The harsh truth is that insufficient profitability is at the heart of nearly every significant challenge agency owners face. This scarcity of profit forces agency owners to make decisions that can compromise not just the business but also their personal lives and the quality of work they deliver to clients.

Setting a Plan

One of the first things we encourage clients to create is a profit plan. Agency owners often have a new business plan for the year but frequently don’t dig any deeper.

Your plan is your sat nav – guiding you where you want to go.

We will help you create a sustainable framework for where you want to go.  This will typically include:

• A revenue forecast, split by client and service
• A capacity plan – can we achieve our revenue goal, or do we need to hire?
• A cost plan to keep those operating expenses in check
• A plan for how much the owners can take home each month

Once you have a plan, decision-making becomes so much easier.  The question “Is it in the plan?” stops us from doing things on a whim.  Of course, there may be good reasons to deviate from the plan as things change throughout the year.  To support this, we’d recommend a quarterly update to the plan, reflecting what we’ve achieved so far this year and a forecast for the remainder of the year

Management Accounts

Management accounts are your regular review to ensure you are on track to hit your plans.  If you’re not, they give you an early warning system and the opportunity to adjust things to get back on track as quickly as possible.

Unlike annual accounts, which are produced in a format for Government agencies, Management Accounts help Directors make decisions about their finances.  As such, they are presented in a completely different format and include many additional Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and information that you wouldn’t usually find in statutory accounts.

It’s also a great place to include an up-to-date tax forecast, which highlights how much you need to put away for upcoming tax bills.

Accountability Meetings

Accountability is a huge part of success in any walk of life

Many clients have told us that being held to account in a meeting has ensured that they’ve stuck to the plans and actions that need to be done to improve their profitability

We will act as your non-exec Finance Director.  This means that we will either attend your regular board meetings or hold a separate finance meeting to review your numbers and agree on actions you need to take over the next month.