Management Services
Overview
We work at the senior level, counseling management and guiding existing staff toward the development of improved management systems. Areas of expertise include:
- Strategic Planning
- Evaluation New Business Opportunities
- Special Projects
- Information Systems
- Incentive Compensation Plans
- Business Process Reviews
Details
Strategic Planning
A strategic plan is the key to business success. Yet many companies operate without one! We bring 25 years of professional planning experience for both manufacturing and service companies to the process. We'll lead a disciplined program that:
- Defines your customers
- Identifies your customers' needs and buying criteria
- Assesses your strengths
- Pinpoints your weaknesses
- Focuses on your opportunities
- Establishes meaningful objectives
- Sets measurable goals
Evaluating New Business Opportunities
New business opportunities can be the key to your company's growth, but leaping blindly into an entrepreneurial "adventure" can be a costly mistake. The CFO Connection can help you take a planned approach to your new business effort. We'll provide the "up front" analysis that can:
- Tell you if you're financially strong enough to make the move.
- Plan your investment, budgeting funds when they will be needed and identifying their source.
- Project when your venture will be profitable.
- Identify your manpower needs.
- Help you select accounting and information management systems.
- Establishes meaningful objectives
- Structure your overall business plan.
Special Projects
How many times has that special project been put off for months or never done at all? The CFO Connection gives you the manpower and expertise to define and manage a special project from inception to fruition without interrupting your day-to-day business activities. With The CFO Connection, your special project will be:
- Our most important activity. Work proceeds at a maximum pace and our energy is not siphoned off by competing responsibilities.
- Clearly defined with objectives set in advance of any work beginning. This avoids costly "wheel spinning" and "start overs" that can result from inexperienced project management.
- Project when your venture will be profitable.
- Conducted with a senior management point of view. Its long-term effect on the bottom line will not be lost in a rush of enthusiasm.
Information Systems
The key to developing the best possible information system is to know what information a company needs to both maximize its opportunities and maintain financial control. We offer that level of expertise, plus the practical experience of having overseen the installation and evolution of a progressively more advanced information system at a growing multi-national company. Using The CFO Connection to manage the adoption of an information system brings a task force leader who has:
- Managed both financial and manufacturing departments, and is insightful of their information system needs.
- Overseen numerous change-overs from existing systems to new systems, managing both technical and human concerns.
- Project when your venture will be profitable.
- Introduced data base information systems bringing together customer information from many, decentralized divisions.
Incentive Compensation Plans
Motivating an organization is a complex art. While companies work hard at getting the most from their employees, they often lose track of the role that compensation plays in motivation. Ironically, a traditional view of compensation for managers can inadvertently create a structure in opposition to the desired management goals. Working with The CFO Connection on compensation programs:
- Provides an objective, unbiased view of the compensation program.
- Allows the company's operating goals to be reflected at the center of the compensation plan.
- Project when your venture will be profitable.
- Brings a familiarity with successful, incentive-based compensation plans used at other companies.
Business Process Reviews
Most companies define their organizations in a hierarchical pyramid, putting their CEO at the top with all other positions shown by rank. However, when they attempt to view the process of serving their customers, a very different corporate structure emerges. This is the structure of their business process. We help companies better define their business process to match their business objectives. In doing so, we help clients:
- Review their procedures from their customer's perspective.
- Develop policies and practices which grow from the need to serve the customer, not the organization.
- Project when your venture will be profitable.
- Track their business process from attracting an order to meeting the customer's need. We assess how work flows from department to department. We identify breakdowns that impede the process; look for lapses in responsibility; and help eliminate redundancy of effort.
