An accounting and finance department that is viewed as a strategic partner, not an expense, presents your organization with an opportunity to build financial structure and acumen to suit its development stage. For most early stage, growing companies, this can be challenging due to lack of funding or operating income to support a robust, in-house, financial function. While many early stage companies forgo a strategic partnership with their accounting and finance departments, fractional services can play a pivotal role in providing you with access to experienced professionals without the burden that comes with hiring someone.
A fractional team will help you with strategic initiatives such as:
1. Assisting with operational growth issues around items like pricing, ROI on marketing spend, lease vs buy, hire vs outsource, and explore/advise on transformational initiatives like raising money, buying another business, selling your business, or even going public at an early stage.
2. Implementing technology and policies to build a work-flowed environment, creating standard financial reports as well as custom reports for your business, with financial records strong enough to support due diligence, an audit, or board reporting.
3. Helping identify the metrics that drive your business, build models or systems to track these, as well as provide robust budgeting and forecasting.
From a cost/benefit perspective, using fractional resources gives you access to more experience and acumen than many companies can afford when in the early growth stages. To learn more about Fractional accounting and Financial Services, contact Bridgepoint Consulting, an Addison Group company. As a leading management consulting firm that has been helping businesses throughout their lifecycle since 1999, we help founders and management teams reduce their operational risk, bridge resource gaps and improve overall performance. Learn more here.
About the Author-Lucas Walters is a Managing Director for Bridgepoint in our Austin Financial Consulting practice. He provides financial and operational leadership expertise (CFO services) to Bridgepoint clients, and has extensive experience across multiple executive-level functions, including accounting, finance, HR, Legal, IT and facility management. Prior to Bridgepoint, he served as a VP of Finance for a fast-growing Austin startup. Walters earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Concordia University and a Masters of Business Administration from the University of Texas–Austin. He is a Certified CPA in the state of Texas.