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Article 1 ended with a question. When does your COO actually talk to Accounting before a decision gets made? How long did it take you to answer? Immediately? Minutes? Maybe you could not think of a single example. Bills get paid, projects keep moving, and financial reports show up. Nothing feels obviously broken, so you conclude everything is fine. If that question made you uncomfortable, you are not alone. Here is the part that keeps this problem alive. You only know what good looks like based on what you have already lived through. Most owners have never worked inside a business where Operations and Accounting were intentionally built to function together. So they measure their company against their own status quo. This article gives you a different reference point. You will see what the relationship looks like day to day, what rhythm it runs on, and five things you can check this week. None of it requires scrapping what you have built. The people are already in the building. The data already exists. What changes is how the pieces are arranged, and how much leverage you get out of the company you have right now. Part 2 of a 5-part series on the COO-Accounting relationship
"Accounting is a stick in the mud." "I'm not really sure what a COO does all day." "The CFO just plays around with their little Excel sheets." You have probably heard one of those lines. You may have thought one yourself. They sound like harmless office humor. They actually point to something expensive. In most growing service businesses, nobody has ever defined how operations and accounting work together. The people who produce your financial reports sit outside the very decisions those reports are meant to inform. That gap costs you every single month, quietly, in profit that should have been there. Part 1 of a 5-part series on the COO and Accounting relationship
In modern business management, effective capacity planning requires far more than matching supply with demand—it demands a rigorous financial framework. Every unit of unused capacity represents sunk cost and margin erosion, while every unit of insufficient capacity risks churn and missed revenue. By evaluating capacity planning as a financial exercise, organizations can translate labor hours, utilization rates, and operational throughput into clear financial metrics like cost of goods sold (COGS) and return on invested capital (ROIC). This guide explores how to integrate operational capacity into your financial planning and analysis (FP&A) cycle to drive sustainable, cash-efficient scale.
In a service-based business, time is literally money, and every day an invoice goes unpaid, your margin shrinks. Unlike product businesses that can rely on physical inventory to back up value, service providers face a unique cash flow vulnerability: you've already delivered the work, paid your team, and covered overhead long before the client settles the bill. That makes managing your Accounts Receivable (AR) aging schedule critical to survival. But how do you know if your outstanding invoices are normal or a sign of trouble? Understanding key AR aging benchmarks, and where your service business stands relative to industry standards, is the first step toward reclaiming your cash flow and protecting your bottom line.This article walks you through the 30-60-90 AR Health Check and what healthy numbers look like for your business.
Between tracking fluctuating material costs, managing subcontractor fees, and juggling multiple active jobs, contractors face a unique set of financial complexities. At the heart of keeping these moving parts organized is the Chart of Accounts (COA), the foundational index of every financial transaction your business makes. For a contracting business, a well-structured COA does far more than just keep the tax preparer happy. It serves as the backbone for accurate job costing, allowing you to see exactly which projects are driving profits and which ones are eating into your margins. This article will guide you through the essentials of building a specialized Chart of Accounts tailored specifically for contractors, highlighting the unique categories you need to track, and sharing best practices to streamline your bookkeeping and elevate your business insights.
Fractional accounting gives your business a bookkeeper and controller for a flat monthly fee. Below you will find what it covers, what it costs, and how to know if it fits.
In the contracting world, where projects can span months or even years, managing cash flow and financial reporting is a unique challenge. Unlike traditional businesses that recognize revenue at the point of sale, contractors must choose how and when to account for their income and expenses. Two of the most common frameworks used to navigate this are Progress Billing (often paired with the Percentage of Completion Method ) and the Completed Contract Method (CCM). Progress Billing allows contractors to invoice clients and recognize revenue incrementally as milestones are met throughout the project. Completed Contract Method defers all revenue and expense recognition until the entire project is officially finished. Selecting the right method goes far beyond basic bookkeeping; it fundamentally shapes your tax obligations, cash flow health, and how creditworthy your business appears to lenders and investors. This article breaks down the core differences between these two methods, explores their pros and cons, and helps you determine which strategy is the best fit for your business.
Choosing new software can overwhelm any accountant. The options feel endless, and each one costs real time and money to test. Building the right accounting tech stack takes years of trial and error. We know, because we have spent over a decade doing exactly that. Our firm has been fully remote since 2012. That means we have tested, rejected, and adopted these tools inside real client work. Here is the stack we trust, so you can skip the guessing. You will notice we left AI off this list. We use it where it helps, but that is a topic for another day.
For consulting firms, project profitability represents the critical margin between engagement revenue and the actual cost of delivery. This gap is fundamental; firms can be entirely booked yet face cash flow constraints if profitability isn't managed at the project level. Project-level tracking is more than a financial formality; it is a strategic tool that enables leadership to optimize pricing, staffing, and capacity. To assist in this process, this guide introduces a practical framework: the Project Profitability Scorecard.
In the construction industry, managing cash flow presents significant hurdles, and the nuances of work deposits often lead to underestimated complications. Mastering construction accounting entails a precise grasp of how these upfront funds navigate your ledger, the timing for revenue recognition, and the strategies to prevent financial pitfalls that could jeopardize your business. For any contracting firm, proper deposit accounting is a necessity rather than an option. The accuracy of your financial statements, job costing, and overall cash liquidity depends entirely on it.
For consulting firms, project profitability represents the critical margin between engagement revenue and the actual cost of delivery. This gap is fundamental; firms can be entirely booked yet face cash flow constraints if profitability isn't managed at the project level. Project-level tracking is more than a financial formality; it is a strategic tool that enables leadership to optimize pricing, staffing, and capacity. To assist in this process, this guide introduces a practical framework: the Project Profitability Scorecard.
As your service business grows, there comes a point where basic bookkeeping no longer gives you the full financial picture you need. Knowing when to bring in a financial controller can be the difference between scaling confidently and flying blind. What a Financial Controller Actually Does A financial controller is essentially your company's chief accountant. They oversee accounting operations , ensure your financial statements are accurate, manage budgets, reconcile accounts, and translate complex financial data into clear insights for leadership. Unlike a bookkeeper who records transactions, a controller interprets what those numbers mean for your business. They also oversee accounts payable and receivable, coordinate audits, and set financial performance benchmarks. For service businesses specifically, this means someone who understands utilization rates, WIP for unbilled hours, project profitability, and realization rates. These are the levers that actually move the needle in a people-driven business. The Financial Controller Readiness Checklist How do you know you're ready? Run through these signs: Your revenue has crossed $1M and is growing fast. More revenue means more complexity. A bookkeeper handles the past. A controller helps you manage the present and prepare for the future. Your financial reports feel reactive, not proactive. If you're only looking at numbers after decisions are already made, that's a gap a controller fills. Cash flow surprises keep happening. Unexpected shortfalls often signal that AR management, billing cycles, and WIP tracking aren't being monitored closely enough. You're losing visibility into project profitability. If you can't tell which clients or projects are making you money, you need controller-level oversight, not just a P&L. You're preparing for growth, a credit line, or an audit. Lenders and auditors want clean, well-structured financials. A controller makes sure you're ready. Month-end close takes too long or keeps having errors. This is a process and oversight problem, and it's exactly what a controller is built to solve. You are still doing financial reviews. If you, or a partner, are spending hours reconciling reports or questioning numbers, your time is not being optimized. Financial Controller vs. Bookkeeper: Understanding the Gap Many growing service businesses assume that hiring a bookkeeper is enough. Here's where the roles diverge:
