On Aug. 26, the Michigan Small Business Technical Development Center (MI-SBTDC), in partnership with the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) will be holding their Fiscal Fitness for the Growing Business at Fifth Third Bank at 1000 Town Center in Southfield.
The Fiscal Fitness program has been lauded by small business owners who participated in previous workshops as a vital tool to help them take their business to the next level. Topics for the workshop will include ways to improve your company’s cash flow, how to use your balance sheet and income statement to diagnose business problems and identify opportunities, how break even analysis can help develop better pricing and make better investment decisions; how to ensure you have enough working capital to support growth; and how to keep your banker on your side.
Fiscal Fitness for the Growing Business is a one-on-one, confidential financial management consulting process designed to strengthen financial literacy and improve the ability to access the capital businesses need to grow.
Many small business owners wear so many hats and are doing everything from washing dishes, purchasing goods, marketing and sales to sweeping and locking up. With owning a small business many owners are everyone from the receptionist, the IT person and the CEO and do not feel they have the time to handle yet anothertask.
Handling the financials is more often than not one of the primary duties that is outsourced. This can remove the business owner from the primary barometer of the financial health of their business. As a result, knowing the financial health of his or her business can help a small business owner sleep soundly at night or it can be the “canary in the coal mine” and help determine what issues need to be addressed to head off potential disaster. Rena Risper, president and publisher of The New Citizens Press attended a workshop earlier this year. Having successfully run her business for almost eight years, she let the professionals work the numbers.
Althogh knowing that “the numbers” are crucial to business success, she did not realize how important it was to understand the figures that made up her balance sheet and income statement. Since attending the workshop and a follow-up meeting, shehas put the concepts and tools she received to use and cannot be happier with the results.
Fifth Third Bank has been the statewide sponsor of Fiscal Fitness for the Growing Business, funded by the Fifth Third Foundation, since June 2009 and all Fiscal Fitness programs provide management tools for the non-financial manager. The workshop is a precursor to the MI-SBTDC Fiscal Fitness Counseling Program which provides the business owner up to four 1-1/2 to 2 hours, one-on-one consulting sessions with a Michigan SBTDC consultant over four to eight weeks to complete the program. At each consulting session the business owner’s actual company information will be used to ensure he or she gets a clear understanding of how the concepts that are introduced will work in their business.
CEOs who have three or more years of financial history and want to develop a better understanding of how to use their financial statements to help make better informed decisions will find this program indispensible.
The morning begins with a continental breakfast at 8 a.m. and the workshop is from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. You must pre-register for the workshop. Registration is free for NAWBO members and Fifth Third Bank clients. There is a workshop fee of $25 for all other business owners. If you are interested in more information regarding the Fiscal Fitness for the Growing Business, you can visit the MISBTDC website at www.misbtdc.org/region9 and register online or call Richard King at (734) 487-0355.
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