Reporting for the March 2015 period is well underway for clients & here is a specific client example of how they have increased the profitability and efficiencies in their business by taking a more managed approach to their activities and working closely with PlanA Consulting. The credit sits with the client.
We’ll call the business in this case study Business Four and its characteristics are:
- Owner(s) work in business
- 5-10 fulltime staff
- Operating in local market for more than 5 years
After the initial planning session a number of immediate issues were identified and they were:
- Cashflow tight
- No financial analysis
- No systems or processes
- Productivity issues
- Fee structure not reflective to where it needed to be
- Owners not aware where to best put their time
(To be fair the above issues are common with most clients & if you’ve read the previous case studies you’ll see the issues & remedies are identical!)
Work was completed on a number of fronts. This included:
- Immediate focus on productivity
- Steps put in place to improve cashflow
- Other outside experts engaged to assist
- Review done on fee structure and associated costs of delivering their core service – adjustments made
- Pricing reviewed
- Internal paperwork reviewed to ensure billable hours not lost and clients being invoiced correctly
- Software introduced to help with both CRM & productivity
- Now operating across the North Island
Financial information for the company year end March 2015 compared against previous year
- Sales up 64% ($357k extra in sales)
- GP Margin up by 3% ($160k extra in GP$)
- Wage expense down from 32% of turnover to 24% (but employed more staff)
- Expenses down from 22% of turnover to 17%
- Operating surplus increased by an extra $115,000
If I look back in simple terms (& this applies to any client) the main gains are around:
- Active sales process & lead management
- Scoping & pricing the job correctly
- Ensuring variations are captured
- Focus on productivity hours & direct cost of sale
- Focus on expenses
- Recovering the $ owed
- Consistent implementation
Not rocket science but just good business practices
Work with this client is ongoing every month & the expectation is that there will be an improvement in all areas in the March16 end of year
If you would like to find various ways to increase both profitability and efficiencies in your business then contact John at PlanA Consulting