AaaS: Made For Entrepreneurs By Entrepreneurs
From the Desk of Brooke Evans, Founder and CEO of CFO Alliance, Inc.
When I started my entrepreneurial journey with CFO Alliance in 2008, I was fueled by an aspiration to serve entrepreneurs by providing them with access to financial talent and leadership they might not otherwise have.
And over the past 11 years, we have had the honor of serving as the Outsourced CFO for hundreds of established entrepreneurs. They’ve invited us to be an extension of their team to help them navigate the unfamiliar terrain of growth and exits.
But when we first launched CFO Alliance, the early-stage market wasn’t ready. As a fellow entrepreneur, I got it. I mean, who has the time – or money – to start with the end in mind to design an optimal accounting structure while simultaneously trying to acquire customers and deal with the demands of running an early-stage company?
Plus, back in those ‘olden days,’ there were other real hurdles, most notably the hardship of sharing sensitive data that was often only available in hard-copy form using scanners, servers and – dare I say – fax machines.
This explains why we have found ourselves starting too many of our engagements with established entrepreneurs as a proverbial ‘clean-up-on-aisle-2’. The accounting and finance functions are often the most underinvested areas in the early years of their business.
As entrepreneurs, one of our most important jobs is to grow as much as possible with finite resources. We have to make tough choices every day about where and how to invest our limited resources to get the maximum outcome. It’s a delicate balance: to drive sales and build an infrastructure that’s sufficient for today yet flexible enough for the future, all while making sure there is enough cash to finance it all.
It often feels there simply aren’t enough hours in the day – or money in the bank.
I knew there had to be another way.
After years of building a model to help more advanced entrepreneurs get the greatest return possible from investments in our services, we knew we needed to offer our services to earlier stage growth companies so they could get their accounting and finances right from the start, too.
Our Evolution of Accounting As A Service
As a professional in finance, I am naturally motivated by efficiency, especially by dollars deployed in any initiative – which is precisely what compelled me to design our Accounting as a Service offering for early-stage growth companies.
Too often we have seen the traditional options – an internal bookkeeper or CPA firm – fail to deliver value and cost owners time, money, and stress.
Entrepreneurs deserve better.
And with advancements in technology such as open-source API, cloud apps, automation, and even artificial intelligence, entrepreneurs now have access to easy, high-quality, and affordable outsourced accounting and finance solutions.
So now, entrepreneurs can start reaping rewards from accounting and finance from the start, rather than wake up in a few years with a mess on their hands, and truly prosper from start-up to exit, and every stage in between.
We’re committed to making your business more valuable with regular financial statements, reports to guide your decisions, and transaction-ready financial statements for banks and investors.
Let CFO Alliance take care of the accounting so you can get back to what you love: growing your business.