Most business owners start their business because they're passionate about something. Regardless of your industry and product or service, we're willing to bet that the thing you're passionate about isn't managing your business' finances. As many businesses transition from scrappy startup to steady growth, their owners find that they spend more time looking at numbers than serving their clients. That's where a firm like Sweeney Conrad comes in.
As your business grows in complexity it may necessitate the need for dedicated accounting and finance staff. Unfortunately, full-time accounting and finance staff can be incredibly expensive. This creates a serious dilemma for a business owner looking to continue to direct resources to the growth of the business while ensuring that the long-term financial needs of the business are met. Enter the fractional CFO!
A fractional CFO is an experienced financial professional working for your business, but for the fraction of time that you actually need. Our fractional CFOs have held this position at companies in the past and now works with clients in a range of different industries who aren't quite ready for a full-time CFO. With a fractional CFO you can get the sort of rich insight and guidance that you'd receive from an experienced CFO without spending multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars on a full-time salary. This type of engagement provides flexibility for growing businesses and an edge over competition that might be making do with a less experienced finance staffer.
At Sweeney Conrad we've built our fractional CFO services to handle a robust range of projects and situations.
Our initial new client diagnostic is used to assess your business' financial health, systems, processes, and capabilities. This helps us to identify gaps, risks, and opportunities for improvement, and drives our strategic focus to support your team.
We can advise on the selection, configuration, and deployment of enterprise resources systems (such as NetSuite, QuickBooks, and Sage). This includes aligning the ERP with business processes to ensure proper migrations and training for your teams. Outside of ERPs, we can advise more broadly on tech automations for accounting processes to help reduce the strain on your internal teams. All of these tech and process automation projects also go hand in hand with our fractional CFOs' expertise on general process revamps, which can include overhauling documentation, cleaning up accounting errors, and ensuring GAAP compliance.
Then, of course, there's the fundamental areas your fractional CFO will help you improve. Cash flow planning and analysis helps you to manage liquidity, anticipate shortfalls, and better manage your working capital. They will also work with you on optimizing your AR and AP, inventory, and terms with your vendors so that you can build the financial health of your business. Part of this process also involves coaching your stakeholders on financial literacy and decision making, which are key skills for your entire executive team to understand.
Finally, your fractional CFO can help advise on big decisions like recapitalization, mergers, acquisitions, and sale of business.
Essentially, a fractional CFO acts as a financial guide for your business. They free you up to do what you do best, serve your clients.
A fractional CFO is typically engaged similar to a lawyer or other professional services. Some independent consultants work on a retainer basis or will charge hourly rates with terms of availability defined in their contract. In some cases, you may be able to bundle fractional CFO services with other day to day accounting teams, or engage them for a specific project.
At Sweeney Conrad, our fractional CFOs are available for a range of different engagement structures. We are able to offer our clients full-service accounting, including tax, audit, and client accounting and advisory services, and our fractional CFOs often work alongside our other teams for clients to provide all-in-one accounting solutions.
By now, you can likely answer this question for yourself. If you've wondered or stressed about any of the topics presented above, or even if it all looks like gibberish to you, then a fractional CFO may be able to overhaul your business' performance. Even if you're unsure, it could be worth discussing your financial situation with a fractional CFO consultant to understand whether you're ready now, or will be soon, for this type of engagement. We encourage you to reach out to us at Sweeney Conrad if you're curious about learning more!