Let’s start was defining the word, ‘fractional.’ Fractional is defined as part-time and in this circumstance, the fractional CFO and/or fractional Controller working for you is doing so on a part-time or contracted basis. While it may sound like a fractional CFO and a Controller have very similar job responsibilities and you only need to choose one for your business, that isn’t necessarily the case.
The coronavirus pandemic has created a need for businesses to become more focused than ever on their business expenditures and daily operations. The same can be said for the financial crisis of 2008 — when the economy takes a hit, organizations dial things in. Implementing the right survival strategy allowed many businesses to come out of the recession stranger than they were before. Here’s how they did it:
Many small businesses that are considering their future growth have considered hiring a fractional team to come support their everyday business functions. Fractional models offer many benefits to business owners that choose to go that route. These models can allow your company to get expert assistance at a lower price. Outsourced services are meant to assist and support your company as you grow and expand your business. How can your small to medium-sized business benefit from fractional services?
On July 11, TGG’s founder and CEO, Matt Garrett partnered with SBDC @ UCI Beall Applied Innovation to discuss the ways you can grow your business through entity structure and formation. Being a business owner is one of the greatest achievements in Matt’s life and he has created a business structure that aligns with his mission and vision for TGG. There is a lot of uncertainty surrounding opening your own business, how can you create a business structure that will succeed for years into the future?
Managing a company’s resources can feel like a daunting task for some business owners. The challenge becomes even greater for company’s with a high level of annual revenue and a large customer base to account for — without proper financial management, you could be leaving millions of dollars in value on the table.
As many small business owners expected, the SBA PPP loans have proven to be an excellent option for funding during this uncertain time. However, many small businesses were blindsided by how quickly these funds were depleted and became enraged after learning that large corporations like Shake Shack and the Lakers received these loans before most small business owners had an opportunity to apply. Here’s how that happened and what the SBA is doing to fix it:
At the beginning of the SBA PPP roll out, there was a significant amount of confusion surrounding what information was required from small businesses to apply, including what paperwork was necessary and what precisely that paperwork needed to show before they got the chance to apply.
Navigating the MSLP loan requirements and details can be overwhelming for some companies. The FED recently hosted a webinar to help us better understand the program and the requirements behind it. Here are some of the key takeaways from the webinar:
The SBA PPP Loan funds have been replenished recently and are currently being disbursed among many small businesses throughout the U.S. Recently, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced that all SBA PPP Loans of over $2 million will be subject to an audit. That being said, businesses who take out smaller loans may also be audited, but every business that takes out a loan of more than $2 million can count on a visit from the IRS within the next few years.
As we begin to look beyond the coronavirus economic lockdown, the government gave us a plan to end lockdowns and stay-at-home orders within the next few months. President Trump has provided governors with a three-phase program intended to safely revive America’s economy, which is called “Opening Up America Again.”
Your Controller should not be doing data entry. The Controller’s main job responsibility is to manage the accounting department from a high-level. Compared to your Bookkeeper, Staff Accountant and/or Accounting Manager, the Controller is focused on ensuring the accuracy of the financial statements.
A Work In Progress (WIP) report consists of an accounting schedule that’s a portion of a company’s entire balance sheet. In best practices, each accounting period has a calculated work in progress report that complies with GAAP principles. These reports are required on projects where the Percentage of Completion (POC) accounting method is used. The WIP report typically consists of current period and project-to-date financial metrics that explain each contract the company is working on, however, the format does change from company to company.
Staff Accountants are the backbone of any good accounting firm and handle the majority of basic accounting functions for your company. When you have great Staff Accountants, your business will run more smoothly, and your CFO will be able to make the best possible decisions. When it comes to accounting, every small decision matters in a big way for the company as a whole. Here are a few qualities to look out for when hiring Staff Accountants:
Small businesses are among the most vulnerable groups to fraudulent activity. These businesses are more susceptible and face a greater risk of fraud because typically, they have employees working across many different departments as their job description, there is a closer relationship between the staff and owners, there are few oversight procedures in place, their accounting department has less expertise on financial functions, and there is a larger impact on the bottom line of a small fraudulent event.
How can you prevent fraud in your small business? Here are a few tips to help you keep your company safe:
As the effects of COVID-19 continue to unfold, many companies have found themselves in a situation for which they were unprepared. Without implementing proper crisis preparation tactics, companies will continue to suffer, as businesses deal with future unexpected occurrences. Being prepared for a potential supply chain disruption, allows companies to work proactively rather than having to react without time to adequately consider their options.
On May 4, 2020, the SEC announced temporary conditional relief for small businesses that have offered Regulation Crowdfunding offerings in the past to allow them to raise additional funding through Regulation Crowdfunding investment offerings under more expedited and less strict criteria.
Small businesses are doing everything they can to overcome the economic hurdles created by the COVID-19 outbreak. It is clear that every business will be impacted in some way, but restaurants and bars have been hit especially hard—and suddenly— by the pandemic.
