or services, hire/fire your staff, etc . Don’t worry you still have a lot of things to do ….
From your outsourced CFO you should have at least this benefits :
- consistent and clear image of your business results (OK, partially this can be received also from your accountant )
- “translation” of your financial statements in business terms , not accounts, balanced / unbalanced accounts , formal things , tax statements ( some accountants provide to their customers some of the “translation” but not the complete view )
- based on the financial statements the CFO should be able to project / adjust / validate your defined strategy
- you should get a clear and concise cost monitoring system setup
- benefit from your CFO’s experience …that should be at least 10 years in various organizations and business models