Knowing the financial impact of decisions, before a client implements those decisions, is very important for financial stability.

The process commences with an examination of the key drivers relative to the physical number of units to be produced and the calculation of the direct costs that will be involved in that process. The calculation of estimated stock holdings can be made based on manufacturing/purchase estimates and the unit sales can be based on estimates from sales people.....

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Benchmarking is a great tool for accountants to utilise to analyse a business so that information on the business' performance can be conveyed to the directors, owners, leadership team.

To enable credible figures to be produced, it is very desirable that the individual departments within a business are segregated so that separate Profit & Loss Accounts, Key Performance Indicator Reports, Budgets and Comparisons to Budgets are produced for the leadership team to be better informed of the individual "department's" performance...

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Now is the time for accountants to be having a cup of coffee with SME clients to help set the business' strategic plan for 2021.

Some of the questions that you could ask include:

• What are your top 5 sales lines?
• What mark-ups do you make from these products?
• What are your bottom 5 sales lines?.....

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As we consider the challenges, potential problems and rewards that might be possible in 2021, SME leadership teams and their accountants could do well to incorporate the strategies of "scaling up" in their strategic plans for the next few years.

The key concepts of "scaling up" require businesses to:

• Attract and keep the right people - leadership team and team members with adequate training and motivation.
• Create a truly differentiated strategy - relating to customers, suppliers, supply chains, communications....

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There are numerous other areas in the strategic planning process in which accountants can assist SMEs, including:

• Review of charge out rates being utilised by tradies to ensure that the charge out rates will ensure that, if productivity is in accordance with the estimates, the targeted profit will be generated.
• Review of retail businesses' expectations of product mix and mark-ups relative to those various products to determine...

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There is a strong expectation that 2021 will be a better year than 2020. However, this will not occur unless there has been some strategic planning undertaken over the next 4 weeks so that the strategies and expectations for 2021 are identified and promoted to the team.

Accountants, who are supplying Business Advisory Services, will be able to assist SMEs to clearly identify strategies for this new cal....

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rowd Sourced Funding Equity Raising has certainly introduced new opportunities for SMEs as well as for accountants and business advisors.

• SMEs can access a retail investor audience for a fraction of the typical cost for public companies under a prospectus.
• Proprietary limited companies can now have a potentially unlimited number of investors under the Crowd Sourced Funding regime (previously limited to 50 non-employees shareholders).
• CSF offers can be advertised publicly, whereas other public offers have heavy restrictions on permissible advertising, or can't be advertised at all.
• Shares issued directly to shareholders – nominees/trust structure is not permitted.
• Crowd Sourced Funding Company is not an investment company – can't raise funds to invest in other entities or schemes.

In ESS BIZTOOLS' Business Advisory Services Update Webinar/Conversation - Wednesday 9th December at 11.00am AEDT (10.00am AEST) Peter Towers will discuss with...

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Accountants could spend some quality time with their SME clients at present planning their business strategies for 2021.

Why not have a cup of coffee with your clients and discuss these strategies with them, particularly those clients who have received JobKeeper payments.

In the Business Advisory Services Update Webinar/Conversation on Wednesday 9th December at 11.00am AEDT (10.00am AEST) Mark Holton, Director of Smithink will...

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There are hundreds of government grants available from the Australian, State and Territory governments, primarily targeted at businesses with turnovers under $50 million per annum.

The range of services that government grants will finance include:

- Funding of research and development activities undertaken by a company at a rate of 43.5% of eligible research and development expenditure.

- Up to $150,000 in grants to assist exporters and suppliers of services to overseas' visitors under the Export Market Development Grant....

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Debtors' management is often not given a high priority in a business and this can lead to high levels of debt owed to the business.

Accountants can assist their clients to improve their debtor's management systems by encouraging a monthly calculation of "Debtors' Days Outstanding".

Debtors efficiency will be enhanced by the utilisation of a written debtors' management system which will assist the team member, assigned to this task, to perform his/her duties...

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