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T H U R S D A Y, O C T O B E R 1 5 , 2 0 1 5
CAPITAL IDEAS UPCOMING EVENTS
FINANCIAL POST
CA LG A RY H E R A L D
C A P I TA L Q U E S T I O N
WHAT’S YOUR NO.1 CASH FLOW MANAGEMENT TIP? Entrepreneurs talk about preparing for lean times and slow seasons
OCTOBER 22: 2015 CALGARY SMALL BUSINESS WEEK EXPO AND AWARDS SHOW Networking, workshops, a business expo, refreshments and an award show highlighting Calgary’s greatest small businesses. ■ Where: Telus Spark (220 St Georges Dr N.E.) ■ When: 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. ■ Admission: $40 for nonmembers. More info at smallbusinessweekcalgary. com
“Track it. It sounds so simple, but just getting all those receipts into a format where you can truly make sense of your spending is much harder than you think, they just seem to pile up! One tool to get the information to my bookkeeper quickly that she recommended to me is Receipt Bank. You can simply take a photo with your phone and it gets uploaded into the system. If you receive an invoice via email, you can forward it to the designated email address so it appears in the same account. The best part about that is you can grant your bookkeeper access to it so they can see what’s happening and rein you in if needed!” Trina Lo, marketing strategist at FreshInk Communications, freshink.ca
“We are very fortunate to have a business that requires advance payment for services so that definitely helps a great deal with cash flow. The other things that we do to manage cash flow is pay invoices as we receive them and keep a minimum balance in our bank account. We never let our account go below an amount that covers payroll and rent for the month. If we are thinking about purchasing something new for the studio, we will only do it if the above criteria are met.”
OCTOBER 28: 2ND ANNUAL NORTH AMERICAN WOMEN IN ENERGY FORUM A platform designed to recognize the contributions that women make to the energy sector, their future in the sector and as a platform for dialogue on key issues. ■ Where: Hotel Arts (119 12 Ave S.W.) ■ When: 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. ■ Admission: $180. More info at womensenergyforum.com For more great events, visit capitalideascalgary.com/ calgaryevents.
COMMUNITY QUESTION
How do you make time to learn and keep your business growing?
Brenda Mahoney, Owner of Vin Gogh Paint & Sip, vingogh.ca
“I’ve learned through painful experience that the best way to get cash flow is to set up your business right from the beginning with something like a paid membership or monthly subscription in such a way that you have hands-free income coming in every month. We started late in the game, but having it now is making a huge and positive impact on our bottom line.” Darlene Hull, owner of HotSpot Social Media, HotSpotSocialMedia.com
Brad Celmainis, president of Brad Celmainis Consulting (bradcelmainis.com) recommends reconciling payments often. “I see so many small businesses fall behind on keeping the bank account balance current in their accounting systems. In today’s world of online banking, there is no excuse for getting behind on bank reconciliations. In my world, cash gets managed daily. It’s the first thing I want to see when I start the day. The reconciled balance should start any cash flow forecasting exercise.” P H O T O BY : S E A N P H I L L I P S , R I V E RW O O D P H O T O G R A P H Y ( R I V E RW O O D P H O T O G R A P H Y.C O M )
“If your business has been diligently following up on money owed but still needs cash to meet payroll, pay suppliers, or secure a new contract, spreading the risk is my No. 1 cash flow management tip. While banks take accounts receivable as part of their security and provide an operating line based on a percentage of the amount, invoice discounters actually purchase your invoices and give you cash for them, usually within 24 hours of the invoices being issued. Invoice discounting is not suitable for every business, but for the majority it requires, not financial acumen, but common sense to realize the best way to improve cash flow in response to economic difficulty is to get the best of both worlds by using a bank and an invoice discounter.” Daryl Turko, owner of The Interface Financial Group, interfacefinancial.com/team/turko
When you’re busy running your business day to day, sometimes it’s hard to find extra time for learning, which is why, which is why Ildi Arlette, president of Results Continuum Inc. (resultscontinuum.com) wants to hear from you: How do you make time to learn and keep your business growing? You can answer the question in two ways: Open today’s Capital Ideas email if you’re a member or visit capitalideascalgary.com We’ll publish the best answers, along with your business name and website address, on Oct. 22. Join Ildi Arlette at the 6th Annual Women in Leadership and Business Conference, a national, two-day interactive learning and professional development event being held at Hyatt Regency in Calgary on Nov. 23-24. Go to wilbconference.com for more information.
