Most good business managers can tell you how much of their time is devoted to dealing with problems in the business. Regardless of how well you have planned there are always going to be problems that occur at the worst possible time. Finding problems you have to solve in a business is a real challenge. There is no place in a management team for a manager who is not adept at problem resolution.

It is vital that all business managers give adequate attention to the implementation of robust financial controls. The purpose of financial controls is to identify financial problems and raise the alarm. A good reporting system is essential to the support of financial controls, this functionality can be found in most good small business accounting software. It is critical that you can create reports using small business accounting software that let you examine the differences between planned and actuals in focus areas such as cash flow, expenses and revenue. You should think through the critical numbers and ratios you need to review on a regular basis, keep it simple to begin with and then design the reports around them.

You must closely monitor the margins on what you sell and any deviation from what you set out to achieve regardless how minor should be immediately investigated and understood. Volume sales operations are particularly sensitive to changes in margins as losses can multiply quickly and therefore it is vital that you monitor both the changes in margin and volumes. Never take your eye of the fixed expenses of the business in the early part of the year and make sure they follow the budget. Debtors collections should be monitored closely, the best way to do this is to run reports that highlight the average number of days it takes to collect payments (small business accounting software is particularly adept at this.

Experience is the way to learn and over time you will learn which financial controls should be highlighted in your accounting reports, just make sure you have the right small business accounting software that can generate these.

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