Outgrowing Your Finance System – A side effect of success

As a business expands it faces a number of challenges to remain successful and prioritising which of those challenges to focus on will have an impact on those that receive less attention. Often the viewpoint of management teams can be to push for improvements and efficiencies on the operational side of the business, while neglecting the “back-room” functions such as Finance, Human Resources and IT.

Although this approach can lead to increased revenue, throughput of orders, expansion of service offerings, and an increase to the overall value of the company; the stress put on the finance system and its team can lead to major issues further on in the life cycle of the business. A high quality advisor who works alongside management and the finance team should have a level of involvement that allows them to identify, provide advice, and remedy these issues in advance of them arising.

As an example, we were initially engaged to produce management accounts for a client who had previously been relying on the services of a remote advisor but soon discovered that additional support would be required. Our accounting support team provided a collaborative approach with our consulting team to review the operational and financial systems. We worked alongside the management team to tailor the output reports to provide them with comprehensive, real time information that would allow them to respond in a more appropriate and timely manner. Issues with the operational side of the system were resolved which reduced the amount of accounting adjustments required from the finance team which frees them up to take on other administrative tasks within the business.

The key outcome of this was that management can now invest more time on the long term strategy of the business to ensure continued growth and success.

By investing time with our clients, we have built a relationship that has given them peace of mind knowing that they can rely on our services going forward

We’ve put together all the information you may require on our secondment offering.  If you have any queries please do not hesitate to get in contact with Heather Brown, Audit Senior Manager, or your usual AAB contact.