A good decision is made fast enough to take advantage of the opportunity. A good decision is competitive enough to win the business, and profitable enough to make more money than the opportunities ruled out. When a business grows to a certain extent, it will face complexity in its cost base, more competitors, and more alternatives: all increase the risk of bad decision making. Good decision support for small and medium sized business is about applying good techniques to simple, relevant information.
Most SMEs can get much better decision support without much investment in new systems or people. In a typical SME, the existing finance team is a great resource just waiting to be used more effectively. Your business contains much more information than you are using effectively.
Improving SME decision making is the final step in the FAB program.
How to get better decision support from your finance team
A finance team must help management know what uncertainties are worth focus, and what the likely range of financial outcomes is: bringing simple 'what-if' modelling to SMEs.
GrowthPath believes the existing Finance team, be it only a handful of people, can provide much better support without much investment in new systems or people. Your existing finance team is a great resource just waiting to be used more effectively.
How are SMEs different?
Most ideas about better decision support come from the world of large companies. SME owners and managers are different.
SME owners and managers are less likely to have MBAs, are more likely to be genuine entrepreneurs rather than professional managers, have more expertise in their market, are more likely to be owners or share-holders, are more likely to be involved in the execution of the decision, and are much more inclined to fast decision making.
To learn more about the topics below and to download an Excel example, please download this position paper: 