Business owners helping business owners
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“In business, you must know the difference between cash flow and profitability. Without an accurate cash flow, it will be difficult to properly fund growth activities. And every business decision should consider the effects on cash flow. Not managing cash flow is the quickest way to damage your business and shorten the life of any business.” Nancy Seeger, CEO of Seeger Consulting Inc., seegerconsultinginc.com
“It may sound simplistic, but knowing your numbers is the best way for us to manage cash flow. You can’t measure what you don’t track. We pay very close attention to cash flow daily, weekly, monthly and yearly. We maintain a trailing 12 month chart of revenue, expenses and net, and this lets us to compare to prior periods and ensure that the ship is steaming in the right direction. This attentiveness lets us identify problems within days.” Dale Macdonald, Director of Elite Sport Performance, elitesportperformance.com
“The key to managing your cash flow is to know your monthly burn rate and to review and update it regularly. When you know what your monthly fixed expenses are you can more easily determine which variable expenses you can take on immediately or plan for in the future while avoiding or minimizing a negative cash flow.” Suzanne Ferguson, vice president of CanaGlobe Compliance Solutions, canaglobecompliance.com
These answers are in response to a question posed by Wellington Holbrook, executive vice-president of ATB Business. Here’s his take: “Maximizing your cash flow is always important, but even more so when things are tight. Here are a couple simple suggestions that are obvious, but you might be surprised how few entrepreneurs actually exercise this way of thinking. First of all, don’t be afraid to ask your suppliers for better terms. Your suppliers want to keep your business and they are often willing to provide more time to pay than you might realize. If you have 15 days, ask for 30. If you have 30, ask for 60. You’ll be surprised how often they’ll say yes. Secondly, if you are in a business where offering terms is normal (usually not true for retail), don’t automatically assume you must offer all of your customers terms. You might just find that they’ll often pay cash or make payment in just a few days. Wait for them to ask before extending anything more than cash terms — you might find many of your customers are happy to pay now instead of later.” R O U N D U P : R E C E N T P O S T S F R O M C A P I TA L I D E A S M E M B E R S Find the full posts on these members’ LinkedIn profiles. We’ll curate a selection every Friday on our LinkedIn group, Capital Ideas Alberta. To bring yours to our attention, email it to hello@capitalideascalgary.com or use the hashtag #capitalideas when you post to LinkedIn.
From “A Culture of Enlightened Leadership: The Power of Emotional Regulation to Impact Leadership and Performance” by Michelle Phaneuf, conflict manager at Workplace Fairness (workplacefairness.ca):
“Becoming an Enlightened Leader may be far easier than you may have imagined. It does not require a title, a degree, money, power more material means. It does require a mind-set a prime filter and some decision making at the level of living principles.”
From “My Big Client OOPS & How I Fixed It” by Amanda Schewaga, owner of The Marketing Girl (themarketinggirl.com):
“Have you ever had that sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach when you are reviewing something for a client and then a situation comes to light where all you can think and repeat is “Oh SH*T!”?”
From “Shy Pup: Overcoming Fears and Insecurities” by Megan Armstrong, owner of Dogma Training & Pet Services Inc. (dogmatraining.com)
“I think any entrepreneur can be trapped by their fears. However, the difference between a successful entrepreneur and one that continually struggles, is how they face that fear.”
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