Teaching the Business of CFOing for Part-time CFOs
Periodically, I have other part-time CFOs ask if they should work with startups.
My typical response is a question, “Do you want to go broke?”
But Mark, I’ve been offered equity. My comeback is another question, “Have you ever heard of the endowment effect?”
Bottom line, working with startups is hard, really hard. Be careful when working with them.
Have you figured out the bookkeeping and accounting issues facing small businesses? That’s precisely what I thought. It’s really bad.
Back in 2001, I seriously considered never doing consulting work again because every small business bookkeeper or accountant that I encountered thought they were experts. Most were not. I continually observed the gap between their perceived and actual skill levels.
Today, I typically get a seat at the table when my clients are either upgrading or turning over their small accounting departments. My favorite role is interviewing accounting candidates to flesh out the imposters from the winners.
Nearly 60 million men and women play fantasy football and one organization estimates the average player spends more than $600 annually on this intoxicating indulgence.
Thanks to my youngest son, I too play in a fantasy league. To plagiarize Tony Horton regarding his sadistic Ab Ripper X routine, “I hate it, but I love it.”
I finished third in my league which isn’t too shabby for a rookie. But I’m so glad it’s over. I don’t think I could stomach another week.
Every year, I say I’m going to quit reading business books. Well, this CFO failed again miserably.
I read 41 books and listened to another 47 bringing me to 88 total books, a bit far from my goal of 100 every year.
Interested in seeing my partial list of favorite books from the the prior year? I’ll want to know your favorites too.
Starting a business is hard. Growing a business is harder. Staying the course following a growth plan that could fail is scary impossible at times.
What if there was a way that we could quantify the growing pains of any company that we serve? What if we could use the results of this assessment to ease the pains as the company grows?
Such a tool exists, and it was created by Management Systems, authors of Growing Pains–I recommend the 5th Edition for consultants.