As a CEO do you have control over the growth of your business? Are you currently adding value to the exit price? Rupen Kotecha from The CFO Centre has written an article discussing the potential barriers surrounding this topic and how to overcome them.
Time is the Problem
Not having enough time is the enemy for most entrepreneurs and business owners as they grow their business. Operational demands of the day mean many businesses owners are just happy to survive rather than thrive.
A common complaint from CEOs is “I knew we had a ‘good business’ but we knew we were barely scraping the surface in terms of potential…” or “My expertise is in growing businesses and the irony was that I was spending 90% of my time simply making sure that the business was functioning”.
Either way, working “in the business” rather than working “on the business” is a recipe for disaster, or at best disappointment!
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
Controlled Delegation is the Answer
Effective and controlled delegation is critical for a business to grow and will allow you to focus on planning and growth and will make the business less dependent on you.
The key is to ensure that the correct systems and procedures are in place.
Many business owners and MDs believe that “if you want it done right, you have to do it yourself” – an attitude that often prevents delegation.
Improper delegation can cause a host of problems, primary of which is an incorrectly completed task, which may hurt the overall productivity of the organization.
Delegation is not difficult. Anyone can give an assignment to someone. However, effective delegation (assigning a task to the correct person) is a highly skilled process that requires planning, thought, and managerial skill.
Don’t start with everything at once – usually the best place to start is with the simple things that take time but that staff can be educated and trained on easily. First aim is to get your staff to take responsibility and empowerment for the things you are happy that their skills are capable of delivering. Over time, the aim should be to build up systems and procedures for all key activities of the business, including but not restricted to financial decisions, the legal requirements to hold employment policies, health and safety policies etc.
The added benefit of such an approach is that when you come to prepare your business for sale, potential buyers of your business will be able to see how the business is run.
The CFO Centre
Today’s business environment is fluid, dynamic and evolving at a far greater pace than even a decade ago. Those businesses that do not operate within this paradigm will become uncompetitive, underperform and eventually fail.
The CFO Centre business planning process helps business owners to move from a disorganised culture of “fire fighting” to a more ordered and dependable culture where the whole team has a clear direction and visibility and each of the cogs within the business work together as part of a well oiled machine.
An MD should be investing for growth and with the right CFO beside them to allow them the space to run the business.
It is the CFO who tells you the current situation, the CFO who with you, works out where you want to go and the CFO who assists you to get to that point.
In simple terms, a CFO will provide a commercial approach involved in developing and implementing strategy based focused on the growth of the business and making money.
We are not accountants or financial controllers, we are Chief Financial Officers. We have run the finances of some of the most significant companies across every industry and sector imaginable. What’s more, you can have one of us, a top flight CFO, at a fraction of the cost because all of our CFOs work for their clients part-time.
About Rupen Kotecha
Rupen Kotecha is the Managing Director of The CFO Centre and for further information visit their website or contact Rupen by email.
