4/27/21
Listening Time:
40 min
Episode 105: Getting Your Consulting Business Finances Right—with Jennifer Yousem
You can be the best consultant in the world, but you still have to get the money part right to have the business and life you want.
In this Craft of Consulting podcast episode, I interview Jennifer Yousem, a fractional CFO who helps non-finance business owners with finance. She shares her strategies for ensuring that you have a profitable, sustainable consulting business and you know that the cash will flow in when you need it. She also reveals how the power of EBITDA—earnings before interest taxes, depreciation, and amortization—for keeping your bottom line healthy.
TODAY'S GUEST
Jennifer Yousem
Episode Details
EBITDA queen Jennifer Yousem knows that you should never wonder how your consulting business is doing financially. In this episode, we talk about:
Understanding EBITDA and why it matters for your consulting business' bottom line
Having a framework to better value your time and focus on value-pricing yourself correctly
Looking at your operating expenses as a baseline for your consulting business
Avoiding pushing for volume to get revenues up
Productizing your business and outsourcing to give you more time back
Hiding bad processes with profit
Having the agency and intel to pick your clients in a way that serves your business and bottom line
Knowing your metrics to develop best-case, base-case, and worst-case scenario financial plans
Layering in best-case scenario “what ifs” for what your business can look like
Using payment models and credit lines to help you with cashflow
Getting paid when clients don’t pay you
Defining key performance indicators that will help know what’s happening with your finances and make deliberate decisions
Embracing the difference between a signed contract and getting the revenue in your account
Automating to ease payment
Not letting your canary die