Mid-market company invests in Key Performance Indicators and increases bottom line by 1734% to $6.2 million in 18 months.
CLIENT’S KEY CHALLENGE
“I feel like I am the captain of a ship in a dense fog without any electronics and all I have is a compass,” the Company’s CEO told us. From the CEO’s perspective, the financial statements were the compass of the business. What they really wanted was better business intelligence – to know where they were going and how they were going to get there, not just a report on where they had been.
For decades, companies have utilized their financial statements to report their progress after the fact. Very few companies are able to make the transition from reporting historical results to leveraging internal business process data to strategically drive their company’s performance.
KEY SUCCESS FACTORS
- Created open, honest communication amongst management team
- Created customized key performance indicators relevant to client’s business
- Increased bottom line over 18 months by 1734% to $6.2 million
- Brought costly outsourced services in-house
The old model metrics (the tools/methods used to measure the progress of a business) are primarily financial and not actionable. They are delivered after the fact, used to report earnings and taxes, and manage input costs. The new model metrics are actionable and multidimensional, allowing for mid-course steering, aligning efforts, creating value, implementing strategy, and managing the value of outputs.
CLIENT’S CURRENT SITUATION
The company had been growing at an average rate of 29% per year over the previous five years. Their controller had a clear understanding of the financial performance of the business and prepared internal financial statements on a monthly basis. Due to his workload, monthly financials were typically ready 45 days after month end.
The business continued to grow and revenue increased, expenses increased and profit remained relatively flat. Over
time, the CEO became frustrated. Based on his previous experience, he knew there was a better way to strategically grow a mid-market organization.
SOLUTION
During the initial six months of our engagement, Whittaker & Co. CPAs developed and implemented a monthly key performance reporting packet. When we began the assignment, our client only had historical financial data to work from. Our first task was to determine where the Company was financially and operationally. The financial assessment of a company is typically readily available from the financial statements. Operational assessments are more challenging, so we used our proprietary method to do this.
First, we gained an understanding of the internal operating environment: vision, strategy, structure, culture, products and services, marketing and sales, people, systems and processes, and finance. Next, we assessed the external operating environment: current business environment, related industries, competition, technology, customers and shareholder circumstances.
Once the assessment was complete, we developed 33 key performance indicators that the management team wanted to use. The metrics were across all segments of the business: marketing, operations, finance, and overhead. Many of the metrics did not have historical data to work from. As a result, processes and procedures were developed to create the data
to be measured.
In the monthly meetings we had with the company’s management team, we found there were metrics that served their purpose, some that did not, and a few more that needed to be created. Within the first six-month period, we were able to measure the things that mattered to our client.
Over the next 12 months, we continued to hold monthly management meetings. Our monthly meetings and key performance indicators provided a diagnostic conversation. It brought forth the strategies that worked and uncovered the strategies that were not working. We had tough conversations about sacred cows in the business that needed to be changed and then created a change agent, knowing that in the next month we would review how any implemented changes affected the areas we were watching as a team. Whittaker & Co. CPAs created a space for the management team to have open, honest communication, asked tough questions, and brought with us twenty years of experience with clients in similar situations.
BENEFIT
After 12 months of full implementation of the key performance indicators, the Company increased their profit by 1734%, to $6.2 million, while increasing their revenue by 57%. They shifted their business model to bring services in-house that they were currently outsourcing and they opened a regional facility in Northern California. The vertical integration that took place to bring the contracted services in-house was the single biggest change they made in their business. The Company has continued to grow and maintain the same level of profit for the last three years.
To learn more about how Whittaker & Co CPAs can assist businesses and their owners, visit us online at www.whittakercpas.com and fill our questionnaire.
