The Client
This technology company has a strong position in the market. From its base in the South of England, it employs over 300 staff and has over £100 million turnover.
The Requirement
This client’s newly promoted CFO approached Isosceles for mentoring and coaching. While she had been in the business for some time in various finance roles, she wanted an experienced hand to help her transition into this leadership role. Evolving the finance function into the high-performing team required to achieve the company’s growth ambitions and help with an extensive ‘to-do’ list.
The board and the CEO were confident she could leap to CFO and wanted to give her every support to succeed.
The immediate requirement was to address the need for organisational change in the finance team. Additionally, it is important to improve the level of business partnering support for the rest of the business. The board was not getting the information they needed from the finance team to support decision-making. Reporting was taking too long, was not reliable, and lacked the interpretation the board required to fully understand it.
The Solution
Step 1: The initial output was developing a plan of action. This was done in four stages and took approximately 6-weeks:
- As a neutral person with no agenda other than their mentee’s success, the mentor spoke to all stakeholders and discussed their perceptions, concerns and expectations of the finance team.
- The mentor reviewed their roles, responsibilities, and assumptions with the finance team and examined their interactions with each other and other departments.
- The mentor then spent time with the CFO to hear her thoughts on what she felt needed to be done.
- Together, the mentor and the CFO produced the action plan, which identified:
- What actions needed to be undertaken.
- How the actions would be implemented.
- Who would carry out the tasks.
- The timescales for completion.
- How success would be measured.
Step 2: The next step was to agree on the plan with the CEO, prioritise the tasks and obtain the CEO’s support to move to implementation.
Step 3: During the implementation phase, the mentor’s role changed to guiding how to approach tasks or issues. He acted as a confidential sounding board.
Although the Isosceles CFO mentored this client CFO for six months, he still has regular check-ins.
Why Isosceles?
This client was referred to Isosceles by the CFO of another Isosceles client. They have worked in four rapidly growing technology companies, and Isosceles has supported him with finance projects in every company. He valued their experience, expertise and flexibility.
Also, Isosceles offered the client three CFOs to choose the mentor the CFO felt most suited to her and their business.
Results
- The CFO gained confidence in her abilities and built a vital finance function to support the business’s growth.
- Since this mentoring project, the business’s revenue has grown by 60%, and the finance function has accommodated that growth.
- The CFO is a respected member of the leadership team.
- The board receive accurate management information packs on time with a high level of interpretation to enable their decision-making.
- This client and Isosceles have formed a strong partnership, and the CFO has been able to take the pressure off of her team by outsourcing several financial projects where specialist finance expertise is required, for example:
- Monitoring performance at the group level against loan covenants.
- Building a sales analysis model to review customer margins and profitability by salesperson, sales team, industry, type, size, and revenue levels.
- Simplified their sales commission model, enabling them to forecast 5-year commission costs effectively and model the impact of changing targets on costs.
- Providing an accounting service for the head office company.
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Author’s Biography
Written by Greg Eaton, a CFO/FD Mentor specialising in helping technology companies improve their decision-making processes and enhance collaboration between finance departments. He assists companies in accomplishing crucial aims and succeeding in the market through a strategic financial approach.
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