It’s that week again – and it seems to come around quicker every year. Shoe shops are managing queues of parents choosing sensible options for kids ahead of a new term and, for families with youngsters, the school holidays are beginning to seem a distant memory.
The start of September marks a new start for many of us, not least those in the business world. A well well-known City figure, talking about his back-to-work routine, once reminisced about buying new black shoes for school after the summer and how he’d continued the practice throughout his career. Whether or not he needed yet more footwear, it was his way of committing to a new start post-holidays and, literally, putting his best foot forward.
Many small businesses and their advisers think this September feels different to the last. Three in four (73%) SME finance brokers feel optimistic about the future of small businesses, according to SME lender iwoca’s latest SME Expert Index. It reveals “a tentatively bullish outlook” for the UK’s 5.5 million SMEs. Fewer than one in 12 (8%) brokers feel pessimistic about the business environment.
SMEs themselves are still a little a cautious about their financial prospects: brokers indicate just over half (56%) feel positive about their own future business environment, despite a glimpse of economic green shoots following the recent lowering of interest rates by the Bank of England.
In any event, early September is a great time to prepare for a new phase of managing – and protecting – a business. A great deal can be done to make sure an enterprise is in good shape to benefit from an eventual economic upturn while, of course, steering it well clear of the buffers.
We’ve compiled a Top 20 checklist of important considerations. It kept getting longer as we put pen to paper but not all are action points: some may be just areas for review to give a business the best chance of success.
- Don’t be complacent in recovery – pause and reflect
- What has the last 12 months taught us?
- If we already bumping along the bottom, how are we going to rebuild our business – is this a hole we can get out of?
- Challenge, challenge, challenge: sense check plans – and make Plan B
- Products – review their relevance, quality and saleability
- Pricing
- Detailed cashflow forecasts – joined up with P&L and Balance Sheet
- Paying deferred liabilities – and how these are going to be funded
- Tax planning opportunities
- Review the model for profit extraction – remuneration and investment
- Interrogate the pre-summer pipeline: be realistic and build it out
- Competition – review landscape and identify advantages
- New ideas – innovation and flexibility
- Key customers – stay close, maintain service, review ability to pay
- Supply chain – how robust is this and where do we sit in it?
- Marketing and sales channels
- Technology – review returns on investment, potential efficiencies and protection from cyber crime
- Workforce post – review capacity, engage with staff, explore sources of new talent, including interim options
- Home working – embrace the benefits and remain flexible
- Office working – an opportunity for collaborative, creative work; many advantages for younger or new staff; physical, social interaction remains important to mental health and wellbeing; business culture is hard to maintain remotely
As ever, Buchler Phillips is happy to offer a no-obligation free initial consultation to discuss ways of safeguarding a business or, for those who believe theirs may beyond repair, exploring the insolvency toolkit for a recovery plan or managed exit option.
Written by David Buchler, Chairman at Buchler Phillips, UK based independent boutique firm with an impeccable Mayfair heritage, specialising in corporate recovery, turnaround, restructuring and insolvency.