While chains like Denny’s and IHOP have the cash reserves in place to pay workers—even during the shutdown—small, non-chain restaurants across the country were left feeling abandoned and desperate when faced with mandated closures. In response to the crisis, a slew of programs, grants, and resources have begun to take shape, along with a regularly updated Hospitality Industry Alliance COVID-19 Facebook group. Here are a few of the solutions we think will be most helpful for owners of restaurants, bars, and other small businesses:
With the new normal becoming a reality for everyone, how can we prepare our businesses to survive and thrive during this unprecedented time? TGG Founder & CEO, Matt Garrett, and Stacey McKibbin, CEO of Consilio Consulting discuss the importance of the numbers in your business, and how to better understand how to come out of the COVID-19 pandemic on top.
As a developer or private equity firm, it is important to streamline your accounting and forecasting processes—particularly when there is complexity involved—in order to ensure the greatest amount of transparency across your company’s financials. This becomes more complicated (and important) when you have multiple LLCs, a complicated ownership structure, and poor communication with investors. Here are a few ways to ensure clarity in the face of complexity:
The Paycheck Protection Program has been created to assist small businesses during this unprecedented time. The SBA PPP program is only a part of the CARES Federal Stimulus package, which works to counteract the economic downturn related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Recently, the SBA PPP has run into several challenges while dealing with the delivery of funding.
The government has implemented yet another business stimulus loan program called the Main Street Extended Loan Facility (MSELF). This loan program provides up to $2.3 trillion in loans to larger businesses in need. All US banks are eligible to originate this loan. Before you decide to apply, there are a few criteria and features that you should know.
As most business owners know, the team behind your bookkeeping is vital to the success of your business. Still, things can get a little complicated when it comes to understanding the roles and responsibilities of each person. In the interest of clarity, we at TGG are always interested in the numbers and transparency, let’s outline each of their roles and responsibilities.
With the changing technological times, almost every company is utilizing technology to run their businesses. This can put a company in a vulnerable position if they do not have the right cybersecurity protocols in place. Small businesses tend to be the first target for hackers, as they assume that smaller businesses don’t take the time to protect their company from cybersecurity threats.
Adopting new technology can be daunting, but innovation is critical to business survival in the age of digital disruption. A recent survey by Ernst & Young revealed insights to help boards of directors improve their companies’ approaches to adopting emerging technologies. Here, we’ve broken down the key takeaways for boards looking to expand and improve their company’s focus on innovation.
The team at TGG has been working with National Cardiac for over 2.5 years and in that time, they have had some exciting breakthroughs that will change the way cardiac health is administered across the country. We recently interviewed the CEO of the company, Steve Kenney, about their current innovations and plans for the future. Here are some excerpts from that interview:
As we look into the second quarter of 2020, the question that remains on many business owner’s minds is: will the rules outlined in AB-5 stand in the face of coronavirus? Concerns around the new criteria for worker classification outlined in Assembly Bill 5 were common at the start of the year, and many business owners chose to reclassify large portions of their workforce as W-2 wage earners rather than their previous classification of a 1099 independent contractor.
This is an article of accounting and finance tactics on how to survive and thrive that our CEO, Matt Garrett shared in a webinar presentation with Vistage. You can view the recorded version of the webinar and the article here as well as on the Vistage website.
When Matt Garrett, CEO and Founder of TGG Accounting, started thinking about how he would lead his team through the COVID-19 crisis, he thought of Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton whose story of survival was chronicled in the book “Endurance.”
“What got this team to survive in brutal conditions was process, routine and sense of purpose,” says Garrett. He has adopted a similar strategy, which is this is just one of the insights he shared for surviving and thriving in a recent webinar for Vistage. Here are the seven tactics for thriving that he outlined to help small and midsize businesses power through today’s health and economic crisis.
As businesses grow and change, it is necessary to re-evaluate your relationship with your Certified Public Accountant (CPA) from time-to-time and assess whether that CPA is the right match for your business.
If your business has grown significantly since you hired your CPA, now might be a good time to look at that relationship. Here are questions to ask yourself and your CPA to better judge whether you are well-served and tips on how to find the right CPA if you discover that it is time for a change.
Research.
Liquidity is vital to riding our crises and times of financial uncertainty.
Business liquidity during times of instability is vital to longevity and ultimately, to survival. Having liquidity allows a business to continue to meet payroll and fulfill operating costs and expenses.
Here are a few ways to look for liquidity during this time of uncertainty:
Reduce Overhead Costs
In a world that is changing more quickly than ever, businesses need a plan when things go sideways. Companies like Cisco have taken the principle of “planning ahead” seriously, ensuring that they don’t have to be worried about the effects of the Coronavirus outbreak, they can calmly implement their Pandemic Response Plan. According to the document published to their website, Cisco has “well-established processes to coordinate our efforts during outbreaks like COVID-19, including our Global Business Resiliency (GBR) and Supply Chain Incident Management (SCIM) Processes.”
Business Resiliency programs centered on surviving unprecedented crises, like the coronavirus outbreak are the exception, not the rule, especially in smaller companies. Annual reviews and “fire drills” ensure that operations do not become so reliant on existing supply chains and processes that they cannot pivot in case of a crisis. For critical business operations, larger companies conduct audits and annual exercises to make sure their resiliency plan works to mitigate disruptions.
The SBA Paycheck Protection Loan Program has changed as of today, Friday, April 3, 2020.
Matt Garrett reviews the eligibility requirements, loan terms and fund allocations required for businesses who receive these PPP loans.