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Woody Kitson

Take Charge of Those Business Numbers!

This month we welcome Leicester based financial guru and WebinArt mentor Mahmood Reza as our guest blog writer. You can also check out our recording of Mahmood's online workshop here - WebinArt Workshop: Pricing your Creative Business


Keep reading for a special offer from Mahmood!


About Mahmood


An experienced and qualified Accounting and Business Professional, Mahmood works within the Private, Cultural, Charitable and Learning Sector. He is a Trustee and Ambassador for The Spark Arts for Children and Great Central Railway, and a previous trustee for Leicester Print Workshop, Nottingham Contemporary and the Arts Council. Mahmood’s working life includes running an accounting firm, delivering financial awareness programmes for SMEs, creatives and multi-nationals. His talent is in translating, sharing and applying the world of accounting and enterprise to all types and sizes of business.



Enjoy this article and let us know what you think in the comments.


Take Charge of Those Business Numbers!


In your business, your financial information is business gold. It plays a key role in your business surviving, sustaining and growing. Critical to this, is taking charge of those all-important business numbers. You can do this by recording, connecting with, understanding and using those numbers. So what’s the easiest way to do this?


Information comes from financial transactions, and the quality of that information follows the same path as for a manufacturer. Our first question is whether our record keeping system should be manual (this includes spreadsheets) v computerised. The choice affects how our raw material of invoices, bills, receipts, bank statements is stored, and accessed; the transformation of that raw material (efficiency and WIP); and the quality of the finished product.


Good systems will help your business -

  • Easily record, connect with & understand your business numbers

  • Keep an eye on your profits

  • See what things cost

  • Control & manage your business

  • Manage and accelerate your cash flow

  • Plan

  • See where to improve

  • How to turn ideas into something meaningful

  • With tax authorities, sending in VAT and Tax returns


Records can be maintained manually and/or electronically (excel and/or accounting software). The choice should be driven by your needs and skills, any internal reporting requirements), relative costs, accuracy of systems, complexity and number of transactions.


You can make productivity and efficiency gains by automating processes for recording financial transactions. For example, you can set up automated bank feeds that send bank data into a cloud accounting system, and then you can establish bank rules to suggest coding for these transactions. Cloud software can remember how you previously coded a transaction and automatically suggests where it should go. Reconciling transactions is so much faster, with the combination of bank feeds, bank rules and system prompts.


You can use a mobile phone to scan in receipts: the data from the receipt is extracted and pushed into the accounting platform (including a copy of the receipt). This significantly reduces data entry and removes the need to keep the original receipt.


Cloud accounting can integrate with other business systems such as websites and shopping carts. Access can be given to multiple users and you can tailor permissions so that people with specific job roles only see what they need to see.


Smartphone and tablet apps give you information on the move wherever you are, as software housed in the cloud can be accessed wherever there is a connection, anytime and from pretty much any device.


Whatever system you adopt, manual or computerised, remember the ‘four S’ approach:


S is for...system - Spend time setting up a system which you stick to on a regular basis

S is for...separate - Treat the organisation as separate to you as the individual

S is for...security – Minimise the number of people involved in your financial record-keeping, and control access to those records

S is for... storage - Keep a regular and safe back-up of computerised and paper records


My normal advice to businesses, irrespective of type and size is to consider and embrace Cloud Accounting. There are options and price points suitable for the start of your business journey, which can be up-scaled as your business grows. The benefits will outweigh the investment that is made.


Check out Mahmood's free innovative free guide, “Release the Power of You, Take Charge of the Cloud”, which explores Cloud Accounting in greater depth. You can download it here -


SPECIAL OFFER FROM PROACTIVE RESOLUTIONS


Mahmood is kindly offering a special incentive, valid until midday 14th July 2019 - A 50% off offer on software subscription for 6 months, and a 50 % reduction on ‘on-boarding’ and support. To find out more, get in touch directly with Mahmood.


Thanks for reading this article and if you enjoyed it and/or found it useful then please Like and Comment below, and share with your network.


Want to see where we help you with your business, and how we turn your business Frowns into Smiles? Please take the first step and use one of the ways below to contact and connect.

Contact Mahmood by E-mail mahmood@proactiveresolutions.com; Phone: +44 116 224 71212; or complete the contact form. 

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