How to build a business budget that reflects your actual strategy
Most South African SME business budgets, if they exist at all, are built incorretly. They start from historical actuals, apply a growth assumption and project forward without strategic input.
The REAL COST of not knowing your numbers
Over the last couple of months, the blog posts have made the positive case for financial clarity. The improvements it brings to decision-making, the confidence it creates and the strategic advantage it provides. In this post I want to make the opposite argument. I want to show you what financial ignorance actually costs. As specifically […]
Invoicing best practices: how to get paid faster
Cash flow is as much a timing problem as it is a profitability problem. You can have excellent margins, even huge turnover, and still experience cash flow pressure if the gap between delivering your service and receiving payment is too big. For most South African service businesses, that gap is wider than it needs to […]
The strategy and your financial plan disconnect
Here is a scenario: A business owner has a clear vision for where they want to take their business. They want to grow to R5 million in revenue over three years. They want to hire two more senior team members. They want to move into a larger premises. The vision is specific, motivating and real. […]
Do I Need to Submit a Tax Return in South Africa?
Tax season can be confusing. Every year, thousands of South Africans ask the same question: Do I actually need to submit a tax return? The answer depends on your personal circumstances, income sources, and whether SARS requires you to submit a return. Understanding your obligations helps you avoid penalties, missed deductions, and delays with SARS. […]
Bad debt: How to best handle it in your business
It is good business practice to have a policy in place that stipulates how your company deals with bad debts. In case you aren’t aware, a bad debt is when an invoice is not going to be paid by a client or customer. It is a debt to you that has gone bad. Besides hindering […]
Xero Add-ons – Making it better
Xero is a powerful accounting platform on its own. But one of its greatest strengths is its ecosystem of integrations, or Xero Add-ons as they are called. These extend the platform’s core functionality in specific directions without requiring you to switch systems or manage separate data sets. For South African SMEs, the most valuable Xero […]
Monthly Accounts – Run Your Business Better!
Management accounts have different meanings to different businesses. Management accounting is a section of accounting that deals primarily with production. When I say management accounts, or monthly accounts, I mean the accounts that business owners receive monthly from there accountants or bookkeepers to run their business. In this context, they are interchangeable terms. Unfortunately, they […]
Surviving versus Thriving
South Africa has one of the highest small business failure rates in the world. Various studies and industry bodies, as well as the business owners themselves have noted that a significant proportion of small businesses do not survive beyond their first five years. The are many businesses registered but then fail to survive. The causes […]
Accountability – Because Willpower Is Not Enough
Willpower is a finite resource. Every South African business owner I have worked with has experienced this at some point: the goal that felt vivid and urgent in January becomes background noise by May (or earlier), crowded out by the daily demands of running a business. This is not a character flaw. It is a […]