SHARING THE LOAD

Being a Managing Director can seem very lonely. No one to share your problems with at an equal level; you may feel you don’t really understand how the business is doing or don’t understand what to do next. You feel stressed and not valued.

 

Often the answer is to slog on alone as you are the boss, but then nothing seems to change. Stress levels increase.

 

The answer is to know you’ve got someone to talk to about your problems. Someone who can offer many years of experience in running real businesses. Your own right hand man. Someone you can share your problems with and so get answers.

 

James had a great team behind him, he felt the current business performance was a financial success but the financial position of the Company was plagued by historical debt which their foreign business owners demanded they repaid and a large but uncertain legal claim. The legacy of the debt and the legal claim muddied the current business performance with their owners insisting that they weren’t in fact making any money……the relationship with the foreign business owner was fraught. Mentoring discussions helped share the stress and revealed a plan of action which was subsequently put in place to remove the stress.

 

Nick was unhappy; business performance seemed to be declining and running the business was no longer fun. Nick decided that the business no longer delivered a good enough service level; maybe they were in the wrong market? Nick decided to close the business. We, acting as a mentor, helped him to think through the issues and come up with an action plan to wind everything up.

 

Mark sometimes feels alone despite having his team around him and enjoys a very regular catch up meeting to help him sort out his next steps. This has helped him to get focus on the massive recent changes within the business.

 

Each of James, Nick and Mark were feeling stressed in their work as Managing Director and found through our mentoring service, that they can find a solution to their problems.

 

So how can we help? As well as saving tax, time and worry, we work with business leaders to help them grow their business in the way they want. One way we do this, is through meeting with business leaders on a regular basis and acting as a business mentor, someone to talk to, share problems and consequently come up with concrete actions to sort out those problems.

 

Contact Jan on 07890 239442 or 01924 254802

jan@sandersgeeson.co.uk

 

 

GETTING FOCUSSED ON YOUR BUSINESS SUCCESS

Does this sound familiar? No time and disappointing profitability. Being paid slowly. Doing the sort of work you don’t enjoy a lot of the time. Just not enjoying the work…….

 

Always in the office and can’t afford the time or the money to do the things you want? Stopped enjoying what was your passion? Feels like a job?

 

What’s the solution? Working harder, doing more, chasing every lead? Having endless internal meetings to sort out what’s going wrong. All that’s happening is you’re getting more and more tired and your enthusiasm is disappearing. You are now working for the hardest taskmaster of all, yourself…..

 

This vicious circle can be stopped by standing back for a few hours and talking through with someone outside the business about what’s important to you about your business, the Why or purpose and think through what you need to focus on to achieve your Why, coming up with an action plan, a strategic plan. Then on a regular basis follow up on this plan in order to implement the key actions, supported by the key numbers vital to the understanding of the business performance. These numbers include non-financial as well as financial figures.

 

Tom and Peter run a web design business but always seemed to be working and made little money and had lots of small jobs which didn’t really interest them. We stopped and took two half day sessions to discuss what they wanted to do and how they thought they could get there. The sessions were followed up by smaller sessions discussing the action plan supported by reporting of key numbers and within one year the business profitability had improved dramatically to the levels wanted, Tom and Peter were doing the sort of work they wanted and their working hours were under control and much reduced. They had decided to focus on specialising in the kind of work they enjoyed and on bigger project work for agency clients as opposed to working for smaller local clients.

 

Jake and Tim despite working very long hours were never confident that they were making the money they deserved as they always got the financial information very late and couldn’t understand the figures when they got them. After our appointment as their accountants and business advisors a strategic planning session confirmed that their plans were on the right track. This was followed up by a tidy up of the financial ledgers and prompt reporting of the financial numbers up to date. This gave Jake and Tim the confidence to put their strategic plan into action and subsequent quarterly management accounts reported the growth of their business by over 100% over the next two years.

 

So how can we help? As well as saving tax, time and worry, we work with business owners to help them grow their business in the way they want. We do this through helping business owners get better understanding of their business numbers and also by getting focus on where they are going, what they want to do and their Why, through strategic business and financial planning. We agree action plans and then follow up with meetings on a regular basis.

 

Contact Jan on 07890 239442 or 01924 254802

jan@sandersgeeson.co.uk

Caring

A few years ago when working as a Finance Director in a business, the Managing Director said to me “You know I can sleep more easily at night knowing you’re taking care and worrying about everything.” I always thought this was a great testimonial.

 

At the heart of everything we do as practice accountants or as a Finance Director is our customers or clients knowing that we care, whether it is just keeping a careful eye on things, taking initiative to anticipate and stop a problem, as a person to listen and advise (where appropriate), whether business or personal, someone to share a problem or even give help to focus on what needs to be done over the longer term or just giving in deciding the next step.

 

Why not give me a call to share your problems. What’s worrying you right now?

 

Call Jan on 01924 254802 jan@sandersgeeson.co.uk