My Clients
What are your current challenges?
Do you recognise any of these statements?
- “I couldn’t take more than a week’s holiday, without worrying whether there would be a business when I got back!”
- “Turnover hasn’t increased for years!”
- “I’m lucky if I break even each month”
- “My staff cause me more problems than they solve!”
- “I’m constantly juggling payments to HMRC, the bank and making the monthly payroll”
- “Economic conditions are driving my business into the ground!”
- “My costs go up continually but my profits don’t increase to cover them”
- “I very rarely take any real money out of my business”
- “I’m never going to be able to retire!”
These are some of the typical problems that I heard from my clients when I first started working with them.
Do they sound familiar?
Business Performance
No vision or strategy – do you really know what you are trying to achieve or are you just working from day to day?
No business plan – if you know what you want to achieve, do you have a plan that maps out the steps that you have to take to achieve that?
Exit planning – your business won’t necessarily continue on forever. Do you have an end point in mind when you can retire with a decent income or even sell the business? Do you have a plan to get you to that point?
Growth
Flat or declining revenues – revenues remain pretty much the same year on year. This is a problem because costs don’t remain the same but increase year on year. So profits are falling.
Little profit for x number of years (but having to work harder) – because profits are falling you are having to, personally, work harder each year. You can’t afford extra staff so you have to take on extra work yourself. You feel that you’re on a treadmill going faster and faster and can’t get off.
Little or no financial management – do you have an endless struggle with your finances, always struggling to pay bills and never being able to draw a decent wage or invest in your business?
Cash
Cash flow problems – you go from month to month worrying about how to pay the bills. After staff have been paid there is little left over. Sometimes you have to defer payments or even borrow to stay afloat.
Need to secure additional funding – you don’t really know how to secure additional funding. You’ve approached the bank but they are no very responsive. Are there any other options for additional funding? Even if you could secure the funds, you worry that you won’t be able to repay or meet the interest costs.
Issues with HMRC – are you behind with PAYE, Corporation Tax or VAT payments?
Escalating costs – costs spiralling out of control with suppliers imposing increases, the landlord insisting on annual uplifts in rent and staff demanding pay rises.
Work/Life Balance
Poor work/life balance – you find yourself working all hours. You work most weekends. You have no time for family and friends. You can’r remember when you last took a holiday. Your relationship with your spouse or partner is suffering.
Business survival dependent on a single individual – the business is you. You feel that the business will effectively stop when you’re not there. Employees have to be micro-managed and rarely think for themselves.
Unsure of where to get impartial advice – you think you know what you need to do to get out of your dilemma, if only you could find the time to do that. But you never seem to be able to find the time. You don’t believe that anyone else can help you with this problem because they wouldn’t know your business as well as you do would be probably working to their own agenda rather than to your ultimate benefit..
Unable to take time off – no holidays, days off or ability to put yourself first and take time out when you need to,
Let's work together!
Free two-hour, no obligation consultation
I always spend an initial two hours with potential new clients on a free of charge basis, so that I can understand your business and you can decide if you would like to work with me. I will give you an honest appraisal of where I think I can help and the decision from there is all yours. Give me a call now and I will arrange to meet you.