Your Business is Growing. So Why Are Your Finances Still Abysmal?

Entrepreneur

2 days ago

When your business outgrows your financial systems, guesswork becomes expensive, and control slips fast.
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You're bringing in more revenue. You've hired. You've expanded. But every time you ask for a margin report or runway forecast, the answers are vague. Everybody seems to have their own version of those numbers.
Sound familiar?
I work as a Fractional CFO with growing businesses across the world, typically between $2 million and $25 million in revenue. Here's what I've seen again and again: The business scales. But finance stays stuck.
The books are late. The metrics are unclear. Budgets are more of a guess than a plan. And somehow, even with all the success, the founder feels anxious about cash every month.
Here are 7 things every growing business must fix, before your finance function becomes the bottleneck to everything else.
Related: I Created a Meeting to Call Out My Team's Mistakes. What Happened Next Surprised Me.
1. Accounting is not a checkbox. It is the foundation
One of the first things I often ask is, "How long after month-end do you close your books?"
If the answer is over 15 days, we're already late.
At scale, you can't afford delays. You need accurate, complete and timely financials — every month. And that too, on time! That means:
Revenue and costs are recorded in the right periods
Clear chart of accounts
Proper treatment of accruals, taxes and adjustments
If your numbers aren't current, you're running your business in the dark. That's not a system. That's survival mode.
2. Revenue means nothing if you're not collecting it
I've seen companies with strong sales pipelines that still struggle to make payroll on time. Why? Poor collections. Invoices go out late. Follow-ups are inconsistent. Credit terms are unclear. And receivables balloon quietly in the background. And the worst thing is that finance and operations are disconnected. You keep serving the customer, despite knowing that they've not paid for 180 days.
If you're not turning revenue into cash, you're not scaling — you're just accumulating receivables. Every growing business needs:
Defined billing and collection cycles
Weekly cash collection tracking
Account-level credit limits and aging reports
The moment finance is treated like an afterthought to sales, cash gets squeezed. Scale only magnifies that pain. And one day, you will wake up thinking, "Why don't I have enough money in the bank?"
3. Your budget can't just be a rough estimate
Budgeting isn't just about controlling spend — it's about giving the business a plan.
I help founders move beyond ballpark targets by installing three key tools:
A 13-week cash flow forecast that updates weekly
that updates weekly A 12-month budget with functional accountability
with functional accountability A 3-year directional forecast tied to milestones
The businesses that feel in control aren't always the ones with the most cash.
They're the ones with the clearest view of how it's being used — and why.
Related: Here's How I Drove My Company's Revenue By Taking One Often-Overlooked Step
4. Not all revenue is equal — focus on what earns, not just what sells
It's amazing how many founders grow topline revenue while quietly subsidizing low-margin customers.
I've worked with service businesses where 60% of revenue came from clients who, once delivery costs were factored in, barely broke even.
At scale, gross margin discipline matters more than volume. You should know:
Which products or services have the highest contribution
Which customers or segments consistently drive profit
Where discounting is eating into your margins
As I often say, "You don't scale by selling more. You scale by selling more of what actually works."
5. Overheads aren't strategy. They're investments with ROI
As companies grow, overheads tend to expand without much scrutiny. You hire faster. Upgrade tools. Expand office space. Add layers. Social media has made it worse because you want to be seen as the next Google!
But more headcount, more software, and more structure don't always mean more output.
In my CFO role, I often ask:
Is this a "must have" or a "nice to have"?
Can we tie this cost to an outcome: efficiency, revenue or scalability?
Are we layering cost without accountability?
Growth without discipline leads to burn without returns.
Related: Understanding Cash Flow in Your Business
6. If you can't measure it, you can't fix it
When I onboard a new client, I rarely look at the P&L first. I look at the reporting structure.
Are you:
Reviewing burn rate monthly?
Tracking actuals vs. budget?
Watching margin compression over time?
Measuring CAC, LTV and churn (if applicable)?
Most financial reporting is either too late, too basic or too bloated.
What you need is reporting that helps you act. Not just admire the problem. Good reporting turns finance into a decision-making engine. Bad reporting just tells you what already went wrong.
7. Finance isn't back office. It is the foundation for decision-making.
Founders often tell me they'll "get to the finance stuff later."
But here's the reality: finance always catches up with you. In diligence. In investor meetings. In cash crunches. In expansion stumbles.
The founders who stay ahead are the ones who:
Hire finance professionals not just to record, but to plan
Build internal monthly rhythms
Tie finance into strategy(not just compliance!)
Demand ROI from every dollar they deploy
These businesses don't grow with anxiety. They grow with clarity.
And when the next big decision comes — fundraising, a major hire, a new market — they already know what's possible, what it costs and what it returns.
Final thought
Your revenue may be growing. But if your finance function isn't evolving alongside it, you're not scaling — you're guessing.
That guesswork becomes expensive: poor pricing, delayed collections, bloated teams or missed decisions.
But it's also preventable. You don't need a finance department to start. You need financial visibility, financial rhythm and financial discipline. Because the moment you stop guessing and start seeing, everything changes.