At the core of every successful business lies robust, dependable, and expert financial services, often sourced externally. In fact, more than 50% of businesses opt to outsource accounting services and key positions, such as Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
An outsourced or fractional CFO is a financial specialist who works hourly, part-time, or is contracted as a strategic financial adviser for businesses. Generally, they have experience across senior financial positions in private and/or public organizations at all phases of growth and work with companies to ensure effective scenario modeling, strategic planning, financial forecasting, and more.
A CFO is crucial for the growth of any business. Their sophisticated financial expertise and business acumen can be successfully outsourced, providing companies with specialized knowledge without the overhead and cost of training new employees. This scalability allows business owners to focus more on their core business while an experienced accounting professional focuses on the numbers.
Fractional CFOs can assist with implementing growth-focused and cost-effective systems to analyze and convert large amounts of data into actionable information, explore causes of revenue leakage and cost overruns, and uncover operational friction in a growing business.
Running a business entails navigating a multitude of intricacies. Numerous components must be meticulously overseen with substantial expertise and foresight. Are you spread thin trying to manage all the moving parts without time to focus on your core business?
Windes can help. Our fractional CFO services provide unique insights gleaned from almost 100 years as a leader in the accounting industry, making Windes an ideal partner to help your business grow. We can assist with the following:
Financial Projections
Our fractional CFO services analyze prior financial outcomes to forecast how the business will perform in the coming months and years. We can forecast expenses and revenues across all critical verticals, estimating how sales expenses will rise and the number of salespeople required to accomplish revenue targets.
Financial projections also demonstrate a business’s income potential and assist in attracting investors. They serve as the foundation for the budget, indicating the amount of investment required for the firm. Our fractional CFO services can help you extend and sustain current financial projections.
Expert Guidance
With almost a century of experience, we can guide you through processes such as staffing up and researching finance possibilities, as well as point out nuances that someone with less specialized knowledge might overlook.
Unit Economics
Our fractional CFO services can assist in establishing and tracking the unit economics of your business model. This involves analyzing the costs and revenues associated with each unit of your product or service and understanding the direct costs of producing or delivering the unit and the revenue generated from selling it. By calculating metrics such as customer acquisition cost, lifetime value, and gross margin per unit, our fractional CFO can assess the profitability and sustainability of your business model. Regularly monitoring and optimizing these unit economics is crucial for making informed decisions and identifying opportunities to increase profitability, ensuring the long-term success of your business.
Scenario Modeling
Planning for different eventualities in a business is vital yet time-consuming. Outsourcing this process can help you save time. Scenario modeling entails developing alternate projections that illustrate how your business would likely perform under various scenarios. Modeling forecasts the impact of each scenario on financial results, such as revenue and costs.
Liaison with the Legal Team & Contractual Reviews
To create accurate financial statements, a CFO must have a comprehensive understanding of the company’s contracts and legal obligations, which can only be accomplished through close collaboration with the legal team. Additionally, such relationships enable a fractional CFO to analyze your legal documents to determine whether they are in your firm’s best interests without bias.
Our fractional CFO services also assist business owners in negotiating more profitable contracts with consumers and detect potential risks, ensuring that contracts are legally binding from a financial standpoint. We can determine whether the contract terms are beneficial to you and offer strategies to improve their profitability. Considering legal matters through the lens of a fractional CFO ensures that you are aware of the financial implications before committing.
Financial Presentation & Reporting
Fractional CFOs can field queries, delve into financial projections in detail, present financial models, and explain the theory underlying the projections’ assumptions.
Even if a fractional CFO is not scheduled to appear at meetings, we can assist the team by providing reports, slides, and figures for you to deliver. This service is especially beneficial when you’re preparing for board or investor meetings. Additionally, we will analyze and certify the integrity of your company’s critical monthly financial statements.
Budgeted vs. Actual Financial Data
A budget establishes monthly benchmarks for how the company should operate to attain the projected results. Our fractional CFO services will compare real financial data to the budget and report on the results to determine whether the business is on track or falling short of expectations. Calculating the difference between your budgeted and actual financial data identifies where you may need to change your strategy or reassess the budget’s feasibility.
Strategic Planning
Inexperienced in-house accounting staff without a deep understanding of the company’s industry sector may make strategic decisions that negatively impact the company’s spending or revenue development. Our experienced fractional CFOs can assist you in avoiding these types of errors by advising on financial and business strategies that succeed.
Human Resources Supervision
We can also work with the human resources manager to monitor how changes to the team affect your capacity to meet budgeted figures and, if necessary, provide recommendations for cost-cutting measures in the area of staffing. Additionally, our fractional CFO services can provide guidance on creating a competitive compensation package that is enticing for employees yet cost-effective for the organization.
Smart Source with Windes
At Windes, our experienced fractional CFOs are dedicated to planning for your future, providing strategic insights and knowledge to help steer your company toward growth.
Our services can be customized to your business needs, providing the financial expertise essential to accelerate growth. Our fractional CFOs can work alongside your existing employees, such as your in-house accountant, controller, accounts payable, and receivables staff, supervising all aspects of your financial management and planning so you can always expect timely, accurate, and actionable results.
Windes provides vital fractional CFO services to build an environment where businesses can grow and thrive. Contact us today and discover how Smart Sourcing from Windes can steer your company toward more growth.